30 years ago when I was in College, this album was a polarizing force.
People either loved it or HATED it. It
was new or shall we say, Nu. London based Gary Webb was exactly my age and had changed
his name to Gary Numan, part man part machine, part of a rapidly rising
new wave that was crashing on the musical shores.
In the small college
town of Bethany, West Virginia there were those who loved their
Southern Rock, cranking up Molly Hatchet and Lynyrd Sknyrd and The
Marshall Tucker Band and then there were the few, the proud, the geeky,
the new wavers.
The song "Cars" from this album went to #1 in the UK and #9 in the US. It sounded like nothing else on the radio with Synthesizers fed through guitar effect pedals and Numan's nasally robotic voice. It's still a great song. My college friend and co-conspirator in the great new wave takeover of the college radio station RadioHannibal went to see the concert in Spring of 1980 in Pittsburgh and came home raving. Of course he did that a lot, but this time it was clear that he had just experienced something truly Nu and exciting.
Now it's your turn.
He’ll perform The Pleasure Principle at:
Orlando,
FL The Firestone (10.17)
GA Masquerade (10.18)
Washington,
DC Black Cat (10.20)
Philadelphia,
PA Trocadero (10.21)
Boston, MA
Paradise (10.22)
New York,
NY Nokia Theatre (10.23)
Toronto,
ON Opera House(10.24)
Detroit,
MI Majestic Theater (10.25)
Chicago,
IL Metro (10.26)
Denver, CO
Gothic Theatre (10.28)
Seattle,
WA Neumos (10.31)
Portland,
OR Roseland Theatre (11.1)
San
Francisco, CA Fillmore (11.2)
Los
Angeles, CA El Rey Theatre (11.3 & 11.4
Gary has been busy over the 30 years since this landmark album was released. You can catch up with him here.
I'm sure in addition to that entire album he will include this song as an encore.