Some artists are so iconic that everybody knows their name, but few truly stand the test of time as well as Gary Numan. A pioneer of electronic music in the late 70s and 80s, Numan maintains a strong and loyal following to this day, and it’s not hard to see why. His latest album ‘Splinter’ is arguably his best to date and reviews of his live shows get better as the years go by. On the verge of his third Australian tour in five years, Gary Numan is very optimistic.
“The fan reaction to Splinter has been phenomenal. We’ve done quite a lot of touring with it and I guess that’s the biggest measure of how the new album is going; with the reaction from song to song as you go through it, compared to say the older stuff which the audience know much better, and it’s been brilliant. I’m reluctant to say I’m very confident about it because I’m not an overly confident person, but I’m as confident as I can be.”
As good as things are now, the lead-up to recording his 20th album wasn’t smooth sailing for Numan. “I ended up being diagnosed with depression and I was on medication for that for about four years. So with the depression and the cure that came with it, I didn’t write any new songs for the best part of those four years.” He explained. “It was difficult. When I started to write again I did a side project with a friend of mine and that kind of got me going again.”
“The fan reaction to Splinter has been phenomenal. We’ve done quite a lot of touring with it and I guess that’s the biggest measure of how the new album is going; with the reaction from song to song as you go through it, compared to say the older stuff which the audience know much better, and it’s been brilliant. I’m reluctant to say I’m very confident about it because I’m not an overly confident person, but I’m as confident as I can be.”
As good as things are now, the lead-up to recording his 20th album wasn’t smooth sailing for Numan. “I ended up being diagnosed with depression and I was on medication for that for about four years. So with the depression and the cure that came with it, I didn’t write any new songs for the best part of those four years.” He explained. “It was difficult. When I started to write again I did a side project with a friend of mine and that kind of got me going again.”
‘Splinter’ maintains a lot of the trademark elements of Numan’s music that made him the icon he is today, but it takes on a new level of maturity and heaviness not apparent in his early work. While the evolution of his sound was inevitable, plenty of other things have changed over the course of his 35+ year career. “I went independent a long time ago because I just got so sick of being ripped off. I’ve even had, in my recent years, a record company that were trying to take a share of merchandise because record sales were declining which is just fucking ridiculous.” This independence has given Numan the ability to control the direction his career takes to a much greater extent. “This is the first time I’ve brought a new album to Australia. The last time I was there it was a celebration of an old album, which wasn’t my favourite reason for touring. I’m very much looking forward to seeing how the new album goes, if people are even aware of it and what’s going to happen.”
So what can we expect from the new live show?
“If anyone is coming along expecting a retro nostalgic type of thing, it’s absolutely not that at all. It’s actually really quite heavy, industrial, and aggressive. From my point of view, it’s just full on. There’s only one song in the middle of the set where I can even take a breath, it’s pretty relentless. We’ve run this set now all across America and it’s just been going really, really well, so we’re bringing the same set to Australia. Fingers crossed we have the same reaction there!”
Gary Numan will be performing at HQ Complex on Thursday May 29th. Tickets available from metropolistouring.com
Interview by Melissa Donato
Written by Sofie Marsden
So what can we expect from the new live show?
“If anyone is coming along expecting a retro nostalgic type of thing, it’s absolutely not that at all. It’s actually really quite heavy, industrial, and aggressive. From my point of view, it’s just full on. There’s only one song in the middle of the set where I can even take a breath, it’s pretty relentless. We’ve run this set now all across America and it’s just been going really, really well, so we’re bringing the same set to Australia. Fingers crossed we have the same reaction there!”
Gary Numan will be performing at HQ Complex on Thursday May 29th. Tickets available from metropolistouring.com
Interview by Melissa Donato
Written by Sofie Marsden
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