Andrew W.K. Puts His Hard Partying To Good Use

Hardcore party rocker Andrew W.K. is taking his people skills and using them to entertain fans, but not in the usual concert setting he's familiar with.

The "Party Hard" singer is going on a two-week tour as a motivational speaker, promoting his message of having fun while doing what you want. The High-Way Party Cruiser Tour begins in Los Angeles on Tuesday and ends in Calgary on April 15.

"It's always been about connecting, about having this party and celebration and inviting people so they would feel loved," Andrew said in an interview with Pollstar. "The whole idea behind the tour is anyone should be able to go out under no specific pretense and just spend time together. That's taking the definition of a party down to its core, which creating the music has been heavily focused on."

W.K. got the idea to become a motivational speaker after his meet-and-greets with fans and media interviews turned into epic conversations about everything under the sun.

W.K. has become quite an in-demand speaker lately, even being invited to give a talk at New York University under the title "Andrew W.K. Talks About Whatever The Hell He Wants."

"When this lecture opportunity came up, it was exciting because it doesn't fit into what I've done," W.K. explained. "To have the confidence to go with these things, even when they seemed absurd or out of the realm of what was familiar to me, that's what was thrilling about it."

The free-form style of the lecture at NYU opened the door for other engagements, including one at the South By Southwest Music Festival in Austin, Texas last month to talk about "Pure Fun And Total Love."

W.K. is filming a reality show based on his speaking engagements called Smokeshow, and has invested in a 1,000-person nightclub in New York City. But he continues to work on music and his fourth major release, Young Lord, is expected to come out later this year.

Here are the Canadian dates for The High-Way Party Cruiser Tour:

April 5 Vancouver, BC @ The Bourbon
April 10 Winnipeg, MB @ The Collective Cabaret
April 11 Regina, SK @ Distrikt
April 12 Saskatoon, SK @ Ryly's
April 13 Red Deer, AB @ Arlington Hotel
April 14 Edmonton, AB @ Starlite Room
April 15 Calgary, AB @ Broken City