Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

fireglo67 wrote:To cut a long story short It's True that I don't need this pressure on.
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Look, your secret that you are a HUGE Spandau Ballet fan is safe with me. I suggest you delete that post so others do not find out.

Let's get real here. Sure we all probably liked a Spandau Ballet song here or there, but they were essentially a group of male models. Looks were their top priority and then came this thing called music. The way you auditioned for that band was not by playing your instrument, but by doing a photo shoot.

Tommy wrote:

fireglo67 wrote:To cut a long story short It's True that I don't need this pressure on.
.....

Look, your secret that you are a HUGE Spandau Ballet fan is safe with me. I suggest you delete that post so others do not find out.

Let's get real here. Sure we all probably liked a Spandau Ballet song here or there, but they were essentially a group of male models. Looks were their top priority and then came this thing called music. The way you auditioned for that band was not by playing your instrument, but by doing a photo shoot.

Hasn't pop music always been that way?
It's no big deal. I'll listen to just about any kind of music, with the exception of anything with any kind of religious overtones.
Rock on.

That's a bit harsh, Tommy. At least according to Wikipedia they were just a bunch of high school friends who started a band together - they weren't some kind of packaged band assembled by an impresario through an audition of male models.

I was never much of a fan, but they do have a certain amount of nostalgia value these days.

fireglo67 wrote:Hasn't pop music always been that way?

To a certain extent, yes, you are right.
But I can list a ton of pop stars who sure didn't look the look (or sound the sound) that the industry wanted and still they succeeded their way.

But, yeah, a large part of the popular music scene has always been about the presentation -- what looks good and cool. I like that aspect, too. It's the very reason why I put a gold pickguard on my new 330. Does it affect the tone? Does it make me play better? Of course not. So why did I do it? Because it looks cool.

Not one of the best from the Spands, but some of their early 80's material had some catchy soul in it, and Kemp's influences were far and varied. I'll take it comfortably over most the contemporary ***** out there today...

I thought we discussed this before, but does/did Graham own or owned this 360F?

From the musical instruments section in my highly authoritative "Harmony Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock" from 1983 (a serious time capsule if there ever was one!):

"More recently, Paul Weller from The Jam, Tom Petty and Spandau Ballet's Gary Kemp have voiced their attachment to Rickenbacker."

So there. Whether he was attached to Rickenbackers for their appeal in videos or for their actual value as musical instruments, who knows. He certainly seems very attached to his brother in that video.

Anyways, I thought The Krays was pretty good...