Gary Numan

[Erneuert]

It’s recent-NIN-Trilogy good, IMO.

[fillow]

More importantly... did he get bashed for it in facebook comments? I can't wait to know

[eversonpoe]

is it five better than blur's song 2​?

Edit: I guess i'm the only one that thought this was a good joke. Whomp whomp.

woo-hoo!

[botley]

In lieu of another acoustic song, Gary shared an "unmixed" (possibly just a soundboard mix) version of this performance from his Roundhouse show in London today.



It's the song "Stories" from Dance. I think I said earlier in the thread that I was avoiding YouTube spoilers of the (R)Evolution tour, so I've never seen a video of this song being performed live, ever, until just now (yes, I'm aware there's another soundboard tape of it on the remastered Living Ornaments '80 CD but I don't think any film footage of those pre-release performances exists).

Dance is an important album in my life (said the man whose avatar is from that album's artwork). When I was about 14 or 15 I found that this song utterly haunted me, as did the rest of the songs from the LP. It spoke to me in a profound way, which helped through some dark nights of the soul. The synth refrain is jarring, the bassline is intoxicating, the lyric is elliptical and the whole thing couldn't be more strange. Even for Numan it's an unusual construction, but with a disarming emotional vulnerability and charm that pervades all his best work.

I was absolutely floored that Gary chose it for this tour, and now we have an amazing (high definition, beautifully lit, delicately performed) video version for the ages. Couldn't be happier!

[r_z]

I'm curious: Are there any other acapellas / stems of Gary's music out there besides those for When The Sky Bleeds... ?

[katara]

In lieu of another acoustic song, Gary shared an "unmixed" (possibly just a soundboard mix) version of this performance from his Roundhouse show in London today.



It's the song "Stories" from Dance. I think I said earlier in the thread that I was avoiding YouTube spoilers of the (R)Evolution tour, so I've never seen a video of this song being performed live, ever, until just now (yes, I'm aware there's another soundboard tape of it on the remastered Living Ornaments '80 CD but I don't think any film footage of those pre-release performances exists).

Dance is an important album in my life (said the man whose avatar is from that album's artwork). When I was about 14 or 15 I found that this song utterly haunted me, as did the rest of the songs from the LP. It spoke to me in a profound way, which helped through some dark nights of the soul. The synth refrain is jarring, the bassline is intoxicating, the lyric is elliptical and the whole thing couldn't be more strange. Even for Numan it's an unusual construction, but with a disarming emotional vulnerability and charm that pervades all his best work.

I was absolutely floored that Gary chose it for this tour, and now we have an amazing (high definition, beautifully lit, delicately performed) video version for the ages. Couldn't be happier!

Thanks for sharing this. I was actually at this particular show. Didn't know it was being filmed!

Song 7 is immense. Fucking excellent stuff.

[Erneuert]

Does anyone know much about these? Particularly Tear It Up and Radio Radio?

https://ibb.co/gM17K4m

[Erneuert]

Thanks for sharing this. I was actually at this particular show. Didn't know it was being filmed!

Song 7 is immense. Fucking excellent stuff.

I dreamt about Song 7 last night.

Also,

[Erneuert]

VIDEO UPDATE. THE CHOSEN (FINISHED DEMO). APRIL 16, 2020

Posted on 16/04/2020 by Gary Numan Making Music
Hello Everyone,


This is the finished demo version of Song 7, now called The Chosen. This update is around a quarter of an hour and includes other news on tour and album release concerns due to the virus plus another explanation of what Intruder lyrics are all about. The lyrics to The Chosen are below.


I hope you are all well.


Gary.


-----


The Chosen


Do you need
One more sign?
A gift for the old?
Can you see
Or are you so blind?
I raised the oceans.


Here you are
Lost to the truth
Lost to all reason.
Here you are
The pain in my heart
The shame on my soul.


And how could you leave your home to burn?
And how could you turn your blue sky grey
And how could you laugh as children warned you
And how could you take their world away


You will fade
Like a sigh
A breath in the cold.
You will die
And I will forget
You were the chosen.


And how could you lose your innocence
And how could you turn your hearts to stone
And how could you laugh as they screamed for you
And how could you steal their dreams away

[botley]

Quarantine jams:

[rampface]

Love this show. I need more full shows from the early years

[botley]

Love this show. I need more full shows from the early years

All I want is the full Living Ornaments '82 video! NEEED that Pino bass...

Here's the NYC show from that same tour (audio only, kinda poor audience tape):



Worth it purely for the funky-as-shit "Remind Me to Smile"!

