The Human League have completed their fifth Australia tour with eight shows on this current tour where they performed the classic album ‘Dare’ from start to finish.
Prior to arriving in Australia, The Human League performed three shows in New Zealand. They were their first shows for 2024. New Zealand had a standard setlist while the ‘Dare’ shows were for Australia only this time around.
‘Dare’ is The Human League’s masterpiece. It is their biggest album and the only album to reach Platinum status, which it did in Australia, New Zealand and Canada.
‘Dare’ was the centrepiece of the Australian tour with seven later tracks setting the mood of the show. Opening with the classic ‘Mirror Man’ was an easy grab to win over the audience. A few from the less successful ‘Romantic’ and ‘Octopus’ shuffled between the hits ‘(Keep Feeling) Fascination), ‘The Lebanon’ and ‘Human’ almost felt like The Human League opening for The Human League.
There were a lot of inconsistencies with The Human League in the 80s. ‘Dare’ was the major departure from the first two records that worked. The contrast was evident with in 1978 single ‘Being Boiled’ in the encore. THL were more Tubeway Army then than what they became with ‘Dare’. Oakey bought in Martin Rushent to co-produce ‘Dare’ but ‘Hysteria’ went to Hugh Padgham and Chris Thomas and then ‘Crash’ to Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, ‘Romantic’ featured five producers including the return of Rushent and ‘Octopus’ to Ian Stanley who had done the Tears For Fears ‘Songs From The Big Chair’ album so their sound after ‘Dare’ was all over the shop and so was the success.
At this show when ‘Dare’ hit, the show went into overdrive. ‘Dare’ was perfection. ‘Dare’ was a peak that The Human League never had before or after that album. ‘Dare’ was the third album for ‘The Human League’ but the first after the split with Martin Ware and Craig Marsh, who went on to form Heaven 17 and British Electric Foundation. Without the experimentation of Ware and Marsh, Philip Oakey was free to redirect his new The Human League, still with Philip Wright (who left in 1986) and now with added female vocalists Joanne Catherall and Susan Sulley. This set The Human League up for who they are today.
Drummer Robert Barton and keytarists Nick Banks and Benjamin Lee Smith make up “the band” but it is the magic from Oakey, Catherall and Sulley the audience is here to see.
The Human League setlist, Melbourne, 14 March 2024
Mirror Man (single, 1982)
Tell Me When (from Octopus, 1995)
(Keep Feeling) Fascination (from Fascination EP, 1983)
Heart Like a Wheel (from Romantic, 1990)
The Lebanon (from Hysteria, 1984)
One Man in My Heart (from Octopus, 1995)(sung by Susan Sulley)
Human (from Crash, 1986)
Dare album (1981)
The Things That Dreams Are Made Of
Open Your Heart
The Sound of the Crowd
Darkness
Do or Die
Get Carter
I Am the Law
Seconds
Love Action (I Believe in Love)
Don’t You Want Me
Encore:
Being Boiled (single, 1978)
Together in Electric Dreams (Philip Oakey single, 1984)
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