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Hall & Oates
RECOVERED MEMORIES


It’s funny how ’70s rock still won’t go away but a lot of ’80s rock has already disappeared. Many of the artists who ruled the charts 20 years ago — even the good ones, like Stevie Wonder and Eurythmics — are barely on the radio now as oldies. But if Hall & Oates are going to be the next ’80s act to vanish off the radar, then all I can say is, "I can’t go for that, no can do."

Arguably the last of Top 40’s real hit-singles machines, Daryl Hall and John Oates have kept the same basic formula throughout their career: one part elegant pop to two parts Philly soul. The fact that they’ve largely disappeared from radio made their Orpheum appearance a week ago Monday that much more fun. Every second or third number would have you saying, "Hey, I’d forgotten about this one." And save for a mid-show stretch of more than decent new material, every song they played in two-plus hours was a hit. Indeed, H&O have had so many that they could afford to leave out smaller fry like "Everything Your Heart Desires" and — in perhaps a nod to Phil Spector’s current status — their cover of the Righteous Brothers’ "You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling."

Very little has changed since I last caught the duo, in the late ’80s: Hall has traded his rock-star garb for a modest jean jacket, and Oates has finally shaven off that Village People–looking moustache. But Hall’s fluid, flexible voice is very much intact, and he’s become more affable on stage, strumming an acoustic guitar instead of hogging the mike. What exactly Oates does outside of songwriting remains a mystery, since his on-stage contributions were restricted to two lead vocals, one guitar solo, and a bunch of inessential back-ups (unlike almost all other hitmaking duos, Hall & Oates seldom harmonize). But as they pointed out on stage, their recent solo albums both flopped, so chemistry must count for something.

They updated their ’80s set list by playing the same songs in a different order, opening with the most outré of their cover tunes: "Family Man," by prog-rocker Mike Oldfield. From there the hits just kept coming, with highlights in the Four Tops sound-alike "Out of Touch" and a 15-minute segue of the two big ballads, "Sara Smile" and "I Can’t Go for That." The only real problem is that H&O’s singles were largely slow or mid-tempo, and they couldn’t find time to play any of their rockier album tracks. That was still a fair exchange for the half-dozen new songs — the best of which, "Life’s Too Short," was introduced by Hall as "something sad but true." Instead of waxing too philosophical, however, the chorus simply stated, "Life’s too short to live it without you," thus turning a big issue into something reassuring and romantic — the very alchemy that great Top 40 is all about.

BY BRETT MILANO

Issue Date: March 13 - 20, 2003
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