The Alarm’s Mike Peters is ready for a new chapter in his life. For the past year, the frontman suffered hospital visits, chemo treatments, and life-threatening pneumonia brought on the lapse of his leukemia.
Peters’ time in convalescence was not spent idly; with his guitar and an IV stuck in each arm, performing for the hardworking hospital staff keeping him alive, Peters wrote the latest Alarm single “Next”. At the time, he had no idea what was next for himself – he had a lung filled with blood and no one was sure if he would make it.
“It wasn’t planned, but once the realization hit me that I would be in the hospital for a long time, I knew I needed my guitar to break the monotony of the isolation,” Peters explained. “Being able to play music to myself kept me going, and I’m convinced that it helped me make the transition back to life.”
Peters directly addressed his health scare by filming the “Next” video in hospital corridors. “I wanted to film something that captured the elation of knowing you are going home, moving on, going forwards ready for what lies ahead, for what’s next,” he says. “At night and in between IV sessions, I would walk the very same empty hospital corridors of the North Wales Cancer Centre, trying to preserve whatever human strength I could hang on to.”
The high contrast black and white DIY video opens with an announcement that he has reached “the beginning of a new road,” and Peters bursts through the halls, miraculously resurrected for the next phase of human existence. The halls of the North Wales Cancer Centre are surreally empty, a veritable Lynchian waiting room of the soul. With this exuberant tune, Peters embraces what’s to come in this joyful tune about celebrating love and life. We’re happy – and ready – for what’s next.
The Alarm has been helmed for over 40 years by Mike Peters. With twenty-three studio albums, over five million albums sold, and 17 Top 50 UK singles, including 1983’s Sixty-Eight Guns, Peters and The Alarm have created a dedicated fanbase. Having battled various forms of cancer for multiple decades now, Peters has dedicated much of his time to services for cancer care. In 2005, Peters co-founded the Love Hope Strength Foundation with fellow leukemia patient James Chippendale. Peters, who hails from Wales, was then appointed Deputy Lieutenant of Clwyd in December 2008. and appointed an MBE in 2019 for this important work.
Once Peters recovered from this round of illness, The Alarm made a triumphant return to the stage with the sold-out annual event The Gathering, which had been suspended in recent years due to the pandemic. More than 1,500 fans attended The Gathering. “People traveled from Seattle, Los Angeles, New York, USA, Australia, all over Europe and from various parts of the United Kingdom,” he said in an interview. “The weekend has been the ultimate tonic for me. I’m back. The future has opened wide again for me.”
Reflecting on the past year and the promise of new music and live shows (the band plays two shows at New York City’s Gramercy Theater in June 2023), Peters adds, “I literally focused my entire being on being able to walk out of the hospital on my own two feet and not in a wheelchair or with assistance. It’s what kept me positive and determined to regain a complete recovery.”
“Next” is now available to stream and for purchase on all DSPs.
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