TICKETS go on general sale today for soul singer Adele’s concert at the Leeds 02 Academy on April 14, one of seven dates that month to promote her second album, 21.

Released on January 24, the album was recorded in Malibu with legendary Johnny Cash producer Rick Rubin and back home in London in Kensal Rise with Paul Epworth, who has helmed albums by Plan B, Bloc Party and Florence + The Machine.

“Wanda Jackson, Yvonne Fair, Andrew Bird, Mary J Blige, Mos Def, Elbow, Tom Waits and Kanye West, amongst others, were influences on 21,” says Adele, who burst on to the British music scene in January 2008 when Chasing Pavements entered the charts at number two.

The new album, the follow-up to 2008’s 19, has “taken a while and it knocked me for six when writing it”, says Adele. “It’s different from 19; it’s about the same things but in a different light. I deal with things differently now.

“I’m more patient, more honest, more forgiving and more aware of my own flaws, habits and principles. Something that comes with age I think. So fittingly this record is called 21.

“The whole reason I called my first album 19 was about cataloguing what happened to me then and who I was then; like a photo album, you see the progression and changes in a person throughout the years.”

The album release will be preceded by the single Rolling In The Deep, out on XL Recordings on Sunday, January 16 – yes, a Sunday, rather than the traditional Monday.

“It’s a dark, bluesy gospel disco tune”, reveals Adele.