[eversonpoe]

i can't even imagine seeing gary at the park west. it's one of the smallest and nicest venues in chicago (i've seen king crimson & steven wilson there, so it still fits a decent number of people, but it's not very big and it has one of the best sound systems)

[voidnz]

The Chosen is so good, I hope it doesn't change toooo much

[Erneuert]

Is the 1998 version of Voix the only instance where Gary has sampled NIN in his work? You can hear samples of Closer (Precursor) in it, as well as some drum samples from Self Destruction (Final).

Man, those 1998 versions of Down In The Park, Metal and Voix are so underrated.

[Erneuert]

The Chosen is so good, I hope it doesn't change toooo much

Those little noises as the song is building (I don’t know how to describe them - like rocket exhaust noises?) remind me a lot of the end of Just Like You Imagined, in shorter bursts.

I don’t know how the hell he came up with this track out of the blue a few weeks ago. It sounds like something he’s been working on for a good while. Amazing track for sure.

[Erneuert]

Does anyone know much about these? Particularly Tear It Up and Radio Radio?

https://ibb.co/gM17K4m

I still haven’t had a chance to listen to these, will post about them when I do. Apparently Sacrifice and Exile demos.

[Erneuert]

Well this sucks.

THE CHOSEN ON YOUTUBE
Posted on 26/04/2020 by Gary Numan Making Music
Very disappointed to find out this morning that someone has put The Chosen up on YouTube. For me to be letting new songs out to Making Music fans before they are released is actually a huge concession on my part and I've trusted that people would understand and respect that. Arguably I was pretty stupid expecting everyone to keep it within the campaign and even more stupid for not stating clearly that's what I expected. So, no blame going out to anyone but me over this. Unfortunately though what it means is that I won't be able to play you entire songs from now on, just snippets of them. Nor will I be able to release high audio quality versions of the works in progress as I did with The Chosen, I'll have to go back to recording the audio on the phone which is obviously inferior.


Even more upsetting is this actually fucks up pretty badly the plan BMG and I have been working on to start letting new tracks out to the public prior to the full release over the next few months as a build up to the eventual release. It now makes making a video for the song somewhat pointless, and as The Chosen was likely to have been the lead song for the album (as My Name Is Ruin was for Savage) I dread to think how much damage this has done to Intruder before it's even released.


If anyone knows who's put it up on YouTube I'd be extremely grateful if you'd ask them to take it back down again.


Thank you,


Gary N.

[jmtd]

Kinda naive of him, and as upsetting as it is for him, that response reads like a lash-out at *all* his subscribers for the actions of a few.

[katara]

Surely he should be reaching out to his record label (BMG?) as presumably the music is being made under contract and they have some stake in it. Does he not have a manager?

[Erneuert]

I believe he self-manages now, for the last 5-10 or so years.

This reminds me back in 2012 (or 2013?) when the official website let us download the entire Splinter album by accident for a short period of time, and it wasn’t released until like a year or 9 months later. He emailed me personally saying not to share it, etc. It’s a shame cock ups like this happen.

[botley]

Kinda naive of him, and as upsetting as it is for him, that response reads like a lash-out at *all* his subscribers for the actions of a few.

Really? I think it reads as just plain hurt (which I would be too, if I was in Gary's position), in a reeling attempt to grapple with the implications of this. It's obvious what a violation of trust that kind of behaviour is. Even cross posting the text from updates verbatim here in this thread strikes me as borderline too revealing, but I'm not upset that others did it, just not comfortable doing it myself even though there's no explicit prohibition on it that I'm aware of. Anyway, I hope he reconsiders the decision to not put the song out as a lead single, it's really bangin'!

[theimage13]

Kinda naive of him, and as upsetting as it is for him, that response reads like a lash-out at *all* his subscribers for the actions of a few.

Naive, maybe. (I mean, it would be someone who frequently sends nudes to people or lets the person they hardly know film them hooking up, then being shocked that they shared the contents...like, come on here, you had to know that was a very, very possible outcome.) He pretty much admits to that much by saying that he was "stupid to expect everyone to keep it within the campaign". You shouldn't have to tell people not to be dicks, but...look at the world. People are dicks. You've gotta at least post a sign that says "please don't be a dick" before you do just about anything these days.

But lash out at all his subscribers? It didn't feel like a lash out to anyone, let alone everyone. No all-caps shouting. No name calling. This was just a calm, reasoned, "this is what happened and this is why things will be different going forward" explanation of the situation. I feel bad for both him and the subscribers who were playing by the rules.

[botley]

Great new full-length radio interview interspersed with some choice back catalogue cuts.

[Trains]

Been on a huge Numan kick lately. I just got done watching the live concert that Gary did with The Skaparis Orchestra during the Savage tour cycle... absolutely stunning. The presence of the orchestra added something to every single song in the set-list. My favourite part was watching the enthusiastic young musicians bopping along to the songs and clearly loving it, I lost track of the amount of times the camera cut to one of them grinning and not able to sit still in their seats. It was nice to see that energy on stage, but it was also so lovely to watch people around my age who were absolutely loving GN's music.

