Thomas Dolby continues to reinvent the his art.

Almost indescribable

It’s easy to review most concerts. The artist appears, they play a few songs, the crowd goes wild, the artist and audience play the encore game, everyone goes home happy. Thomas Dolby’s show is not like that. Yes, there’s an encore. Yes, there’s a set list. But this wasn’t a gig, this was something else. Almost indescribable, but let’s give it a go.

First, the name of the tour; The Iconic 80s – My Personal Recollections. This is not just a trip down memory lane, it’s a full on guided tour. There aren’t that many actual Thomas Dolby songs on display and the set list, at first glance, makes this look like a retro tribute show. That rumour is quickly dispelled.

New order

This isn’t nostalgia, this is a celebration of why the 80s is so important, both musically and in a broader cultural context. The Aston Villa fans upstairs at the O2 Institute, whose cheers punctuate the reverie, probably don’t appreciate how the world they enjoy today was built on the ashes of the establishment that fell during the 80s.

Dolby references the poll tax riots, the miners strike, the threat of nuclear war. No, the 80s weren’t all dayglow leg warmers, fishnet gloves, sunshine and butterflies. The 80s were transformational and in this tour, Dolby drags the audience through that cultural revolution – a revolution which created a new order, as it were.

Complex compositions

First, though, fitting right in with the nostalgic theme and giving a gentle ease in to the synthpop onslaught that is to follow, we get Martin McAloon. The affable, warm, authentic presentation of the national treasures which are Prefab Sprout songs is both charming and compelling. We’re likely never going to see front man Paddy touring again and so it falls to Martin to carry the torch. The audience were greatly pleased by both the sentiment behind the performance and the way in which Martin has translated a set of complex compositions into something that can be played on one guitar. At times, he manages to make it sound like he’s playing two at the same time. The final word of the perfect opening to the evening came from the audience: “Albuquerque!“

With the audience suitably warmed, Thomas Dolby glides nonchalantly to the stage. With an array of synths, keyboards, sequencers, tracks and a drum pad, we hear a version of Blue Monday from New Order – a fitting platform from which to launch the show. It’s both the original song and not, at the same time, and it shows an artist who has been in the game long enough to be comfortable with both.

Dolby favourites

Amongst the original Thomas Dolby songs, we get The Flat Earth, My Brain Is Like A Sieve and Europa And The Pirate Twins. One of Our Submarines makes an early appearance together with the story of why it was created in honour of Dolby’s uncle Stephen who was lost at sea during the Second World War. The UK government kept the circumstances secret until records were declassified more recently, adding extra emotional layers to the song. This is a hallmark of the evening – stories which fill in the gaps between the music. Not just pauses in the set list, the stories make the recollections themselves more real and vivid.

He tells another story of being ‘discovered’ in his early 20s and shipped over to America to create the iconic intro to Foreigner’s Waiting For A Girl Like You. Left to his own devices in the studio, he was able to hide the fact that he could actually only play the keyboard one finger at a time. How times have changed.

Inspiring conversations

We finally find out why this tour exists, along with the purpose of the eclectic set list. Dolby teaches music composition at Johns Hopkins University where he is the head of the Peabody Conservatory’s Music for New Media program. He tells the tale of his students discovering who he is and saying that they’re really into retro music. Aside from the obvious insult to anyone who was actually there in the 80s, he discovered that they know almost nothing about the era that created the very instruments that they are using to compose their work. The story goes that these conversations inspired him to try something new – a symphony, no less.

Dolby says that the symphony is still a work in progress and so he’s trying it out on his tour. Well, if this is the prototype then the final version will be well worth checking out. He is joined on stage by more musicians for the remainder of the show – Martin McAloon on guitar, Mat Hector on drums, Jakko Jakszyk on bass and via the magic of video, Ana Pshokina and Jason Mraz.

A virtual symphony orchestra for a real symphony

It’s impossible to list all of the component parts of the soundscape that Dolby has created here. We get everything from ethereal, fleeting yet recognisable themes through to full songs, accompanied by a virtual symphony orchestra.

Comfortably Numb, Here Comes the Rain Again, Red Rain, Sign Your Name, Little Red Corvette, Billie Jean, This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody) merge into one another. It’s not a medley, it’s hard to describe what it is exactly. It’s very good and it definitely does its job of stirring up those nostalgic feelings. Anyone who stood in a pub and watched the first videos on the first video jukeboxes will understand. Anyone born in this millennium probably wouldn’t.

We get the searing, plaintiff intro to U2’s With or Without You and the movement is concluded. There are four in total, though to be honest it’s harder to distinguish the compositional differences between them compared to, say, Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto K622. Can we compare Dolby to Mozart? Probably, since Mozart’s first reported piece of work was a cover version.

Back in the limelight

Martin McAloon is back in the limelight for Bonnie, a song originally produced by Dolby for the Steve McQueen album. After the solo set earlier, it’s really good to see what Martin can do with a proper band around him. Hopefully we’ll get more of that in the future?

What else do we get in this musical smorgasbord? New Year’s Day, The Killing Moon, The Things That Dreams Are Made Of, Sweet Dreams, Ordinary World, Don’t Give Up and more. Somewhere, the relentless, recognisable theme of Enjoy the Silence drifts across, it’s not easy to say precisely when, such is the pace of the composition. Again, this is not a medley, it is a blending of musical themes, some obvious, some subtle, all thoroughly enjoyable.

The symphony concludes with a recipe incorporating such ingredients as White Wedding, Love Will Tear Us Apart, Dancing With Tears In My Eyes, Vienna and the glorious, uplifting finale, Don’t Dream It’s Over. The evening concludes with, of course, an encore; Hyperactive!, She Blinded Me With Science and Airwaves. Smashing stuff for the Dolby diehards.

Important contributors

Now, if I were to be picky, which is very unlike me, I would say that this is very much Dolby’s recollections rather than a broad retrospective of the significance of the decade. We hear bits and pieces of The Human League, Depeche Mode, Ultravox and Gary Numan. To my mind, we get a bit too much Peter Gabriel and Eurythmics, whereas some other very important artistic contributors are notable by their absence.

Vince Clarke, for example, or OMD or even Sparks are surely bigger parts of the 80s story than Terence Trent D’Arby? Mind you, Sign Your Name was inexplicably produced by Martyn Ware so maybe that’s the connection. Clearly, this is Dolby’s personal playlist and like any symphony, it only makes sense as an entire piece of work.

Some fans have complained that they went to a Thomas Dolby gig to hear Thomas Dolby songs. They’re entirely missing the point. This whole evening and the symphony which nestles within it are all part of the Thomas Dolby story. Through these collections and recollections, he says, “I was there.” The 80s weren’t an easy decade to live through but something unique was created in that time, something which we may never see again. If you were there, you understand.

In the end, don’t dream it’s over, celebrate that it happened. Celebrate that you survived to tell the tale.

Thomas Dolby: Website

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