This unofficial site features his current and recent events and tours
Review of Tony Hadley vs Martin Fry ABC: -
Wolverhampton
26th February 2005 - 4 pm and 7.30 pm
This
review could be entitled the view from the back and the view from the
front. I hadn't intended going to Wolverhampton, I was going to go to
Jersey instead. but by the time the Jersey one had been confirmed all the cheap
plane tickets had gone, if I didn't go to this one, I would have more time to
wait before seeing Tony again.
My companion for this trip would be my 17 year old daughter. I only booked the tickets for the 7.30 pm show a week before and the seats I got had been returned, they were Row D, right in front of Tony's microphone. It would be a train trip to Wolverhampton and I wasn't sure that the train would get there in time to see the early show, but as luck would have it - we arrived on time. A quick check into the hotel next door to the theatre and off to the box office to buy a ticket (this ticket was at the back of the stalls). It was a bit strange going to the gig on my own but my daughter didn't really want to do two gigs on the same day again.
Both shows had the same set list, unfortunately I was only able to get the second half one as this theatre has a safety curtain which came down before I was able to get to the stage, but thanks to the man on the mixing desk. I was able to get the one for the second half.
As far as I can remember the first half set was: Up Up and Away. Signed Sealed Delivered, Tears are not Enough, Poison Arrow, Uptight Outtasite. True, Barricades, The Very First Time, The Best is Yet to Come, Walking in Memphis, Wives and Lovers, Walk Away Renee (if you were there and I've got this wrong - let me know!) and the second half was as the set list.
Tony sang The Best is Yet to Come. I hadn't heard this song before on the tour, he also sang Walking in Memphis. He also asked what everybody's favourite Spandau songs were and of course Musclebound and Paint me Down came up. Tony doesn't like either of these, but jokingly sang a few lines of Musclebound. He also talked about wearing a suede loin cloth, everybody whooped at that idea, but Tony said maybe 20 years ago it would have been fine.
The matinee audience was not as lively as the evening audience and not many people stood up in the first performance and it seemed that lots of people at the early show brought their Mum! Maybe this happens all the time, but because I am usually at the front, I haven't noticed this before.
The Brass section or the 'Horny Boys' as Tony termed them were on good form, their dance routines are good fun and at one point Tony was joining in. He also joked how young they are.
During the second show someone shouted out to Tony that he had a hole in his trousers (it was on the inside seam near the top of his leg), he was doing one of the seated songs, so everybody could see it, he knew it was there and made a joke about anyone being able to sew! When he came back on again, it had been sewn up.
Tony said he liked the old theatres and that they don't make them like that before and that he expected to see Kermit and Miss Piggy at any moment.
Tony's posing with the guitar during Lets Stick Together is good, he doesn't seem to have learnt any more chords and in the finale of this song it is supposed to be Tony that is doing the big finish, but if you watch carefully it is Ritchie B doing it, hiding behind his amp!
Too soon both gigs are over and time to head round to the stage door. It was quite a cold evening in Wolverhampton and nobody I knew to talk to, so the nearly an hour waiting went quite slowly, only shortened by Martin Fry coming out first. It turns out that Tony was watching Arsenal on Match of The Day - Thanks Tone! He remembered my name, but there was a pause whilst he thought what it was! I thanked him for answering my questions on the Remember the Eighties interview, he asked which ones I had asked. He also talked to my daughter's friend on her phone about the football.
Quite an easy journey up to Wolverhampton for me, but due to the rail engineering and trains turning into buses, a longer journey back, but at least it wasn't in the middle of the night.
Denise 27/2/05