Poptone at Irving Plaza

Daniel Ash

Guitarist/vocalist Daniel Ash and drummer Kevin Dompé (better known as Kevin Haskins) met while attending nursery school in Northampton, England. Both played instruments as youth, and were inspired to play together during the late 1970s punk movement. They first played in the Craze and Jack Plug & the Socketts before forming Bauhaus 1919, soon to be renamed Bauhaus, the first gothic rock band to cross into the mainstream. Ash and Haskins continued to play together in Tones on Tail, Love and Rockets, and the Bubblemen. More recently, the two have DJed together. Early in 2017, they formed Poptone with bassist Diva Dompé (Haskins' daughter), who performs with her sister in Blackblack and also performs in Yialmelic Frequencies. Poptone, based in Los Angeles, California, has not yet recorded new music.

Poptone was expected to revive the Ash/Haskins collaborations which Ash wrote or sang in previous bands, but at Irving Plaza tonight fans had to wait until the second encore to hear the one Bauhaus song, "Slice of Life." The rest of the set consisted of Tones on Tails and Love and Rockets songs plus a few cover songs. Hardly a trace of gloomy gothic rock was present, profoundly overtaken by the brighter and experimental wash of these later bands. The opening cover of Elvis Presley's "Heartbreak Hotel" was stark, fuzzy and brooding. Previously, the song was performed by Tones on Tail, and from there Poptone performed eight more Tones on Tails songs and four Love and Rockets songs in the main set, closing with a hard-to-recognize take on the Temptations' "Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today)." On a few songs, Ash played saxophone instead of guitar and Dompé moved from bass to synthesizer, but the sparse arrangements remained simple yet sharp and cutting. Poptone did an extended take on Tones on Tails' American dance hit, "Go!", but did not perform Love and Rockets' American hit, "So Alive." Except for an occasional reunion tour, American audiences have not heard Ash and Haskins perform all these songs since 1999, so there is a new audience living in a new era for these sounds.

Visit Poptone at www.poptonetheband.com.

Setlist

1. Heartbreak Hotel (Elvis Presley cover)
2. OK, This Is the Pops (Tones on Tail cover)
3. Mirror People (Love and Rockets cover)
4. Movement of Fear (Tones on Tail cover)
5. Happiness (Tones on Tail cover)
6. No Big Deal (Love and Rockets cover)
7. Lions (Tones on Tail cover)
8. Twist (Tones on Tail cover)
9. Love Me (Love and Rockets cover)
10. Performance (Tones on Tail cover)
11. An American Dream (Love and Rockets cover)
12. Christian Says (Tones on Tail cover)
13. There's Only One (Tones on Tail cover)
14. Ball of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today) (The Temptations cover)

Encore 1:

1. Physical (You're So) (Adam and the Ants cover)
2. Flame On (Daniel Ash cover)
3. Go! (Tones on Tail cover)

Encore 2:

1. Slice of Life (Bauhaus cover)
2. Sweet F.A. (Love and Rockets cover)