On this day, 8 February 1991, alternative pop band The Dream Academy played Cardiff University on their A Different Kind Of Weather Tour.
The Dream Academy formed in 1983 when Nick Laird-Clowes met Kate St John (then of The Ravishing Beauties) at a party and asked her to join his band. The trio settled on the name The Dream Academy and shopped their demos for nearly two years.
Their work was rejected by every record label before they finally landed a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records in 1985. Along the way, they made connections with Adam Peters and Pink Floyd's David Gilmour, a friend of Laird-Clowes. Gilmour would go on to produce and/or play on two of their albums and co-write one Dream Academy song, "Twelve-Eight Angel"
The band's first single, "Life in a Northern Town" (1985), was a worldwide success and sizeable hit in the U.S., charting at No. 7 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, from an album co-produced by Gilmour.
The song also made number 15 in the UK Singles Chart. The single was dedicated to the English singer-songwriter Nick Drake. It was their only major chart success. The band's follow-up single, "The Love Parade" (1985), charted in the U.K. and the United States.
A Different Kind of Weather is the third and final studio album by the English band the Dream Academy.It was released on 15 June 1990 by Reprise and Blanco y Negro Records. The album saw the return of David Gilmour as the main producer, six years after he had produced their debut album.
The album failed to enter the charts, despite the band performing their first and only tour of the United Kingdom to promote its release, in 1991.
