Adam Ant comeback

Post-punk 80s icon Adam Ant is back in action! From The Quietus:

After a troubled and turbulent decade, one of the most iconic faces on the planet during the post-punk era is returning to active service, and in a most unpredictable and chaotic style. Over the last few weeks, Adam Ant has been turning up unannounced at assorted club nights for quick guerrilla gigs - a dandy highwayman in the underworld - and joining other artists onstage for surprise duets

I am informed that my love of dancing to Adam Ant as a toddler ultimately resulted in My First Emergency Room Trip and, accordingly, the scar on my left eyebrow. Photo: The Foxling. A Wild Nobility: An Adam Ant Exclusive By Simon Price [quietus via JWZ]

• [Phikus]

  Anybody else remember when he showed up on an episode of Northern Exposure? I would have linked a clip if I could find one…

• [Zaren]

  That was one hell of an interview, btw.

• [_OM_]

  ….This is damn good news! I only saw Ant the one time he came to Centex back when he was pushing his pseudorockabilly Viva Le Rock reimaging, and while he put on one hell of a show for some reason he wasn’t playing *any* of his previous hits. He took the same approach Roger Waters took with his first solo tour to promote The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking – playing only the new stuff to push the album sales up – and it went over with the crowd in attendance like *two* turds in a punchbowl. He came out for one encore – did Desperate, But Not Serious and Goody Two Shoes, but obviously was pissed at the crowd for constantly shouting for the old hits that he refused to perform the one that *everyone* wanted to hear live: Strip.

  Either way, it’s good to see he’s gotten his shit back together again, and hopefully he’ll tour the states. Might be interesting to see if I can still slamdance and kill people with a fake leg…

• [Marcel]

  Wait. You guys are actually into Adam Ant?!

  Are you the same ppl who claim Billy Idol was a punk rocker?

  • [Znaps]

    Fairness to Billy Idol, Generation X were quite fun.

• [GrumpySteen]

  New wave, new romatic, post-punk,
  Hot funk, cool punk, even if it’s old junk
  It’s still rock and roll to me.

  I don’t know why discussions like that devolve into arguing, however politely, over which label should be slapped on the artist. Doesn’t anyone else just listen to music without giving a damn what genre it’s supposed to be in?

  That said, Adam Ant is the 85th most played artists in my playlist (out of 470). I’m glad to hear he might be making some new music.

• [deckard68]

  Adam Ant’s history is rich, and I have tremendous respect for artists like him and Kate Bush who enthusiastically embraced music videos as a way to expand their own artistic expressions rather than as a way to sell discs. Theatre-arts backgrounds invested these pioneers with quality visuals. And seeing now well-known actors like the dude from House, and Amanda Donohoe (loved her on LA Law and as the serpent in “Lair of the White Worm”!), in Stand & Deliver and other early Ant videos is so much fun.

  Adam also seems to have dated all the actresses I love the most, which is …just weird, but a credit to him.

  But as someone who loves his career, I want to say that this is not a “comeback” for Adam in the sense of a high-profile return. He is releasing a new album, yes, but don’t elevate his recent one-off gigs and his recording to a “comeback” in the traditional sense. The pressure of an actual “comeback” would be crippling to him. He has bravely managed his anxiety or bipolar disorder, and he appears to be on a good blend of diet of medication that has allowed him to enjoy life and record again.

  But I am expecting small things, and would encourage everyone to simply expect small things and be happy, rather than exert any pressure on him to over-extend himself.

  (Also, I am loving the way he is revisiting his earliest Dirk Wears White Sox tunes, which are such a treasure trove even though they happened before his tribal and pirate personas were invented. If you’ve never checked out his whole catalogue, look to the UK expanded reissues that his music partner put together a couple years ago — they are massive upgrades over any of the US discs.)

• [dculberson]

  XTC versus Adam Ant; which one will survive?

• [Anonymous]

  pffffffffft.
  I was working in Manchester the other day and he should have been making an “unannounced” appearance and he never turned up
  what rubbish!
  I was all “…is he here yet? is he here yet?”
  what a let down

• [insatiableatheist]

  What he needs to do is attach himself to a comedy series, in the way Gary Numan did with the Mighty Boosh or Cliff Richard with the Young Ones, to establish some ironic street cred’.

• [Anonymous]

  For the love of FSM snap out of it!!! Listen to yourselves! Remember those damn dirty hippies and baby boomers who were constantly nostalgic for Woodstock and Haight/Ashbury and hating Nixon and all that shit? Well, guess what– you’re doing the exact same thing, but just with this new-ro pirate dandy instead of the Lizard King.

  I catch myself listening to 80s music just like everyone else, but I consider it a closet shame. I saw Dave Wakeling in concert three months ago– and let me tell you, you can never go back. Your junior high fantasies will always outstrip the reality of a 50-year-old rocker who cannot jump around anymore because of his knees.

• [BritSwedeGuy]

  A friend made the secret preview show – the words “Pirate Metal Extravaganza” were used.

• [mralistair]

  apparently his manager was dead set against this idea…
  the singer was adamant.

• [Anonymous]

  Wow, look at all that lip gloss! He was quite hot back in the day…

• [hassan-i-sabbah]

  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Z_zdIxw-wI&feature=fvw
  Saw them many years ago in Edinburgh, The support band were supposed to be the Police but,they couldn’t make it so this other band turned up,who were signed to the same label at the time ,who were THE CRAMPS!!
  Fucking Awesome.

