The '80s Are Alive

2008 seems to be the year that the '80s come back to life, at least for me.

There are always the 'nostalgia' tours, like the Here & Now Tour, which I don't object to in principle but most of the artists aren't favourites of mine so I'm not going. This year's tour features Rick Astley, Johnny Hates Jazz, Curiosity Killed The Cat, Paul Young and Cutting Crew, none of which I care for, although I'd love to see Bananarama and ABC who are also on the bill. I saw the 'Nanas doing a promo gig in support of Scissor Sisters a couple of years ago and they were daft as ever. So, no, I don't mind missing these folks for their 15 minutes sets doing their hits.

Of far greater interest is the Yazoo reunion with their remastered albums, 'In Your Room' boxset at the end of May and 'Reconnected' tour in June. I'm seeing them at Hammersmith and looking forward to it. I like Alison Moyet and saw her at the Royal Albert Hall five years ago but I've never really got on with Erasure.

A couple of days later I'm seeing Gang Of Four and Tom Tom Club at the Royal Festival Hall as part of Massive Attack's Meltdown season. I'm not too fussed about GoF but the Tom Toms will be great. I saw them a few years ago at a New York punk thing celebrating CBGBs at the Great Eastern Hotel and they were fab, Tina's bass forcing us all to bounce. It was a wierd affair full of young city kids and meedja types pretending to be punks and, in a crowded corridor, it was great to see Tina walk up to Dawn Right Nasty and give her a big hug with all the youngsters oblivious to who Tina was. During the gig I managed to liberate Tina's knickers for Dawn's trophy cabinet (it's a long story).

In July it's time to explore the Funplex with the marvellous B-52's. I've mentioned their new album a few times recently and it really is good. They're playing the Roundhouse which is as good as anywhere else for them to strut their stuff. I suspect it'll be a mix of promoting the new album and reliving the hits and that sounds good to me.

At the end of the year, there's the Steel City Tour in December. That is, of course, a reference to Sheffield and that means the Human League, ABC and Heaven 17, united for an evening of electronica and pure pop. Thanks to David for pointing this out in his blog.

The Human League need no introduction and one of the highlights of last year was seeing them perform their classic album, 'Dare', live at Hammersmith. Their last album of original material was six years ago but I'm just getting into it and their '90s albums now.

ABC have just released their first 'new' album in ten years, 'Traffic', and it is excellent, full of classic pop songs, catchy tunes and the full-on production values you'd expect from ABC. Obviously timed to coincide with them being on the Here & Now Tour, but I hope we get to hear quite a few of the new songs on the Steel City Tour when they'll have more time on stage.

Heaven 17 had the great hit, 'Temptation' but, from memory, that's about it. They're very much the junior partners on the tour from my perspective but should be fun nonetheless.

And, of course, other 80s greats are still releasing new music and touring, and have done so for years. Janet Jackson's 'Discipline' came out a few months ago, Madonna's 'Hard Candy' was released a few weeks ago and the Pet Shop Boys have recorded a great version of Madness's, 'My Girl' which deserves to be released as a single (take a listen on the PSB website).

Phew. What next, I wonder?