electropop · synth-pop
Empire of the Sun
Luke Steele and Nick Littlemore’s costumed electro-pop empire — back after eight years with Ask That God.
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Hometown
Sydney
Formed
2007
Genre
electropop
Upcoming
12 shows
About
Empire of the Sun is Luke Steele (once of The Sleepy Jackson) and Nick Littlemore (of PNAU), who met in Sydney and in 2008 released Walking on a Dream, the record whose title track became one of the most-played Australian songs of its era. Steele performs as the Emperor, in headdress and paint; Littlemore mostly stays in the studio. Asked about breaking character he said: “The biggest spectacle would be coming out in shorts with no make-up.” The fourth album, Ask That God (2024), took eight years. Littlemore’s account is blunt: “We have had tension in the past, because we’ve always wanted to make the greatest thing.” What brought them back was grief — a fan who “went into the hospital and didn’t make it” — and the songs that came of it are about mortality without being mournful. “You don’t go into sad moments to create another sad moment,” Littlemore said. “You want to lift yourself up.” The 2026 North American run is billed Ask That God: Afterlife — thirty dates from Red Rocks on 11 August to Las Vegas on 9 October, with Polo & Pan and Midnight Generation opening throughout.
You asked, the internet answered
Frequently Googled
Why was there an eight-year gap before Ask That God?
Partly other lives — Littlemore rebuilt PNAU into a hit machine, Steele reunited The Sleepy Jackson and worked with Daniel Johns — and partly, by their own admission, friction. “We have had tension in the past, because we’ve always wanted to make the greatest thing,” Littlemore told the ABC. The pandemic forced a full stop (“we had to turn all of the computers off”), and the death of a fan they knew gave them something they needed to write about.
Who is opening for Empire of the Sun on the Afterlife tour?
Polo & Pan, the French electronic duo, and Midnight Generation — on every headline date of the 2026 North American run.
Does Luke Steele still wear the costume?
Yes. The Emperor headdress and face paint have been the show since 2008, and Steele has joked that the only way left to shock anyone would be “coming out in shorts with no make-up”. Littlemore’s line on it: “Empire of the Sun came through into a kingdom.”
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On stage