In 1979, at age fourteen, I listened to the Beatles and little else, but I liked "Cars" and bought the single. I liked the B-side ("Metal") even more, and bought the album, which sort of sat around as the beloved oddity of my record collection until 1981, when a friend said, "You have to hear this."

He played "Listen to the Sirens", "My Shadow in Vain", "Friends", and I was simply blown away. There was such muscle in this earlier music, such arrogant, alienated power, it was a real revelation. It showed me that rebellion and anger could be intelligent. "Far too erratic to be okay. So? If you're concerned, well I don't care."

Since then, like most people who are reading this, I have scoured record stores for anything by Numan I could find. From the late Eighties on, though, it was mostly out of loyalty. From about "The Fury" onwards, I found that the intensely visual character of his lyrics had given way mostly to abstractions ("disease, anger, love") and grumblings about how mistreated he was. I bought "Outland" because I felt I owed it to Gary, but that's where I would have stopped.

Luckily, I met someone who's even more of a Numan geek than I am, and he made me listen to "Sacrifice." No female backing vocals! Yes! He's back, and so am I as a fan.

Michael Blakley
(location unknown)
michaelb@caere.com

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