[continued from last post]

GENERAL PUBLIC

Another of my several musical deficits to be addressed by this show was my failure to see Dave Wakeling sing in person! My brightest flame burned for all three Beat albums, but he actually had bigger US Top 30 hits with his follow up band, General Public. So no matter how beloved The [English] Beat were in The States, getting behind the General Public name actually carried more weight here. Giving this outing some reasonable heft.

Beyond all commercial concerns, the fact remained that Wakeling was a gifted vocalist with some of the best male vocalizing this side of Billy MacKenzie. After hearing him sing the lead on “I Confess” I’d have followed him anywhere! Unfortunately, this evening, he was all but inaudible on the opening “Hot You’re Cool,” down to the vagaries of the mixing. Which was a shame since his large six piece band really filled up the venue with style to spare. After the song someone in the front row yelled” we can’t here you” and Dave responded that he had just sung his heart out, which I don’t doubt for a second.

Fortunately, the mix improved to normality for the following, “bubbling under” hit “Never You Done That.” At least Wakeling’s voice was reaching ears now. One of the band’s most successful songs was in my Record Cell on the “must have” soundtrack for the egregious “Threesome” film. I enjoyed their cover of The Staple Singers hit from my youth, “I’ll Take You There” as it was a loving take on a soul classic given a Caribbean splash of toasting on the record by Ranking Roger [R.I.P.] and here live by Dave’s backing vocalist/toaster who hailed from Charlotte, North Carolina. Then they capped off a vibrant set with the hit “Tenderness.” Now I really need to see one of Dave’s “English Beat” shows he mounts all over The States…just not where I live.

BIG COUNTRY

The penultimate band in the lineup were the resounding Rock of Big Country. I’ll admit that I could not get into the band in the 80 owing to the tendency for singer guitarist Stuart Adamson to strain his vocals in his delivery. Though I was a Skids fan, I could not follow him to Big Country due to that factor. I got parasympathetic discomfort listening to him sing. But that would not be a problem this evening. They opened with the debut single “Harvest Home,” and I marveled at how closely singer Simon Hough came to Adamson’s vocal tone with one crucial difference; he was not trying to vault out of his range.

And of course the rhythm section was massive here with founding drummer and session monster Mark Brzezicki having a thrilling dialogue with bass player Gil Allen who was seriously on fire this evening! I don’t remember Tony Butler playing with such verve. Meanwhile the distinctive leads of Adamson were being served by Ken [Steeleye Span, Al Stewart] Nicol this evening.

The band moved to third album, “The Seer” for the anthemic “Look Away” and then pivoted to the pair of hits from the successful debut album that made such a big splash in 1983 with “Fields Of Fire” and the airplay classic “In A Big Country.” All of it was full on and maybe I’m an outlier here, but I’d never heard Big Country that I was able to enjoy like I had this evening.

A FLOCK OF SEAGULLS

A Flock Of Seagulls was one of the two bands here I’d seen live before. The other had been Belouis Some. It had been in the early 90s when Mike Score was living in Central Florida with local musicians filling the roster in his band playing a free downtown show. Nothing to write home about. Two years later on from that show and Score would release the fifth AFOS album, “The Light At The End Of The World” on a small label run out of fashionable Winter Park, Florida!

But that was then and this is now. Score had been on a tear in the last decade with A Flock of Seagulls having the original band re-group for an album, “Ascension,” with the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra. Then another string laden album of orchestral versions without the original band, “String Theory.” And finally in 2024, a brand new AFOS album; the first since 1995, but without the original band.

The big difference for me was that in his live band, Score had gotten Gordon Deppe of fave rave Canadian band Spoons to be his lead guitarist. A fantastic idea that I was 150% behind. We think of AFOS as a synthesizer band primarily due to keyboardist Mike Score being the anchorman and singer of the group. But without the capable Paul Reynolds at the six strings that mattered back then, it might have failed to gel for the group. In Mr. Deppe, Score now had the guitar support that was needed to get this bird aloft. And I was excited to see Deppe even as a guitar slinger since I’ll never get to see Spoons live.

And true to expectation, Deppe was slinging that guitar! They kicked off with third album single “The More You Live, The More You Love.” A good, soaring song that hit all of the upbeat AFOS marks. Then a curveball of great surprise was delivered with the title track to the brand new 2024 album “Some Dreams” getting the nod in their set! The Vapors had an even newer album just out a few months ago, but they stuck to vintage material. No such reticence on the part of Mr. Score! I will say that the new song slotted effortlessly into the band’s set.

Possibly a bigger curveball was the next song from the relatively obscure “The Light At The End Of The World” album being “Say You Love Me!” For this type of show to feature deep cuts like that instead of, let’s say, “Wishing [I Had A Photograph Of You]” took some daring, but all of this music sounded just fine together. Then the band took the night home with the double play score [pun intended] of “Space Age Love Song” and “I Ran.”

With that it was ten p.m. and time for the venue curfew. Here’s the rundown of who, what, when, and where.

