Human League/Soft Cell/Alison Moyet tour

Great - more 80's-originating tours filling my dance card this year.

(That's in addition to John Cougar Mellencamp.)

Soft Cell without Dave Ball?!?!

That caught my eye. Who's playing keyboards? I guess Marc Almond doesn't have the same draw as a solo act.

Found this:

"Ball’s co-producer Phil Larson will be standing in just as he did on the last Soft Cell US tour...The forthcoming album, Danceteria, will be the end of any new studio music from Soft Cell because recording without Dave just wouldn’t be Soft Cell.”

So I think that's it: Almond has a new Soft Cell album to promote. And once that's done, he retiring Soft Cell.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Also: the Hollywood Bowl? Seems awfully optimistic to think that this lineup could fill the 17,500 seat Bowl. Essentially the size of a sports arena. Was expecting a much smaller venue, e.g.: the 6000 capacity Greek Theater seems more realistic. Are these other venues of a similar size? Might end up like that last Roxy Music stadium tour where they ended up blocking off big chunks of unsold seats.

I want to see Moyet but have little interest in the others.

Ah Michael, you should've seen her at the Fillmore when she came around last year.

I was at one of those Roxy shows in Austin. The floor was barely full, let alone the first tiers (where I was sitting). Given the sorry state of Ferry's voice that night, maybe it was a mercy.

The last one of these types of shows I saw was Simple Minds last year (with Soft Cell, ironically, plus Modern English), at the Moody Center, which is Austin's arena. (For those who used to live here, it replaced the Frank Erwin Center a couple of years ago.) This is also where Roxy played. I saw some empty swathes of seats in the upper tiers, but the floor and mezzanine were pretty full.

That said, I thought the same thing about the locations of both the Roxy and Minds shows. I thought they'd have been better off in some of our better theaters, maybe across multiple nights. (That's what Ferry does when he plays here with his solo band.) Better sound, better sightlines, and more likelihood of sellouts. Plenty of promoters will tell you it's better optics to book a major act in a smaller place and pack it out, especially over multiple nights, than book them in a big room and watch it not fill up. So I think the promoters for both of these tours and the League/Soft/Moyet tour are swinging for the fences. I have no interest in attending the latter (it's not coming here anyway, though I notice it's going to theaters in other Texas towns), but I'll be curious to read any reports of how full the shows were.

This tour is coming to Wolftrap here and I think it will be well attended. The Wolftrap crowd is the perfect demographic for these 80s combo tours.

For us, Alison Moyet would be the big draw. Unfortunately, the local tour stop is at one of this area's most PITA venues.

> Was expecting a much smaller venue, e.g.: the 6000 capacity
> Greek Theater seems more realistic. Are these other venues
> of a similar size?

The concert space at Marymoor Park is in that range. It's a big grassy area that can hold about 5,000 people. Unfortunately, it's part of a big multi-use space, so parking, entrance and egress are challenges. Last time we went, it took us more time to get out of the parking lot than the headline act spent on stage. Plus -- my wife especially loathes this part -- nothing but porta-potties.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/22/2026 05:04AM by Delvin.

Ah, the dreaded spousal porta-potty dilemma…dasher of many a concert dream.

My days of breathing through my mouth in a porta potty to avoid the aromas are OVER… I don’t care WHO comes to town!

My ardor for The Human League started to quickly ebb following the "Fascination!" US EP. By the end of 1982 I was all about the first two albums more than the hit stuff. I can't say I've ever had the desire to see the MK II band live. And the band's output [over the last 40+ years??!] since then has been beyond spotty. The one great Post "Dare" album I rate is "Octopus," though "Secrets" was at least a decent one. "Credo" and "Romantic?" made my head hurt. I never heard "Crash!"

I only had the first Yazoo album and never was an Alison Moyet fan. As with the aforementioned Simple Minds 80s Victory Lap tour last year, the one band I have any interest in seeing here is Soft Cell. But not enough to put up with the rest of the show, since I'd have to sit through Moyet as first on the bill, I imagine. Soft Cell only had that one hit in the States, but it was a doozy. I actually liked "The Art Of Falling Apart" better than "Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret" and wonder what might hit the setlist from that angle.

Former TP subscriber [81, 82, 83, 84]

[postpunkmonk.com]
For further rumination on the Fresh New Sound of Yesterday®



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/30/2026 07:08PM by Post-Punk Monk.