Why ’80s band Spandau Ballet, returning to Canada, feel ‘True’ video is false

TORONTO – It’s been 32 years, but Spandau Ballet’s Tony Hadley and Martin Kemp can only shake their heads at all the elements of the “True” video that still feel a little false.

The song gave the swoon-inducing New Romantic band their signature hit — a chart-topper at home in the U.K. and in Canada. The ’80s classic also achieved the band’s highest-ever placing stateside, topping out at No. 4.

The accompanying video, featuring the suit-clad band performing in a more or less empty room, is still a favourite, with nearly 20 million views on YouTube.

Well, it’s a favourite outside the confines of the reunited band, anyway.

“It’s quite a bland video,” summarized bassist Kemp in an interview in Toronto this week, with frontman Hadley murmuring his agreement. “But it actually could have been a lot worse.

“There was (going to be) a cartoon man walking through it. Oh my God. It was just appalling.”

Nodding vigorously, Hadley now decides to air his own misgivings with the video.

“It really hacks me off to this day that they got me to the soundstage — I said, ‘Right, give me the microphone. I need a (cable).’ They said, ‘No, no, no. We’re only going to shoot you (from the neck up).’

“And what happened? There I am, in the middle of the video, it’s before we had radio mikes, and there is no (cord) coming out of my mike.

“That’s it. I’m over it now.”

Moving on has become a specialty for the London quintet, who split up for the first time in 1990 and then spent the ensuing decades battling bitterly in the courts over songwriting royalties (which were being directed to Martin’s brother and the band’s primary songwriter, Gary Kemp).

Somehow, they collectively put that protracted legal dispute in the rear-view to reunite in 2009. The subject of a new documentary called “Soul Boys of the Western World,” Spandau Ballet will play their first show in Toronto in 32 years on April 27, at Massey Hall.

Kemp and Hadley sat down with The Canadian Press to discuss erstwhile fashion trends, forgiveness, and their light-hearted feud with Duran Duran.

CP: In the documentary, it’s interesting that your interviews are presented as narration rather than in the talking-head format.

Kemp: It’s a funny thing — when you talk in front of the camera, you can’t be completely honest. But the way (director) George Hencken did it, she put us in front of the microphone in a dark room and that way you completely react and tell your honest story. We wanted it to be warts and all. Everything exposed.

Hadley: There’s no point in sugar-coating our story because it’s impossible, in a way, to sugar-coat. We went through a hell of a lot as a band to get to that point where we were achieving success, but then imploded as a band. The breakup of the band was pretty awful but at least we had the strength of character to get ourselves back again.

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CP: Watching the film, did your bandmates’ recollections ever differ completely from yours?

Hadley: Oh yeah.

Kemp: Everybody has their own truth, don’t they? Over the years either you distort it in your own brain or it just gets distorted. What was really interesting is hearing about everybody’s story for the first time, because we never sat down: “How did you feel during those dark years?” We’ve never done that. We’ve never asked (multi-instrumentalist) Steve Norman how he felt — and all of that stuff that he reveals, that he had a breakdown. Listening to it back was probably one of the most difficult things.

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CP: In the film, someone in the band says you were “really gutted” about losing to Duran Duran on (British game show) “Pop Quiz.”

Hadley (laughing): Bloody cheats! We all know what happened.

Kemp: It was a good bit of fun, but in a way it summed up the whole relationship between us and Duran Duran. Everything was competition. Whether it be “Pop Quiz,” or releasing a record, or who controlled America and who controlled Europe. At one point, we had two Learjets racing back to London from Germany to do Band Aid. Everything became a competition.

Hadley: We’ve had some great nights with those boys.

Kemp: But even that was a competition of who could stay up the latest.

Hadley: The funniest one was the Beastie Boys, who challenged us to a drinking competition. They lost. Massively. They’d heard we had a bit of a reputation as a drinking band.

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CP: Obviously you take pride in the band’s influence on fashion, but is there anything specific from that era you regret wearing?

Kemp: I don’t think there’s any one piece of fashion where I look back and wish I hadn’t done it. What I’m proud of more than anything else is that … we were never told to wear anything as a band. It’s not like nowadays where you have an A&R man or a stylist or a designer telling you what to wear. What we were doing is wearing the same stuff onstage that we were wearing in the clubs. As bizarre as it looks, that’s what people were wearing in the ’80s.

Hadley: I’ve told this story before, of meeting my granddad in Waterloo station. He was a very smart man with a three-piece suit. We were getting on the train and he refused to get into the same carriage as me because I had these Persian trousers on, ballet slippers and this weird shirt. He thought I looked ridiculous. I thought I looked really cool.

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CP: The band was a family — literally for you, Martin, and figuratively, obviously, for the rest of you. And that split was so ugly. How did you come out on the other side of that where you could work together again?

Kemp: I don’t know. But it’s something that I’m very proud of. I think it shows incredible strength of personality from everybody across the board. Even the guys who manage the band, everybody involved, to be able to put the band back together is an incredible strength of personality.

Hadley: It was very difficult. It took a lot of soul-searching. It was a tough one to do but I’m glad we did, because we’re better people for it. I think we’re a lot more relaxed with each other now than we were before. We’re all older guys and stuff and it’s easy. We’ve been rehearsing this last week and I think we’re playing better than ever. It sounds fantastic. There’s almost a punky edge to the band, which I really love.

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Answers have been edited and condensed.

— Follow @CP_Patch on Twitter.