Reunion Tour Rules of Thumb: Toxicity in Motion
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One of the Trusteds - Augusts1, to be precise - tendered the news that the raving loonies/house-funk-soul-rockers of Happy Mondays - standard-bearers of the Madchester sound that sprung up in Manchester, England during the late '80s - were reuniting and sharing a U.S. tour with another reconstituted U.K. group, new-wave fave the Psychedelic Furs. Two bands I followed and enjoyed on their initial go-round are coming back, together, to play a series of concerts, and I am singularly uninterested.
Consider the '80s nostalgia being plied by a show featuring versions of A Flock of Seagulls, Dramarama, When in Rome, and Gene Loves Jezebel - a bill that played the House of Blues in Hollywood this past weekend. The hairspray alone could choke an unsuspecting soul.
I've long railed against supposedly unassailable British Invasion stalwarts/superstar bands The Who and The Rolling Stones that continue to flog their catalogue on tours despite the absence of charter members lost to death or retirement. It's all pretty weak to me.
In my Toxic Tuesday series, I normally poke fun at terrible bands and/or terrible songs. But this Tuesday, the target is a terrible idea: Reunion tours. Although there are exceptions, here are five rules of thumb as regards what are usually crass cash-grabs. They should give you a good handle on what's going down when has-been musicians take their repertoires out of mothballs, don their weaves and spandex, and hit the road.
- No new material = Definitely desperate for dough
- Crappy new material = Desperate and pathetic
- Random replacement members = Why are you insulting us?
- Original lead singer fronting hired session players = Time for a class-action suit
- Original band backing newly-adopted lead singer = You must be joking
If you can think of any other rules, you are most welcome to lay 'em out for us. And just to prove I still care, I put the vintage Psychedelic Furs' track "Here Come Cowboys" on the MOG Player - and embedded a clip of the grooving, glistening Happy Mondays number "Kinky Afro" below. They still sound super. Of course, that was then, and this is now.
Locating MOG account...
Comments (18)
Yup, that's about right. You can't make money unless you go on tour. Even if it's old tired tour. It's like karma for our favorite artists. They had it too easy at one point in time and now we're making them pay for it, shipping them from their geriatric homes to the staples center and telling them to dance.
Ha! Glad I could be the impetus for your post! I have no further rules but totally agree w/yours. And I love both the Furs & Mondays' tracks. Hadn't seen that vid for 'Afro' before, thx. Bez, Bez, Bez, ahahaha! Here's the vid for 'Cowboys'(which I hadn't seen either):
misstackett: So right. But do I want to see the shabby faded puppets dance for us again, when there are new bands out there clamoring for my attention?
August: I would've run the Furs vid, but I wanted to divvy up the coverage evenly between the two bands. Now you've gone and upset the balance. ;-)
Oh good, I was hoping that was the case, hehe!
The Furs - eh, their transgressiveness was always a bit of dress-up. But now the Mondays - those were some genuinely twisted fuckers. That could be fun, though with Shuan Ryder clean it's a tossup....
Strange way great minds work, Mike. I was just commenting to my wife that I wouldn't be all that interested in seeing Depeche Mode again, if they were ever to come our way. Now they're not reuniting, they're still going strong, but the need to keep pumping the "hits" for the older members of the audience (read: those my age or older) leaves me cold. It's a shame too, as their last two albums could make for an excellent set on their own.
As to the tour you suggested, yeah, there wil be no good to come from it, except maybe a few tenners in Shaun's pockets (hopefully not up his nose).
And let me echo August: Long live late-80's Bez. Dance, white boy, dance!
Actually I should've qualified my Bez statement with 'Bez, Bez, Bez(shaking my head no), ahahaha!'
Bands that come back together after bitter splits and suggesting that hell would have to freeze over before they ever played together or with “that guy” again, I might pay to see. I wouldn’t expect new material for those reunion dates, just the joy of knowing they were able to put differences aside and rekindle the magic at least one more time.
Kind of like what Pink Floyd did at Live 8. If the boys had toured one more time before any more deaths befell them, that would have been something to see- even with no new material. Now it’s too late.
Now, take a group like Journey- that’s a totally different side of the coin. That’s your replacement lead singer scenario- and that‘s probably more of a money grab.
I do not know if I would go see this, maybe there would be a band blow up on stage
ivy: I do think that the lure of seeing the revived Mondays is the potential for car-crash-quality hysteria.
Dale: I do believe we share a similar attitude as regards this issue. Even though I revere the great sounds of the past and still enjoy them, I crave the new. That's where the big thrills are. Thank MOG that we get steered in so many fresh directions.
MusicRX: Whereas I am skeptical of the bitter who settle their differences to reunite for a big payday. (Hmmm. Mentioning Journey on Toxic Tuesday. Coincidence? I think not.)
Rawk: Ah, the joy of mid-concert inter-band fisticuffs!
Rockers over the age of 60?
*runs away*
Ironic twist: The Human League - who are still going without ever having stopped - made more money doing an '80s package tour than they can get on their own.
So: what do you do when you were just a tad too young to see them the first time around?...cos I'm tempted. Not expecting anything comp. to the heyday, but it could be the only exposure I'd get.
And I do want to see Depeche Mode -- precisely cos the current material is damned good. Amazing thing, that.
Anna: Hey, Neil Young is 63 and he still rocks hard!
Anna: Ageist whelp!
Jonh: Not surprised. Strength in numbers. The scary thing is that I wouldn't be surprised to see audience members dressed in period costume/fashion, such as it was, at one of these "Remember the '80s" tours.
nicki: No one would want to deny anyone a little joy or harmless fun in that kind of sitch. And good new material plus original members would mean a major green-light in my book.
ZZTodd: True dat,
I try to have open ears, but my ageism closes them somewhat sometimes. However, after having become a late-onset fan of some of Police's songs thanks to dollar-LP's in the 1990's, I saw them in Oakland a few years ago and their spare, trio sound worked well in a huge arena, unlike the younger opening acts whose sound was a muddy din.
Spike: Although I still enjoy a lot of the music produced by The Police, I find that I am more inclined to listen to a few select tracks from Sting's solo output - and I'd be more inclined to see a Sting show promoting new material than a Police reunion. Then again, I saw The Police a few times in their heyday. And at least, you saw the actual trio doing it, rather than faux Popos.
Friends have raved about Sting. I've been meaning to check out what's after his first album. I missed the faux Popos, fortunately it seems. Beguiling post, as always.