"Off to see The Motels in concert" Topic

At the Ramona Mainstage. Small venue.

Small enough that they have a meet and greet with the performers afterwards. Saw them last year around this time as well. Despite her grandmotherly age, Martha still has that voice!!

Oh, man, I envy you! I love the Motels, and I was just listening to a few of their CDs the other day. I had such a crush on Martha Davis back in the '80s.

Post a set list afterwards, if it's not too much trouble. Hope they do "Icy Red"; that one didn't get much airplay in the US, but it's one of my favorites.

Still looks good at 62!:

She and The Motels had some great tunes back in the Eighties. Here are my three favorites:

"Only the Lonely", which saw a lot of airplay on MTV back during the summer of '82:
YouTube link

"Take the L", also from 1982:
YouTube link

"Suddenly Last Summer", released in the fall of 1983:
YouTube link

Have fun, Mardaddy!

Have you heard her take on "Take My Breath Away"?
YouTube link

The backing track is the same, but the vocals are distinctly Martha.

One of my all time favorites. My sister is working Barry Manilow on Sunday. She seems jazzed about it…

This just in! Barry is cancelled, but she's working Dave Mathews tonight.

Besides the ones already mentioned, I always liked Remember The Nights & Straight into the Heartland from the Little Robbers album.

9:45 here and they are about to go on.

I'll get some pics too!

So, Mardaddy? How was the concert?

You still asleep, Mardaddy? Hmm. Must've been a festive evening, then!

Yep, must've been one of THOSE evenings. :)

Nope, not one of THOSE evenings, just been busy today and my son has been monopolizing the computer…

So – it was fun, not as good as last year (less songs I was familiar with this time around), but still a great time… well worth the $25 USD admission.

Despite what some might think, y'know, Motels, wow, keyboards, sax, girly singer, pop one-hit wonder-type… OH NO, you really have to see them on stage to see what you are dismissing. Four members, no keyboardist (prerecorded), and the lead guitarist is seriously high-energy and screeches out with his guitar what was (back in the day) the sax solos. They do seriously rock on stage, Martha STILL has the voice and can hit those notes, rocks the guitar while singing and still gets emotional with their slower songs.

Got the set list from the lead guitarist:

Where Do We Go From Here
Mission of Mercy
Take the L
Danger
Ya Wanna Be Happy
People Places and Things
Counting
Nothing
Suddenly Last Summer
So LA
Little Robbers
Obvioso
Closets & Bullets
Where oh Where
Cry Baby
Apocalypso

Cry baby was the BOMB – the whole band completely ROCKED OUT playing that: YouTube link

For the encore, the rest of the band came back out on the stage and started playing Total Control (arguably the first stand-out song from their very first album), Martha started singing but not from the stage – she was at the entrance to the venue – behind us – and sang the whole song wandering throughout the audience itself (got a short video when she came nearby.)

Finished the encore with Only the Lonely.

I did get some pics, I'll link when I get around to posting them on photobucket or wherever from my cellphone – six feet away from her for most of the concert!

I love smaller venues like that. Lucky guy! Thanks for posting all of this.

Wowsa… it's an 80's spectacular…

I saw The Fixx when they ventured through, missed Flock of Seagulls and Missing Persons – one cancelled, had other plans the date of the other – but later this year, they'll have Wang Chung & the Greg Kihn Band.