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Tickets on sale Friday, December 19, 2025 at 10 AM CT via theorionhuntsville.comApollo South Opens: 5 PM
Doors Open: 6:30 PM
Show Starts: 7:30 PM
Rob Thomas still pushes himself to progress as both a performer and a songwriter. Even after achieving sales of 80 million records worldwide between his solo output, Matchbox Twenty, and various collaborations, generating billions of streams, and entertaining millions of fans on the road, a restless burst of inspiration unflinchingly drives him to create. It’s the same spirit that has cemented him as a generational artist. On his sixth full-length solo album All Night Days, he continues to pen honest songs about life and love that always seem to hit you at the right moment when you need them the most.
“Dude, I’m just a fucking middle-aged dad who’s still trying to write the perfect song,” he laughs. “At the core of it, my wife, son, and family are more important than anything, but music helps me get through life. I don’t have a hobby. This is what calms me. This is what gets me excited. This is where everything goes to. I don’t feel much differently mentally than I did at 30. I love it as much as ever.”
That passion has defined his expansive catalog. Beyond Matchbox Twenty smashes such as “Push,” “3AM,” “If You’re Gone,” “Bent,” and more, he has delivered a series of solo hits, including “Lonely No More,” “This Is How A Heart Breaks,” and “Street Corner Symphony.” He elevated into the stratosphere alongside Santana on “Smooth,” which garnered three GRAMMY® Awards and went triple-platinum. As a solo artist, Rob has notched three consecutive Top 10 entries on the Billboard 200, beginning with his now-classic double-platinum #1 debut album …Something To Be. Most recently, 2019’s Chip Tooth Smile bowed in the Top 15. Plus, it incited the applause of Rolling Stone, Billboard, Good Morning America, and ABC’s Nightline who professed, “No matter your age group or musical taste – or whether you even realize it – you’re probably familiar with Rob Thomas’ music.” He stands out as the first artist to receive the Songwriter Hall of Fame’s coveted “Hal David Starlight Award” in addition to garnering numerous BMI and ASCAP Awards. Giving back at every turn, he also notably co-founded the Sidewalk Angels Foundation alongside his wife Marisol Thomas.
Starting in 2020, he carefully assembled what would become All Night Days with co-producer Gregg Wattenberg [John Legend, Goo Goo Dolls]. This time around, he took a different approach, building out the album over a few years instead of crafting it in one shot.
“It’s funny, because I didn’t set out to make a ‘record’ like I normally would,” he affirms. “Instead of sitting down and just doing the whole thing alone, I got to take my time. It’s truly a collection of the best eleven songs I’ve written since Chip Tooth Smile.”
Fittingly, he introduces the record with the sunny and swaggering “Hard To Be Happy.” Buoyant piano accompanies his upbeat delivery boosted by a bright bounce and slick guitar. It sways towards an instantly chantable chorus, “‘Cause I don’t know why. Some tears get hold of me. Sometimes it’s hard to just be happy.”
“I wanted to write a song that felt happy,” he says. “More than ever, we live in a time where personal and mental wellness can become a focus in your life. For that to happen, it needs to be acceptable to say, ‘I’m not happy right now; I don’t feel comfortable in my own skin’. The song itself is very no-filler. It shows, ‘It’s alright to be unhappy,’ but it’s wrapped up in a happy tune. The message is, ‘I’m going to be fine, but leave me alone for this second’.”
Harmonies give way to claps and shimmering keys on “Hand In My Hand.” It culminates on a reassuring refrain, “Put your hand in my hand, lay your head on my shoulder, and feel just a little bit more.”
“We’re in a weird place,” he notes. “If you talk about compassion, caring, and wanting to love your fellow man, it’s perceived as a ‘political’ move. I’m simply saying, ‘We’re all on this planet together. We’re all brothers and sisters’. If we all made a little effort to see other as the children we once were, everything would be fine. Let’s take a moment, connect in a human way, and feel a little more. Even if things seem fucked up, it’s going to be alright.”
The title track “All Night Days” revolves around a magnetic riff uplifted by a head-nodding groove. It stretches towards a climactic chorus as Rob proclaims, “I know I’m just a little bit drunk right now. I’ve never felt like this. I wish I could be wild and just for a little while.” The arena-ready guitar solo only amplifies the energy.
“Someone said to me, ‘Remember when we used to stay out all night?’,” he recalls. “I replied, ‘I think my ‘All Night Days’ are over’. I believe everybody should make a bad decision here and there, because that’s what makes life worth living. Personally, I have a hard time reigning it in though, so I don’t know what it’s like to be wild for only a little while! That song is special. Musically, we're trying to present these songs in a new way with vitality. There are artists that are out right now that I really love and every time I would write something that felt too much like one of them I would auto correct. I didn't want to sound like anyone else. I wanted to sound like me. I made a Rob Thomas record.”
Guitar tiptoes around whistling and finger-snaps on the raucous “Machine.” Flaunting his high register, it kicks into high gear on the horn-laden hook, “I guarantee I’m in control. I’m a machine.” He goes on, “It makes me picture a dad in Whole Foods on a mission with his kids in the shopping cart!”
Elsewhere, he notably co-wrote “I Believe It” with his Matchbox Twenty bandmates Paul Doucette, Kyle Cook, and Brian Yale. “We’ve been kicking around the song for a while,” he notes. “It naturally fit what I was doing, and the guys were cool with it.”
All Night Days concludes with the heartfelt exhale of “Back to The Start.” Over plaintive acoustic guitar, he reminds, “Life starts turning sideways and the whole thing falls apart, but if you feel like second chances, when you come to the end, we can always go back to the start.”
“My wife and I have been together for 27 years,” he elaborates. “I’ll never forget when she first met up with me. I came up from Florida, and I was so stoked to be in New York City with this model who lived in Queens. There is so much that happens over the course of a lifetime. You’ll be sitting there in your worst time, and somebody will say, ‘Remember that place we were at’. These memories can reignite a new beginning even if it feels like the end.”
Coming full circle, Rob’s son Maison actually recorded tracks for a handful of songs. “Maison went to Berklee College of Music, and he has his own band,” he goes on. “He’s really put in the work. It’s really cool to have him on the record. If it’s nepotism, it was earned.”
In the end, Rob is still making the kinds of songs that last forever.
“I hope you see yourself in my music,” he concludes. “The great songs I listen to are the ones where I’m the hero of the story in my head—even if I don’t know the writer. There are a lot of ‘Saturday Night’ and ‘Sunday Morning’ songs on All Night Days. Maybe one of these tunes becomes a part of your life. I’m going to keep writing no matter what.”
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701 Amphitheater Drive NW, Huntsville, AL, United States, Alabama 35806
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