Polydor/Republic Records is proud to announce that legendary Who frontman Roger Daltrey is returning on June 1, 2018 with a brand new solo studio album, As Long As I Have You. (The SoundBard is proud to announce it too.)

As Long As I Have You was produced by Dave Eringa — known for having worked with Manic Street Preachers, as well as producing Wilko Johnson and Roger Daltrey’s heartfelt 2014 collaboration, Going Back Home — and it features Pete Townshend’s inimitable guitar on seven tracks, as well as guest performances from Mick Talbot on keyboards (The Style Council, Dexys Midnight Runners) and Sean Genockey on lead guitar (Suede, Shame, The Proclaimers).

Says Daltrey, “This is a return to the very beginning, to the time before Pete started writing our songs, to a time when we were a teenage band playing soul music to small crowds in church halls.” Adds Townshend, “It shows Roger at the height of his powers as a vocalist.”

You can pre-order As Long As I Have You here, and listen to the title track right here:

Work on As Long As I Have You commenced shortly after the aforementioned, Top 5, gold-selling Going Back Home was released, and it continued during breaks on The Who’s record-breaking 50th anniversary tour, The Who Hits 50 (a tour The SoundBard saw, heard, and very much loved on March 19, 2016, at The Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey).

Daltrey sings with the voice of experience.

The album is a mixture of self-penned tracks such as “Certified Rose” and the soulful ballad “Always Heading Home,” along with songs that have inspired Daltrey over the years, including Nick Cave’s “Into My Arms,” Stevie Wonder’s “You Haven’t Done Nothing,” Stephen Stills’ “How Far,” and the title track, originally recorded by Garnet Mimms in 1964 — the same year Daltrey, Townshend, John Entwistle, and Keith Moon changed their name from The High Numbers to became The Who.

Daltrey notes that the passing of time has actually made his interpretation of this material that much better. “And now, I can sing soul with all the experience you need to sing it. Life puts the soul in,” he observes. “I’ve always sung from the heart, but when you’re 19, you haven’t had the life experience with all its emotional trials and traumas that you have by the time you get to my age. You carry all the emotional bruises of life and when you sing these songs, those emotions are in your voice. You feel the pain of a lost love. You feel it and you sing it, and that’s soul. For a long time, I’ve wanted to return to the simplicity of these songs, to show people my voice, a voice they won’t have heard before. It felt like the right time. It’s where I am, looking back to that time, looking across all those years but also being here, now, in the soulful moment.”

Daltrey will be headlining the Royal Albert Hall on March 22, 2018 in aid of The Teenage Cancer Trust. He’s also set to perform a series of concerts this June and July, featuring The Who’s Tommy. Daltrey will be accompanied by members of The Who’s touring band, plus some of the best orchestras in the United States at some of the most prestigious venues in America. You can see all of the dates and locales for that tour here.