• [ZDepthCharge]

  “resulted in My First Emergency Room Trip and, accordingly, the scar on my left eyebrow.”

  Pics or it didn’t happen…

• [azaner]

  Sweet. Good for him. Stand and deliver.

• [theLadyfingers]

  Surely more New Wave than Post-Punk?

  • [Manooshi]

    Yeah, he was New-Ro. Post-Punk was later in the decade.

    I had this same poster- except with the other Ants also present- when I was in Jr. High. Still pissed that my dad ripped it off of my bedroom wall and threw it away. So what I was lusting after a bunch of pirate dandies?

    He fucked up when he went solo, imho. Oh well.

    • [hassan-i-sabbah]

      Adam Ant was original London scene Punk. Saw the Pistols many more times than y’all. Billy Idol too.

    • [Teller]

      Agree. He was pinned with The New Romantic label, despite whatever he thought he was.

  • [fxq]

    Yes
    and
    Awesome

    • [fxq]

      From TFA “AA: “No! I actually had a song called ‘Dirk Wears White Sox’ that we used to play live, but we were told we couldn’t put it on the album because it was based on The Night Porter, a Dirk Bogarde film about a sadomasochistic relationship between a concentration camp prisoner and a Nazi guard. What about Joy Division calling themselves that, and then New Order? They only got away with it ‘cos they’re fucking ugly and they look like brewers.”"

      OK, maybe more punk. Still awesome.

      • [Boba Fett Diop]

        Of course Ian Curtis had more talent in his little finger than Adam Ant had in his whole body and Zorro boots combined. He had to come up with a whole shtick to even approach the kind of transgressive stage presence Joy Division had, regardless of how many Sex Pistols gigs he attended. That doesn’t mean that Curtis’ life wasn’t pretty fucked up outside of music, or that he didn’t do an incredibly stupid thing at a time when his career was about to explode.

  • [skeletoncityrepeater]

    Adam and the Ants and Adam Ant’s earlier incarnations are surely ‘post punk’ with their heavy tribal drums and melodic incantations – I would say he skipped the new wave entirely and went from post-punk to ‘new romantic’ then to ‘Bryan Ferry’ in his later career. I hope he comes out to California.

• [nunks]

  I tell you all, the judgement day is coming.

• [IWood]

  Stay away from him, Rob! You’re much bigger now. You’ll crack your head open like an egg!

• [Antinous / Moderator]

  If he’s going to make a come-back, he’s going to have to release a photo taken after 1990.

  • [Rikki Simons]

    Here’s one: http://www.contactmusic.com/photos.nsf/main/adam_ant_2817065

    • [Antinous / Moderator]

      He looks like the love child of Little Richard and a thrift store.

      • [arkizzle / Moderator]

        Antinous FTW!

      • [Rikki Simons]

        He does! But regardless: I neeeeed that coat. Need it.

• [bat21]

  I still have my Antics in the Forbidden Zone VHS. :)

• [Chris Brewer]

  It must have been me – I spent far too long the other day trolling through A&tA vids on youtube. (Does Gwen Stefani even know what a record collection is?)

  “As their masters rot on walls and the angels eat their grapes I saw Picasso, Pablo Picasso, visit the Planet of the Apes.”

• [Kaz]

  Didn’t he already have one Come Back in the 90s? (Did I tell you you’re wonderful… I miss you… yes, I do…)

• [SKR]

  only ONE turbulent decade?

• [ZenGrrl62]

  Oh, Adam Ant, I love you so.

• [sprockety]

  I have to post that less than 5 minutes before I saw this I was reading the Wikipedia article for “Children of Men”.

  Quietus is the name of the suicide kit(movie)/drowning ceremony(book).

  I’m really not trying to equate Adam Ant with suicide, just, how many times in a day does the word Quietus bounce before your eyes?

• [Anonymous]

  he is SO proto Capt. Jack Sparrow!

• [Anonymous]

  Remember when Darby Crash (The Germs) went to stay with him in England for several weeks, and when he came back and played his last live show, he had feathers all over him? That was Adam’s doing. Darby killed himself shortly thereafter. Whatever happened, Adam is punk squared.

• [franko]

  adam rocks. i’ve never lost the faith that he’d have a comeback. i listen to his early stuff and i’m blown away by how cool it all is, even now: their use of percussion is just driving and FUN. plus, best new-romantic dresser, by far.

• [igpajo]

  Great news! I was a huuge Ant fan in jr high and early high school. The Ants were my gateway drug…steering on the course towards more hardcore music that would define my later high school, early college punk days. I think I probably drew this logo so many times, on peechees and book covers and the backs of trenchcoats, that I bet I could probably draw it freehand from memory some 25 years later.

• [Anonymous]

  Marco Pirroni ROCKS!

• [Anonymous]

  Oh my god. I saw him in concert in the seventh grade and that was IT for me. He remains the sole pinup in the locker of my heart. Got to see him on the Persuasion tour before the album never released. I walked by his flat in a pouring rainstorm during a business trip to London. I swear I’m a normal 37 year old woman. Except when it comes to Adam.

• [shashi2005]

  I saw him playing at Southport fun fair in the nineties, in a tent near the rollercoaster. Southport funfair was like Coney Island without the picturesque charm.

  • [LaughingLemon]

    Southport is for people from Liverpool who can’t afford the train fare to Blackpool.

• [Xenu]

  He’s over 50 now, right? Does he still look and sound like the Adam Ant we all know?