I saw GN twice on the Savage tour and most recently on the 40th anniversary tour, and at each event the crowd was so static and low-energy. It felt like I was the only one signing along and moving to the music, and I swear I was getting more than a few looks for it. It strikes me as an odd juxtaposition when you have GN and his band throwing themselves around on stage energetically to heavy-ass songs like Haunted, Here In The Black, Mercy, etc -- songs that have these HUGE anthemic choruses and chuggy, headbangy riffs -- but then nobody in the audience seems to care and only seems to be there so that they can football-chant "NOO-MAN" at the top of their lungs between songs. Like, I get it; there's always going to be a huge percentage of the audience members who have been going to see GN for decades and who are happy to just chill, see their dude on stage and have a pint -- there's nothing wrong with that. It just seems a shame that Gary's music doesn't seem to get more energy out of his audiences. I guess what I'm asking is, does anyone else feel a bit out-of-place when you go to see Numan or is it just me overthinking it?

[katara]

I saw GN twice on the Savage tour and most recently on the 40th anniversary tour, and at each event the crowd was so static and low-energy. It felt like I was the only one signing along and moving to the music, and I swear I was getting more than a few looks for it. It strikes me as an odd juxtaposition when you have GN and his band throwing themselves around on stage energetically to heavy-ass songs like Haunted, Here In The Black, Mercy, etc -- songs that have these HUGE anthemic choruses and chuggy, headbangy riffs -- but then nobody in the audience seems to care and only seems to be there so that they can football-chant "NOO-MAN" at the top of their lungs between songs. Like, I get it; there's always going to be a huge percentage of the audience members who have been going to see GN for decades and who are happy to just chill, see their dude on stage and have a pint -- there's nothing wrong with that. It just seems a shame that Gary's music doesn't seem to get more energy out of his audiences. I guess what I'm asking is, does anyone else feel a bit out-of-place when you go to see Numan or is it just me overthinking it?

Were you at the London Roundhouse show? It was exactly as you described. Most people were a bit older (to be expected) and barely anyone was moving. Numan himself was really into it, which was great to see. However, the crowd was basically dead. It was nice in a way, as I could just enjoy the music without fear of crowd surfers and other nonsense. Regardless, I also felt quite out of place.

[botley]

Numan's crowds are, it's fair to say, far more "polite" than most you'd see at other heavy rock gigs. I don't think that's a bad thing, necessarily! I was able to get right up to the very front for my first Numan gig (on the Jagged tour) because all the people around me were so lovely and willing to make room. I'll never forget that.

[eversonpoe]

Numan's crowds are, it's fair to say, far more "polite" than most you'd see at other heavy rock gigs. I don't think that's a bad thing, necessarily! I was able to get right up to the very front for my first Numan gig (on the Jagged tour) because all the people around me were so lovely and willing to make room. I'll never forget that.

first time i saw him was when he was doing the replicas anniversary tour. it was amazing except for a guy sitting near me who kept wailing "where are the traaaaaaaaaaaacks, gaaaaaryyyyyyyyyy?" in between (and sometimes during) songs. repeatedly. even after "tracks" had already been played.

second time, i was on the floor instead of up in the seats, roman remains opened, and the crowd was appropriately rowdy during loud songs, and very respectful and quiet during the slower moments of the evening. despite my back pain acting up, it was a much more enjoyable experience.

[Trains]

Were you at the London Roundhouse show? It was exactly as you described. Most people were a bit older (to be expected) and barely anyone was moving. Numan himself was really into it, which was great to see. However, the crowd was basically dead. It was nice in a way, as I could just enjoy the music without fear of crowd surfers and other nonsense. Regardless, I also felt quite out of place.

Afraid not, I saw him play Rock City in Nottingham and then at a smaller academy in Leicester, they're more local to me. Would love to have seen him there though!

And for sure, I would 100% take a subdued, friendly crowd over getting trampled on by a mosh pit anytime. I think it's partly down to the fact that I came in through the Pure, Hybrid and Jagged albums so Gary's always felt a bit like a more "heavy" musician to me.

Speaking of, I'm really enjoying the love that those 90's albums are getting, what with the AF remasters coming down the line and the acoustic version of Bleed. I'd love to see some Exile or Sacrifice tracks thrown into the set-list whenever Gary next tours... which, with things looking as they are, might not be until well-into 2021.

[Erneuert]

What do you guys think of the most recent update comparing the original The End Of Dragons demo with Ade’s version 7?

I love the drum sound they’ve added to it.