Take time for Take That

THE 1990S ARE remembered for, among other things, the golden era of boy bands, and the English quintet Take That were front and centre. Two decades later, they’ve still got that harmonic magic, as will be clear enough on their return visit to Bangkok on Thursday.

The show in the Impact Exhibition Halls will mark their first visit to Thailand since those glory days.

Now a trio – Mark Owen, Howard Donald and Gary Barlow – they performed for more than half a million people in the last year as the current tour swept through stadiums around the world, including 10 sold-out nights at London’s O2 Arena. Every show’s been a memorably spectacular production. 

Formed in 1990 as a five-piece – Jason Orange and Robbie Williams are the absent friends now – they took the world by storm with “Relight My Fire”, “Everything Changes But You”, “Could It be Magic”, “Pray”, “Never Forget” and “Back for Good”.

Hits like those earned them seven No 1 albums in Britain and sales topping 45 million records. They won six Ivor Novello awards and eight Brit awards and have put more than seven and a half million bums in concert seats.

And the success just keeps on rolling. Their most recent album, “III”, went straight to No 1 at the end of 2014. It features the chart-topping single “These Days” and “Get Ready for It”, written for the movie “The Kingsman”.

How do they keep pulling it off? We got to ask Gary Barlow. 

 

IS THE YEAR OFF TO A GOOD START FOR YOU?

We’ve all been busy – writing, rehearsing and looking after babies!

 

AND NOW YOU’VE GOT MORE TOURING AHEAD. 

Well, there’s one thing we love and that’s performing in concert. We did quite a few months of touring last year, 60 shows I think, and it’s just the best bit. And it’s the bit of course where we get to see our beautiful audience and it will be a lively set-list! 

The show is great fun for us, and we hope to give people who’ve followed us for many years a glimpse into our past records and our current records, so it’s a celebration of our music.

 

WE’VE HEARD YOU’LL BE RELEASING ANOTHER ALBUM LATER THIS YEAR. 

We started writing for the new album while on tour last year and we’re really excited by the songs we have. There’s still a lot of work to do, though.

 

TAKE THAT STARTED OUT AS A QUINTET. HOW DOES IT FEEL BEING A TRIO?

I have to say performing as a threesome has been brilliant. Obviously we’ve known each other for many, many years now. We’re having great, great fun. For us it’s an absolute pleasure to still be up there onstage and touring and making new music. It’s what we love to do, and I hope we can continue doing it for many years to come.

 

POP MUSIC HAS CHANGED A LOT SINCE YOU STARTED OUT.

I think pop music today is brilliant. Bands have gone a bit quiet in general. We’re maybe a bit short of bands at the moment, but I think there’s some amazing talent and some enormous superstars. 

 

WHAT’S THE BEST PART OF BEING IN TAKE THAT?

We love what we do! We love it so much, and it gets us out of bed every single morning. It’s great fun. It’s something we’ve done all our lives and we’re lucky enough to still be able to do it. We love writing. We love performing. We love every aspect!

 

HOW CLOSE ARE YOU WITH YOUR FANS?

We all use Twitter, which keeps us closer to our fans than ever before. Some of our fans have been with us since the beginning, so you know their families and lives, which is a very special thing. 

The world has changed since the ’90s, when very seldom did we really take pictures with people – only when they had their cameras present. We used to do more autograph-signings. Now I very rarely write autographs – it’s always photos and selfies with people. 

It’s easier to get your message out now because you type it into a tweet and then all of a sudden the world gets to hear about it or read about it. 

 

IT’S BEEN 20 YEARS SINCE YOU WERE LAST IN BANGKOK.

We played in Bangkok in 1996, just before we split up. We always see messages on Twitter from the Far East and we hope we bump into those people this time round. 

 

PLEASE SAY SOMETHING TO THE THAI FANS. 

We’re extremely excited to see you all! Thank you for your patience, and we’ll make sure the wait was worth it!

 

 

BOY OH BOY

>>Take That Live in Bangkok is at 7pm on Thursday at Impact Exhibition Halls 3-4. 

>>Seats cost Bt2,000 to Bt5,500. For details, check www.ThaiTicketMajor.com or call (02) 262 3456. 

>>Find out more at www.Contango.co.th.