There are two big music concerts coming up at the Villa next week, OMD on Tuesday and Jake Bugg on Thursday.

The latter, which is already sold out, features the talents of the singer songwriter on his solo acoustic world tour.

Nottingham-born Bugg started playing guitar at the age of 12 after being introduced to the instrument by his uncle Mark.

He was enrolled in a music technology course but, by the age of 16, he had dropped out and was writing and performing his own songs.

He credits hearing Don McLean’s Vincent (Starry, Starry Night) on an episode of The Simpsons as his formative musical influence.

Other influences are Oasis, Donovan, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, Johnny Cash, Jimmy Page and the Everly Brothers.

In an interview with Absolute Radio in 2014 he also mentioned that the American heavy metal band Metallica had been a huge influence on him when he first picked up the guitar as a 12-year-old.

His precocious talent was recognised when he was selected to perform on the BBC Introducing stage at the 2011 Glastonbury Festival at the age of 17, after submitting material to their website.

He subsequently signed to Mercury Records and his songs were then placed on various BBC radio playlists, with Country Song being used in a national TV beer commercial.

Last September he released his fourth studio album titled Hearts That Strain and has been following this up with his solo acoustic world tour which also takes in venues including Douglas, Glasgow and Manchester and which will also take him as far afield as Switzerland and Australia later this year.

Music veterans OMD (Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark) are also currently on a world tour and will be heading to the USA and Canada next month.

The band was formed in Wirral, Merseyside, in 1978 by co-founders Andy McCluskey (vocals, bass guitar) and Paul Humphreys (keyboards, vocals).

OMD released their influential debut single, Electricity, in 1979, and gained popularity throughout Europe with the 1980 anti-war song Enola Gay.

The band achieved broader recognition via their album Architecture & Morality (1981) and its three singles, all of which were international hits.

Once described as ’musical innovators’, OMD were pioneers of synth-pop during the 80s.

The BBC once wrote that ’OMD were always more intellectual than contemporaries like Duran Duran and the Eurythmics. The band rejected celebrity status and strove ’to have no image’.

At one point in 1996, McCluskey even retired the OMD name due to waning interest and decided to focus on songwriting for such Liverpool based acts as Atomic Kitten and The Genie Queen, and on trying to develop new Merseyside artists from his Motor Museum recording studio.

In January 2006, Andy McCluskey announced plans to reform OMD with Humphreys and Cooper. The original plan was to tour the album Architecture & Morality and other pre-1983 material, then record a new album set for release in 2007.

More recently, OMD collaborated with Gary Barlow, Taron Egerton and Hugh Jackman on the song Thrill Me, co-written by Barlow and McCluskey for the soundtrack of the film Eddie the Eagle. In September last year, they released their 13th studio album The Punishment of Luxury.

Tickets are available for the OMD concert at www.villagaiety.com

by Julie Blackburn

Twitter:@iomnewspapers