The Human League :: Regeneration Tour 2008

It makes sense that The Human League should have come together in Sheffield in 1977. It was, after all, the year in which electronic pop music as we know and dance to it today started being played and heard around the world. Kraftwerk's 'Trans-Europe Express' emerged out of Dusseldorf's Kling Klang studio. David Bowie, Iggy Pop and Brian Eno recorded four albums in various permutations by the Berlin Wall. Giorgio Moroder and Donna Summer joined forces for 'I Feel Love'. Two avant-garde New Yorkers called Alan Vega and Martin Rev, the original synthesizer duo, issued their debut LP as Suicide and a bunch of wacky cosmonauts from France called Space had an international hit with 'Magic Fly'.

Meanwhile up in south Yorkshire, galvanized by punk, Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh, a pair of 21-year-old computer operators and arch conceptualists, were using tapes and synths to create a similarly audacious type of rhythm-based pop music. They were known as the Dead Daughters. By the end of '77 they had recruited Adi Newton - who promptly left to form Clock DVA, Philip Adrian Wright - who would be responsible for 'stage visuals' (slide projections and light show), and a hospital porter by the name of Philip Oakey, he of the notorious asymmetrical haircut and lugubrious baritone, who was drafted in as singer. The four briefly operated as The Future, before settling on The Human League.

The Human League mark I put out several singles ("Being Boiled", the "Dignity of Labour" EP, "Empire State Human", the "Holiday 80" EP- which earned the group their first Top of The Pops appearance) and two albums of cold, stark, brutal electropop - 'Reproduction' (1979) and 'Travelogue' (1980) - before Ware and Marsh quit to pursue their own vision, first with the British Electric Foundation and then with Heaven 17.

By 1981, with the addition of Ian Burden on bass/synthesizer, Jo Callis on guitar/synthesizer, and two teenage girls, Joanne Catherall and Susan Anne Sulley (who Oakey had spotted dancing at Sheffield's Crazy Daisy night-club), on backing vocals. The Human League Mark II were (re) born as the first world class/the world's first class synthesizer pop group, the missing link between Abba and Kraftwerk, Suicide and Steps, Chicory Tip and The Chemical Brothers, all machine beats and classically simple melodies, serious boys and dancing girls.  It was, along with Joy Division's subtly dramatic transformation into New Order following the death of Ian Curtis, the great rock-band metamorphosis of the age.

It was an age dominated by synthesizer acts, but even among the class of 81 (including Soft Cell and Depeche Mode), The Human League stood out.  By the end of the year, following critical acclaim and commercial reward for the singles "The Sound Of The Crowd", "Love Action (I Believe in Love)", "Open Your Heart" and "Don't You Want Me" (the Christmas number one and the biggest-selling single of the year), and brilliant third LP 'Dare!' - the 'Sgt Pepper' or 'Thriller' of the game - The Human league were the most popular group in Britain.

Within six months the Casiotone romance of "Don't You Want Me" had found its way to number one in America, 'Dare!' was on its way to selling five million copies, and the League were arguably the most popular group on Planet Earth!

After reaching number two twice - first with "Mirror Man" in 1982, then with "(Keep Feeling) Fascination" in 83 - The Human League bequeathed only a couple more albums to the decade (four if you count the 'Dare!' remix spin-off project, 1982's 'Love and Dancing ' by The League Unlimited Orchestra, and Oakey's eponymous '84 team up with Giorgio Moroder). In 1984, there was the feverishly anticipated 'Hysteria', featuring the Top 20 hits "The Lebanon", "Life on Your Own" and "Louise".  And in 1986 came the radical shift in style 'Crash', collaboration with the hottest US Producers in US R&B, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, the brains behind Janet Jackson's 'Control'. Most significantly, 'Crash' gave The League their second stateside chart-topper in "Human". The next ten years saw just two further long players: the coolly received 'Romantic?' (1990) and 1995's scintillating 'Octopus', which reached number 6 and gave the group three more Top 40 Hits ("Tell Me When", "One Man In My Heart" and "Filling Up With heaven").

2001 saw the release of The Human League's eighth studio album: 'Secrets', helmed by the TOY production squad, who managed to update the classic League sound without pandering to contemporary trends. The album features nine tracks (including the single "All I Ever Wanted") broken up by seven instrumentals, which range from the savage "122.3 BPM", with its muffled bassline rumbling with the intensity of The Prodigy's "Smack My Bitch Up" to the sublimely sad "Lament". Though critically acclaimed it unfortunately didn't get the needed promotion due to the untimely demise of their record company 'Papillion Records'.

The current band line-up is as follows:

Philip Oakey - Vocals, since 1977 
Susan Anne Sulley - Vocals, since 1980 
Joanne Catherall - Vocals, since 1980 
Neil Sutton - Keyboards, since 1990 
Nic Burke - Multi-instrumentalist, since 2001 
Rob Barton - Percussion, since 2001 
David Beevers - On-stage engineering, since 1990 

The band continues with their core business of playing live (touring in their own right and at various music festivals) and they marked their 30th anniversary in 2007 by playing their best-selling album 'Dare!' in its entirety to sell out crowds all over Europe. Latest official news is that the band are currently in the studio writing new material, they are still The Human League and they are still going strong after 30 years at the cutting edge of music. Long may it continue.