New Sparks album "Hello Young Lovers" out in Feb. on.................... In The Red!!!!!?????

Someone take this away from me or else I'm going to listen to it 1,000 times in a row. No lie. It's the best Sparks since the Island Records era.

I'm really quite excited about this. Does it mean we get another round of "Why don't Sparks sell records anymore when they should?" navel-gazing though?

I'm going to see them in Glasgow in a few weeks, it should be good - they've not played up here for years. The previous 2 gigs at the Royal Festival Hall in London were fantastic.

I'm just biased I suppose because those were my favorites. But you're right about Hello Young Lovers not simply being Island-era redux. It's more a case of them drawing on the same thing, whatever it was, that inspired them while writing back then.

I don't think so, necessarily. Depends on the level of inspiration. Having not been so into Li'l Beethoven the one time I heard ... not even all of it, I was actually a little disappointed to see people saying that it's not really Island era redux!

I would heartily disagree -- if it was just that, then it would be a case where for the first time in their career they were not simply coasting (which they've done before, but not with good results) but actually revisiting the past. And that would be tres lame. Neither the Island-era backing lineup nor the brothers themselves would quite have done songs this way either on this album or the last.

Bowie did this, kind of, on his Hours album, by the way, which I was perhaps somewhat alone in thinking was pretty good.

My AMG review.

Also "Metaphor" is fucking awesome, especially when they bust out the harmonies halfway through.

Very insightful review there, marvelous.

Saw them at Gateshead last night, surpassed my (high) expectations. Wasn't entirely sure about the idea of performing Hello Young Lover in it's entirety but it worked a treat, and as said upthread 'Dick around' was magnificent as was (Baby, Baby) Let me Inavade your Country. Second half of 'oldies' was splendid too, but it's a rare treat to actually here someone whose more recent material manages to outshine the tried and trusted oldies.

Truly one of the great live acts, the oppositional dynamic between Ron and Russell makes for a truly remarkable live experience. If there's any tickets left for Saturdays London gig or the freebie show at HMV on Friday get them quick.

Whomp was released on CD in Europe by ZYX back in the mid-nineties and then in America on Oglio in the late nineties. Given the strong pound, I'd actually say use Amazon or something similar to search for a used CD copy over here.

That awesome piano version of "Change" - has this been a fixture of their set for long? Is there a recorded version that sounds like that?

Also, for anybody who hasn't seen it, here is the Youtube of Sparks doing "Mickey Mouse" on SNL, in which for several brief, glorious seconds, Ron Mael breakdances.

http://www.indie1031.fm/listenlive.php

"All these mongoloids with their cameras down there..."

Just back from the LA show. OH SO GOOD. Russell's cut his hair back a bit from the length shown above, otherwise nearly the same set list as in the UK and the performances were tremendous. What a band. Standalone concert of the year so far (counting Terrastock as more of a free-flowing brilliance).

(And I could have sworn that was you, Ned. You were right behind me at the exit, but I wasn't gonna just go up and say "Hey. You don't know me but I recognize you from the Internet.")

I never imagined at this age (I turn 21 again later this year) I’d say that was the greatest rock show I’ve ever seen, but that’s exactly what last night’s performance was. The new album is marvellous and I looked forward to hearing it live, but I was completely unprepared for how Sparks made it rock rock rock! If we had been booted out of the hall after the first few songs, we’d have gone home deliriously happy. ‘Dick Around’ simply stood our hair on end with its ferocious roar and Russell's most inspired vocal. My favorite song of the first half, and it's hard to pick one, was, much to my surprise, Rock Rock Rock, performed with such a blistering punch I’ll never think of it the same again.

Dan’s comment about the set list for the second half was spot on. I had thought how great it would be to hear Sparks play a bunch of songs we’d never heard live before – you know, screw the past (as great as it’s been), let’s have them pull some different nuggets out of their long and brilliant collection. How surprising and thrilling to listen to the second set unfold very much that way, with several songs we had never heard performed at the 6 shows we’ve now been to:

Happy Hunting Ground
Bon Voyage
In The Future
Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth
Hospitality On Parade
The Number One Song In Heaven
Music That You Can Dance To
I Predict
This Town Ain’t Big Enough For Both Of Us
Amateur Hour
- Encore -
How Do I Get To Carnegie Hall?
Suburban Homeboy
Change

We were on the floor near the left of the stage with a bird’s eye view of Ron during the first set, with Dean and Josh just behind him. Dean and Josh have a great onstage rapport, and they seemed to feed off one another’s energy all evening. The guitars were certainly not lost in the mix this time! New guys Josh and Steve really are first rate musicians, and they mesh with the band so well. It was wonderful to see them having such a good time, and lord knows we hope they stay on with Sparks. I don’t recall seeing Tammy nearly as animated or having as much fun before either. In fact, everyone seemed to have more fun than I remember at recent shows. I thought Russell didn’t smile much during the LB concert, and we thought he didn’t seem to be having much fun, but he was clearly having a ball last night.

Russell’s voice was in superb form – no surprise there! We got a night-long eyeful of him belting out song after song, and he really put all of himself into every line – just electrifying watching and listening to him.

Even Russell’s intro of the other band members was charming and funny, especially when he said of Ron "he writes most of the songs….. except for the few really good ones, which I wrote…." That’s when he cooed "Pineapple, pineapple……. Gone with the wind…." which made Josh and Dean double over with laughter. Russell said, "Hey those are classics!"

It’s been said many times before in the reviews: The fact that these guys can have such vim and vigor and creativity here in their fourth decade of making music is nothing short of amazing.

The LA band, consisting of brothers Russell and Ron Mael, will tour the UK later this month.

what facet of bbc would play 'Dick Around' anyway? MAYBE evening 6Music at a push...

man this album is still amazing. it was so cool to get into this band in 2005, get obsessed with all the good stuff, to the point where I'd reluctantly try out the bad stuff, which I tried really hard to talk myself into liking, and then whammo they drop their best album

It’s been said many times before in the reviews: The fact that these guys can have such vim and vigor and creativity here in their fourth decade of making music is nothing short of amazing

Seventeen years later…

man this album is still amazing. it was so cool to get into this band in 2005, get obsessed with all the good stuff, to the point where I'd reluctantly try out the bad stuff, which I tried really hard to talk myself into liking, and then whammo they drop their best album

Ha, this was exactly my experience except I got into them in the year or two before Lil' Beethoven came out. I remember finally getting Balls after hearing most of their other albums and thinking it wasn't bad but also thinking it was a shame that this was where they were at and that I couldn't have been into them during a more exciting time in their career. And just then they start making some of their best music ever. (I also prefer HYL to LB though.)

I started listening them soon after Interior Design, basically pre-internet; I had no idea if they were still making music or not.

Wow, yeah, I guess this was addressed in the documentary, but it really must have seemed like they'd retired at that point. Six year gap between albums after almost two decades of an album every 1-2 years.

yeah "When Do I Get to Sing My Way" kind of the only notable thing to come out of that era

I was surprised that Plagiarism was barely mentioned in the doc. I kinda get it, reworking the back catalogue runs counter to what Sparks is all about, so I get why they didn't want to do it. but I think it actually foreshadows their 21st Century comeback sound quite well. the version of Pulling Rabbits Out of a Hat in particular is really excellent, at least compared to the version that actually came out on the album.

Balls is kind of underappreciated IMO, as a Sparks album (especially one 6 years on from the last) it's not great, but as a catchy Europop style album it's pretty neat. feels like it could be a hidden treasure under any other name.