Legendary rock band coming to Alabama in 2024, ready to play classic hits

Heart has announced some new dates for its 2024 “Royal Flush Tour,” including a stop in Alabama.

The classic rock band led by Ann Wilson and Nancy Wilson is set to perform on Nov. 13 at the Legacy Arena at the BJCC in Birmingham. And here’s a bonus for Led Zeppelin fans: Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening will open the 8 p.m. show.

Tickets go on sale to the general public on Friday, April 5, at 10 a.m. CT via Ticketmaster. Prices haven’t been announced by promoter AEG Live. A round of pre-sales is underway, and will run through Thursday, April 4, at 10 p.m. CT.

Heart — famed for 1970s and ‘80s hits such as “Magic Man,” ‘Crazy on You,” “Barracuda,” “These Dreams,” “Alone,” What About Love” and more — has an extensive agenda this year, traveling on what a publicist said is the band’s first tour in five years.

The tour includes more than 80 shows, starting on April 20 in Greenville, South Carolina, and ending on Dec. 15 in Las Vegas, Nevada. About 30 new dates were announced this week, including the show in Birmingham. Heart plans to travel across the United States, head to Canada and perform in European cities such as London, Berlin and Helsinki.

Cheap Trick is scheduled as the opening act for most dates on Heart’s tour; Jason Bonham or Bachman-Turner Overdrive will step into that spot for some shows, depending on the city.

Audience members can expect Heart to play some of its greatest hits on the tour, a press release says, pointing to “Magic Man”, “Barracuda”, “Crazy on You” and “These Dreams.” Setlists for Heart in December 2023 also include “Alone,” “What About Love,” “Straight On,” “Little Queen” and a couple of Led Zeppelin covers. (Ann and Nancy Wilson famously covered “Stairway to Heaven” at the Kennedy Center Honors event in 2012, with Jason Bonham on drums. He’s the son of the late John Bonham, the founding drummer of Led Zeppelin.)

Heart has 15 studio albums to its credit, 1975-2016, including blockbuster records such as “Dreamboat Annie” (1975), “Magazine” (1977), “Little Queen” (1977), “Dog and Butterfly” (1978), “Heart” (1985) and “Bad Animals” (1987).

Nancy Wilson, left, and Ann Wilson of Heart performed at the Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre in Chicago on Thursday, July 11, 2019.(Photo by Rob Grabowski/Invision/AP)

Lead singer Ann Wilson, 73, and guitarist Nancy Wilson, 70, are best known as the prime movers of Heart, although both have pursued solo projects over the years. Ann Wilson, for example, recorded much of her 2022 album, “Fierce Bliss,” at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals.

READ: Ann Wilson talks Heart, new Muscle Shoals album, Led Zeppelin

Heart is a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, inducted in 2013 by Chris Cornell. “The first female-fronted hard rock band, Heart proved women can rock with the best of them,” the Rock Hall’s website says. “Heart’s mix of hard rock and folk yielded one of the longest lasting and most commercially successful bands of all time.”

Heart has a history of performances in Alabama that includes an October 1977 date at Boutwell Auditorium in Birmingham and a March 1986 show at the Von Braun Center in Huntsville and an August 2019 concert at Oak Mountain Amphitheatre in Pelham.