When Kev Met Bob: Local legends join forces for first joint national tour

Jebediah frontman Kevin Mitchell will team up with his own alter ego Bob Evans for their first ever joint tour. The When Kev Met Bob national anthology concert tour includes nine dates across Australia, with a hometown Perth show at Milk Bar on Friday, October 20.

A veritable time machine of classic compositions and crowd favourites, When Kev Met Bob will see Kevin Mitchell and his sharper-dressed mate, Bob Evans, join forces for an evening of music which encompasses almost 30 years. Beginning in Kevin Mitchell (and Bob’s) adopted home of Melbourne on Friday, September 29, the tour also includes shows in Daylesford, Archie’s Creek, Adelaide, Newcastle, Sydney, Brisbane, and Cairns.

While Kevin Mitchell plucks from the storied Jebediah discography of the ‘90s until the present day, Bob will keep things a little more contemporary, offering up songs from his six-album catalogue from the last 20 years.

The upcoming tour is a true first for Kevin Mitchell, with his near-30 years spent as the frontman of Jebediah having been kept separate from his work as Bob Evans, ever since the latter first appeared on the scene in the late ‘90s.

“It’s a little scary! I haven’t really done a proper ‘tour’ in years, as my last album, Tomorrowland, came out during all the COVID lockdowns, so touring has been extremely sporadic ever since,” said Kevin Mitchell. “This is a show I have always had in the back of my mind though. I have always just kind of been sitting on it and waiting until it felt right to do so. For nearly 30 years I have kept my solo music and my Jebediah music separate, and that has been a very deliberate decision that was also an important one to me. I think I have reached the point now however where that separation has done its job. So I suppose it feels a little freeing and exciting to step into a new phase now; The Kevin Evans years!”

First forming Jebediah as a teenager, Kevin Mitchell’s songs became radio staples, and his albums became chart mainstays in a matter of years. By the time Jebediah released their second album, Of Someday Shambles in 1999, Kevin Mitchell was looking to spread his wings a little bit and explore a different musical direction. Thus, Bob Evans was born.

Removing the endearing alt-rock fuzz that characterised Jebediah, the Bob Evans sound was more acoustic, and folk-oriented, with debut album Suburban Kid arriving in 2003. Even while his main band took some time off from recording new albums, Bob kept the home fires burning, with his sixth album, Tomorrowland, arriving just two years ago.

“For me, personally, I think it will just be nice to finally present all this music I have written on one stage,” said Kevin Mitchell. “There’s a lot there when you combine it all together, and it’s very much my adult life laid bare in song. The earliest songs I’ll be playing were written when I was 17, and the most recent are from my early 40s.”

With decades of musical experience, the upcoming When Kev Met Bob tour is set to be a celebration of one of the country’s finest songwriters and performers in a truly unique format. For Kevin Mitchell though, it’s another opportunity to do what he’s consistently loved doing for almost 30 years.

“I really think it’s quite simple, there’s no trick to it,” he said. “I still love it and haven’t quit. I suppose that begs the question why. My motivations in the very beginning were always just based around satisfying my own happiness and not really about achieving any sort of tangible markers of success.  So my love for it has never been reliant on anything else so it’s never gone away.”

The When Kev Met Bob tour hits Milk Bar on Friday, October 20, 2023. For more info and to buy tickets, head to milkbar.oztix.com.au