FLAMBOYANT retro soul songstress Paloma Faith is making a habit of playing North Yorkshire shows.

After sold-out rabble-rousing performances at York Barbican in February 2012 and for the Forestry Commission's Forest Live series at Dalby Forest last June, she has booked into the Barbican again for Saturday, November 1. Tickets go on sale at £29.50 at 9am tomorrow for this York return, plus Hull City Hall on October 31 and Leeds O2 Academy on November 2 in a Faithful weekend of Yorkshire dates.

The petite 32-year-old singer, songwriter and actress from Hackney will be promoting her third album, A Perfect Contradiction, which shot to number two on its release last month and is still perched in the top ten with its pastiche of Sixties and Seventies soul, disco and R&B and upbeat Eighties pop. A new single in the Dusty Springfield ballad mode, Only Love Can Hurt Like This, will be issued on May 12 on RCA.

Come the autumn, it will form part of a live set that will feature hits from 2009's 500,000-selling Do You Want The Truth Or Something Beautiful? and 2012's double-platinum-selling Fall To Grace, as well as highlights from the new record.

A Perfect Contradiction features a roster of collaborative songwriters and producers, such as Pharrell Williams on first single Can’t Rely On You; Plan B for Other Woman; Raphael Saadiq for Mouth To Mouth and Love Only Leaves You Lonely, John Legend and Mr Hudson on Take Me and Stuart Matthewman for Taste My Own Tears and the album-closing It's Not The Knowing.

Most of the collaborators actively courted Paloma, not least Williams approaching her at the Met Ball, as well as the queen of the ready-made anthem, Diane Warren, repeatedly calling to ask Paloma to listen to a song she had written with her in mind, the aforementioned single Only Love Can Hurt Like This.

A Perfect Contradiction marks a change in sound for Paloma. “Its tone is the very opposite of what the last album was," she says. "There are a couple of melancholy moments, sure, but it’s much more a ‘if it’s all gone to s***, let’s have a dance’ kind of record.”

She wrote much of the album while living in New York last year, completing the recording process between NYC, Miami, Los Angeles and London. Inspiration came not only from the older sounds she has always adored, but also from Eryka Badu, Jill Scott, The Fugees and N.E.R.D, and another benchmark was Candi Staton’s Young Hearts Run Free, a song where the lyrics speak of sadness, but Staton's delivery leaves you feeling empowered.

"I’ve been reflecting on things that have been tough, but I’m almost celebrating that," says Paloma. "If you haven’t been to the bottom, you wouldn’t be able to recognise how it feels to feel really amazing after all."

Tickets for York can be booked on 0844 854 2757 or at yorkbarbican.co.uk; Hull, 01482 300300 or hullcc.gov.uk/hullcityhall; Leeds, 0844 811 0051 and 0844 826 2826 or gigsandtours.com and ticketmaster.co.uk