JOSIE COTTON

1. He Could Be the One
2. Systematic Way
3. School Is In
4. License to Dance
5. Johnny Are You Queer?

BELOUIS SOME

1. Some People
2. Round Round
3. Imagination

THE POLECATS

1. John I’m Only Dancing
2. Jeepster
3. Make A Circuit With Me

THE ICICLE WORKS

1. Hollow Horse
2. Birds Fly (Whisper to a Scream)

PETER GODWIN

1. Emotional Disguise
2. Baby In The Mountains
3. Images Of Heaven

CHINA CRISIS

1. King In A Catholic Style
2. Arizona Sky
3. Working With Fire + Steel
4. Wishful Thinking

THE VAPORS

1. Prisoners
2. Waiting for the Weekend
3. News at Ten
4. Jimmie Jones
5. Turning Japanese

GENERAL PUBLIC

1. Hot You’re Cool
2. Never You Done That
3. I’ll Take You There
4. Tenderness

BIG COUNTRY

1. Harvest Home
2. Look Away
3. Fields of Fire
4. In a Big Country

A FLOCK OF SEAGULLS

1. The More You Live, The More You Love
2. Some Dreams
3. Say You Love Me
4. Space Age Love Song
5. I Ran

That’s an impressive 38 songs played in four and a half hours. Almost a whole Top 40 worth of New Wave tunes. This is the second “New Wave Caravan” tour that I’ve seen in as many years. I had resisted this type of show in the past largely due to there in many cases being more bands I didn’t care for as compared to must-see groups on such bills. I can’t say that was the case here. I own material by almost every act here. And to be honest, I always wanted the Polecats “Make A Circuit With Me” EP!

Also, the “treadmill of hits” format with each band getting three to five songs moves pretty briskly. So much so that even a few dud acts might be worth sitting through if enough Monk bait groups were top heavy on the bill. And this show had three artists I was extremely invested in seeing! The Vapors were a band where I needed to have all of their albums and the latest, “Wasp In In A Jar” is still sparkly fresh on my want list. I might even get it this year!

As for China Crisis, I have collected the band for 42 years and have nearly 50 releases in the Record Cell. All of the albums, the DLX RMs, and nearly every single in at least one format if not multiple. Alas, “Christian” on 12″ I’ve never found. Sure, sure. A four song set from that band was a compromise but at least it didn’t entail air travel to see them. There’s still hope that I can catch them in a full concert. And Peter Godwin was flat out a miraculous event for this fan. I didn’t care that it was only three songs. Any set with “Images Of Heaven” is worth hours of longer, lesser shows. I still can’t believe that I saw him sing with my own eyes. And he’s singing all over America.

Also the compromise of bands stripping down their lineup to the bare bones to facilitate fast breakdown between sets was another possible negative factor. But at this point in time, I have to be less picky. I’m not getting any younger and the bands in question are up to half a generation older than I am! If I want the particular New Wave Itch scratched that they represent, then I’ll have to take the bait. Especially when the shows like this one were not painfully loud with bass fracking and also featured a well-rounded diverse palette of genres.

Even with me weighing the various factors and coming down clearly on the side of this Lost 80s Live Tour, there are rumblings in the margins that suggest that this type of retro tour approach may not last forever. Three dates in Roanoke, Virginia, Macon, Georgia, and San Antonio, Texas were cancelled. Roanoke was just two hours away from the Cary show that I saw and the Roanoke show was added after the Cary tickets were already on sale. So perhaps the Roanoke audience had already bought into the Cary show.

And with this lineup, I can see it going over well in Atlanta, Georgia. I was shocked to see it popping up 90 minutes away in Macon. Atlanta music fans might not be so into overnighting in sleepier Macon whereas I can certainly see all 50 Macon fans of this tour eagerly going to Atlanta for this. Just ask me. I’ve gone to Atlanta from Orlando and Asheville for shows for the last 40 years. Maybe the right venues were not available so they took a gamble.

Still, The Lost 80s Live Tour has been going for 23 years now. That counts for something. Especially when this year’s second Totally Tubular Fest was cancelled fully. Maybe the days of having punters line up for a greatest hits approach is getting tired? We did note the inveterate 80s fest band Wang Chung who have a few Lost 80s Tours under their belts opted this year to weigh in with Rick Springfield, who has his own 80s fest happening but with half the number of bands. Apart from The Chung, no one I’d want to see though. [since you asked: Rick Springfield, John Waite, John Cafferty, Paul Young] But maybe the days of mini sets are numbered? I’ve now enjoyed two retro festival tours and my biggest gripe, apart from the mix issues that some of the bands were plagued with in Cary was the fact that women were pretty scarce on the stage at both shows. Whatever happens going forward, can we not have more female artists involved?

The Lene Lovich/DEVO/B-52’s tour isn’t huge but the two headliners will surely do full sets of 75-90 minutes, and La Lovich might hopefully get more than four songs. And I just bought tickets for a pair of very different legacy acts plus opener that follows the same format of just three bands. The only thing that I can endorse fully is that if any of these entertainment choices appeal to you then my advice is to go all in and shoot for a good time. Besides, when will Peter Godwin be gracing American stages again any time soon?! Here’s the rest of the tour dates where there may be seats for you available. Note that the August 28 Toyota Arena date in Ontario has moved to The Grove in Anaheim, CA on the 22nd.

REMAINING “LOST 80S LIVE” DATES

• Aug. 14 | Saenger Theatre | New Orleans, LA
• Aug. 15 | Smart Financial Centre | Sugar Land, TX
• Aug. 17 | The Pavilion at Toyota Music Factory | Irving, TX
• Aug. 20 | Arizona Financial Theatre | Phoenix, AZ
• Aug. 21 | Cal Coast Credit Union Amphitheater | San Diego, CA
• Aug. 22 | The Grove | Anaheim, CA
• Aug. 24 | The Greek Theatre | Los Angeles, CA
• Aug. 29 | Vina Robles Amphitheater | Paso Robles, CA
• Aug. 30 | Mountain Winery Concerts | Saratoga, CA
• Aug. 31 | The Venue At Thunder Alley Casino Resort | Lincoln, CA

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