A Review Of Gary's Teletour Show
Max Bell Arena - Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Published November 12th 1980
In The Calgary Sun

Electronic Perfection
Space Man Seduction

By James Muretich

With an awesome stage show, the king of electronic rock descended upon the Max Bell Arena last night.

The Gary Numan concert was unlike any Calgary has seen this year, weaving a compelling wall of synthesized music with a light show and stage construction that rivals anything ever done for a rock concert.

Moving about the stage like a space snake, Numan was constantly backed by musicians atop or within towers of pulsing light frames. As smoke hung about the stage, changing colors according to the shifting lights, the frames would move in geometrical precision horizontally and vertically.

The result was to merge the visual and musical aspects of Numan's sound perfectly.

As Numan stood there dressed in a black leather suit, with only two red leather stripes running across his waist and up his right side, the entire effect was like that of a German realism painting. The imagery is so strong it's intoxicating. It speaks to you directly yet is hard to convey verbally.

His music is the essence of the city with its pulsing rhythms matched perfectly on stage by the lights and the smoke wafting in the air. It is stunningly real in a strange way.

From the opening song, The Wreckage I Call Me, the music seldom changes with Numan supplying only different lyrics and occasionally one synthesizer player stopping or switching to a violin. Yet to label it simple and dismiss it is to miss the whole point.

By his style, Numan creates a hypnotic state bordering on religious prayers. Soon, the body and mind are swept up in a soothing flow of his synthesized rock along with his droning, fragile voice.

While Numan keeps up the face of the cold, alienated man on stage, the truth is different. I mean, he did smile when someone handed him a cloth reading - We Love Gary.

The spaceman has a heart.

The Diodes, from Toronto, opened things up with an interesting combination of new wave with rock reminiscent of the psychedelic era.