Of the myriad of 80’s New Wave-era bands you thought you might never see again, Culture Club would have come to mind. Since, at times, Boy George, Roy Hay, Mikey Craig, and Jon Moss have not always been the best of friends. Not to mention that absurd attempt in 2006 when the band actually hired a new lead singer, Sam Butcher (that project was thankfully short lived).
2014 saw the band mending fences again and the quartet has returned to the US for the first time since 1998 and delivered a killer show at the Blue Hills Bank Pavilion in Boston, MA.
While he no longer has the high pitched falsetto voice that was once such a dominant force in pop music some three decades ago, George’s voice has matured and significantly deepened. Opening with possibly their best song, Church of the Poison Mind, the adoring Boston crowd was instantly captivated by The Club, who did not let up and followed up with It’s a Miracle and 1983’s infectious I’ll Tumble 4 Ya.
Ever the fashion plate, George did wardrobe changes several times during the night and went from wearing a long red overcoat over multicolored pajama-ish threads to later on even donning what looked like a monstrous thick black-liquorish like curvy turban.
While all aspects of the bands career were covered, George did not ignore his solo ventures and pulled out his 1987 cover of Bread’s Everything I Own, which was fetching, as was an atmospheric take on 60’s Brit-Popstar Dave Berry’s The Crying Game – which then led into the bands icon first hit, Do You Really Want To Hurt Me?
The groups initial encore led off with a new song, More Than Silence which is off the bands forthcoming album, Tribes, and showed they still have the chops to make a first rate pop song. Culture Club, who would have been a natural for the glam movement ten years prior to their forming, did not forget their roots by then churning out David Bowie’s Starman.
A second encores saw a superb delivery of Karma Chameleon, which was followed up by a dynamic cover of T-Rex’s Bang a Gong (Get It On) which would have more than pleased the late Marc Bolan.
Although the venue was only half full, the faithful returned and we more than rewarded as Culture Club may have grown older, but have not lost their appeal.
Culture Club Boston setlist
Main Set
Church of the Poison Mind (from Colour By Numbers, 1983)
It’s a Miracle (from Colour By Numbers, 1983)
I’ll Tumble 4 Ya (from Kissing to Be Clever, 1982)
Let Somebody Love You (from Tribes, 2016?)
Everything I Own (from the Boy George album Sold, 1987)
Like I Used To (from Tribes, 2016?)
Move Away (from From Luxury to Heartache, 1986
Black Money (from Colour By Numbers, 1983)
Victims (from Colour By Numbers, 1983)
Human Zoo (from Tribes, 2016?)
Time (Clock of the Heart) (from Kissing to Be Clever, 1982)
Different Man (from Tribes, 2016?)
Miss Me Blind (from Colour By Numbers, 1983)
I Just Wanna Be Loved (from Don’t Mind If I Do, 1999)
The Crying Game (from the soundtrack of The Crying Game, 1992)
Do You Really Want to Hurt Me? (from Kissing to Be Clever, 1982)
Runaway Train (from Tribes, 2016?)
Encore 1
More Than Silence (from Tribes, 2016?)
Starman (David Bowie cover)
Encore 2
Karma Chameleon (from Colour By Numbers, 1983)
Bang a Gong (Get It On) (T.Rex cover)
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