Cat Stevens Announces Memoir Tour with Exclusive Beacon Theatre Show
Hold your incense sticks: Cat Stevens is back—this time with a memoir tour and a Beacon Theatre comeback no one’s been clamoring for. In a move that’ll thrill die-hard hippie revivalists and confuse everyone else, the 76-year-old folk icon (née Steven Demetre Georgiou) has teamed up with HarperCollins for “Peace Train: My Journey,” a 320-page deep dive into his ’70s heyday, conversion to Islam, and awkward reunions with former bandmates. Preorder went live June 1, promising priority tickets and a signed bookplate if you cough up the extra cash—a tactic Rolling Stone calls “vintage rock n’ roll marketing” and People Magazine labels “a nostalgia-fueled cash grab.”
The real spectacle, of course, is the accompanying tour, hitting five major U.S. cities this fall, including New York’s famed Beacon Theatre on October 15. Tickets drop via Ticketmaster on June 15 with prices ranging from a modest $75 lawn seat to a wallet-emptying $500 VIP package (you get a meet-and-greet plus a tote bag ironically printed with the words “Goodbye George Harrison”). Insiders tell Billboard that demand is “niche but intense,” especially among fans eager to glimpse the man who once protested fame by disappearing to a desert monastery. Want front-row access? Better set your alarms—sales start at 10 a.m. ET sharp, and scalpers are already salivating.
Cats Stevens buffs will feast on anecdotes about studio misfires, spiritual awakenings in the Sahara, and the real story behind “Morning Has Broken”—no, you won’t learn how to play it in five minutes flat. And don’t expect any earth-shattering confessions; interviews in The Guardian suggest the memoir is more “reflective diary” than tell-all exposé. Despite that, the tour is pitched as a hybrid event: half reading, half acoustic set, half Q&A—oh, who are we kidding? Organizers claim it’s an “intimate experience,” but at $200 a pop, “intimate” feels more like “affordable luxury.”
Sure, some fans have already started a “Bring Back Cat Stevens” petition for bigger venues, but others warn this is peak nostalgia syndrome—like wearing bell-bottoms to your Zoom call. Yet here we are, ready to line up for our paperback keepsake and overpriced bottle of water. If pop-folk’s reluctant prophet wants to monetize his memoir impulses, who are we to stop him?
And there you have it—another celebrity book tour set to stir exactly the level of excitement you’d expect. Nothing shocking here, folks. Let’s all act surprised.
Sources: Celebrity Storm and People Magazine, Rolling Stone, Official Yusuf/Cat Stevens Website, Ticketmaster
Attribution: Creative Commons Licensed
