Twins a band of gipsies

Press, 16 January 1986, Page 14

Twins a band of gipsies

By

NEVIN TOPP

The time is 6.07 p.m. and Joe Leeway, a self-des-cribed rock ‘n’ roll gipsy has been admiring the sunset from his Los Angeles hotel room.

Leeway, aged 30, has become a distinctive part of the (contradictory) trio, the Thompson Twins, with his dreadlocks, and has moved from a roadie for the band to centre stage, playing bongos and synthesizers, plus taking in backing vocals. He has been enjoying the warm Californian weather, having started in the state on the band’s North American tour three months ago. The band’s tour took in winter and deep snow in Canada, the East Coast, and the Mid-West, before moving to the balmier climes of Florida, and finally Los Angeles. Leeway said he had enjoyed the tour, with only occasional flashes of homesickness for Britain. "We’re rock ‘n’ roll gipsies, and have been for three years now. After finishing in Los Angeles, the band’s tour group will tour New Zealand, including an outdoor concert at the Addington Showgrounds, Christchurch, on January 25, Australia, and Japan. Leeway, who designs the Thompson Twins stage shows, said that the band would not be bringing the full stage set-up used in the United States on the New Zealand leg of the tour because the freight costs were too high. But the band would be bringing some of its interesting new stage props, including 5m diameter spheres which hang from the stage, and reflect light. These looked like “alien eggs,” and could create quite a claustrophobic ef-

Peking Man (above) suffered the same fate as the New Zealand cricket team on Tuesday, losing their one-day cricket match against the Netherworld Dancing Toys at Blenheim. While the Netherworld Dancing Toys are old hands at the South Island tour game, for Peking Man it is their first visit. The Auckland band have been talking about coming

feet, when the light on them is reduced, he said. However, the band would not be bringing the lighted hemispheres, which varied between Im and 5m in diameter, and which were placed on the stage, he said.

It was not certain when the Thompson Twins would be able to tour Britain, Leeway said.

The band have twice attempted to tour Britain in 1985, but each time they have been thwarted. The first time early in the year Tom Bailey collapsed, which meant that the tour was postponed, and in November the collapse of a promoter’s firm meant the tour to celebrate the release of “Here’s To Future Days”

to the South Island for two years, and they have used the opportunity of two band special shows at Blenheim and Nelson (which included the Netherworlds) to carry on in the South Island, plus play at the Thompson Twins concert at the Addington Showgrounds on January 25. Besides playing at the Calton Hotel, Christchurch, for three consecutive evenings, starting tonight, the

was cancelled. The band turned to North America as a replacement for the failed. British tour, and Leeway said some hardened Britons from the group’s fan club crossed the Atlantic to see the band perform in Madison Square Gardens, New York. The fans, 20 of them, were put up in a New York hotel by the band for the New York show, which was held on Friday, December 13, and which drew 18,000, Leeway said.

The Thompson Twins are working on a live six-track mini-album taken from the North American tour as an alternative to those British who bought tickets to the second tour which was

band are also booked to play at Timaru’s Old Mill on Sunday evening, with the possibility of an underage event at the same venue at 5 p.m. on the same day. After finishing the Thompson Twins Auckland show on February 1, Peking Man are planning to go into pre-production to record an album, which they hope will be released by the end of April.

abandoned when the promoter went into liquidation. “Those fans who bought tickets can either exchange them for the mini-album or have a cash refund.”

Alannah Currie, the New Zealander in the band, had been talking to the group about Godzone, and Leeway had already grasped certain essential phrases such as fishing, food, beer, and black-sand beaches. “The Currie clan are gathering for when we come.” There had been talk of a hangi, and Leeway said he hoped to be able to see some of New Zealand, as the band had a week off after the New Zealand section of the tour was completed.

The single, “Room That Echoes," that went to No. 1 in the New Zealand charts before Christmas, will also be released in Australia in early February. Initially, the band were considering releasing their first single, “Lift Your Head Up High,” in Australia as the debut record, but they decided to go with the second hit single, their first one for C.B.S. Records.