Robbie Grey canβt wait to get on the stage at Tucsonβs AVA at Casino del Sol Sunday, July 29.
Thereβs something liberating about being at his stage in the game with no pressure to crank out a No. 1 hit and sell millions of albums.
βWeβre creative people; we like making music. For us to, one, be able to make it, and, two, taking on tours where people want us to play it, for us itβs a really nice reward,β the Modern English frontman said during a phone call from England in early June.
These days when the band tours and records, itβs not about making money. The band, which was at the top of the 1980s international post-punk/new wave movement, made enough money from their smash single βI Melt With Youβ to pay the bills indefinitely.
βWe donβt have to worry about too much financially,β said Grey, who along with his bandmates is in his 60s. βItβs not like weβre going out to play for money any more. Weβre going out to play because we enjoy it.β
Modern English is on the lineup for the 1980s throwback Retro Futura Tour 2018 with Belinda Carlisle that has been winding its way through the States since early July. We are one of the final shows before the tour wraps in Michigan on Aug. 4.
We caught up with Grey early last month to talk about the bandβs new album and still making music after four decades.
What are those Retro Futura shows like?
βTheyβre good fun. Theyβre quite big venues. People turn up to hear the hits, really, I suppose from all the different artists. Itβs kind of like a fun experience. Itβs not very hard work, letβs put it that way. You get to play short sets; itβs not a long concert. You generally get to play your more commercial songs. So itβs good fun.β
At this stage in your careers, you guys probably get along fairly well with the other bands since no one on the lineup is battling for the No. 1 spot on Billboard.
βThatβs absolutely right. I mean weβve never done anything like this before, an β80s-type tour, and itβs such good fun. I think youβre right, thatβs probably the reason why. Everybodyβs relaxed about it; thereβs no competition going on. Every band got on really well and thatβs why we decided to do it again really.β
You guys seem even more cohesive as a band today than when you started.
βWeβve all known each other since we were kids, teenagers really. When we got back together eight years ago, itβs was very easy. Simple really because we just were older and we knew each other pretty well anyway, so it was just an easy situation. Once we saw how to jam in the rehearsal room, it just felt really good and quite coming easy really, natural. Thatβs why we went on to write and record another album. It just felt like the right thing to do.β
Does your new album pick up where you left off or does it come from a more mature place?
βOur first album was an album called βMesh & Lace.β That was quite a dark album. It was β80s underground, gothicy type album. And after that we had βAfter the Snow,β which had βIβll Melt With Youβ and was totally different. But whatβs happened recently to us, our first album βMesh & Laceβ has become really, really popular because a lot of the young kids are getting interested in post-punk, which basically mean they all wear black clothes and they like listening to some of the lyrics which was what our first album was all about. When we recorded our new album, which is called βTake Me to the Trees,β we tried to marry .... the sort of noisiness of the first album and the songcraft of βAfter the Snow.β I hope thatβs what we did with βTake Me to the Treesβ.β
You guys crowdsourced this album. Thatβs a massive different approach than how you did it in the 1980s.
βWe used to get hundreds of thousands of dollars in checks back in the day to make albums from record companies. Now itβs all done by the bands. All of the bands are like little cottage industries. Whatβs nice about it is you can make the music you want. thereβs no kind of pressure to write βI Melt With You,β which is what record companies always want you to do. Crowdfunding β and we were amazed, by the way, how many people could remember us even. We raised the money we needed really quickly and we went around the clock about three or four times more moneywise. That really helped us. We didnβt know what would happen, but when it kicked off, the fans came out in droves to help us. It was really fantastic.β
So will you sneak in some of your new material in Tucson?
βOh, yeah. We wouldnβt have done it otherwise. Last year we played two tracks from the new album and this year we will be doing the same. Weβll be doing a track called βMoon Beam,β which is a good pop song, and the title track from the album which is called βTrees.β That is good for us because a lot of people get to hear our music that probably wouldnβt get to hear it. People who come to Retro Futura are not necessarily the people who would go out to buy our new album, but they get to hear it.β
Whatβs been the crowd reaction been to the new material?
βIt seems to fit like a glove. When we played on the last Retro Futura tour, we would come out every night and the 25-minute set would just fly by and each song would go down as well as the other songs, except of course βWhen I Melt With You,β and everybody is singing along at the end. But all the other songs, the new ones and the old ones, all go down very well.β
Youβve been doing this all your adult life. Are you still having fun?
βYeah, definitely. Itβs definitely harder work because your bodyβs older and traveling all those miles isnβt easy as it used to be. But the fun side of it is probably more fun now than it was before. We were so, so busy before, the pressure of product from the record companies and everybody. We did a tour, 80 concerts in 100 days back in the β80s. This is a lot more relaxed and you can enjoy it more.β