01/06/2026
When David Bowie saw the Human League at a London club in 1978, he believed he’d seen the future of pop music.
The Sheffield new wave band were nothing like the punk battalion taking over the U.K., instead creating a new musical mold from computers, sequencers, and electronics that felt a bit alien to the times. Then featuring Ian Craig Marsh, Martyn Ware, Philip Adrian Wright, and Philip Oakey, the quartet was armed with Korgs and Rolands and nary a guitar in sight. And they dressed like new age special agents, drowning in heavy eyeliner, with suits, leather suspenders, and bright skinny ties alongside asymmetrical mod bobs.
Bowie, of course, knew what he was talking about, and quickly took an interest in the group, prophesying how influential the Human League would be on the ensuing MTV generation and seeping into the DNA of a league of synth pop descendants in the decades to come.
“He came to see my band more than I went to see him, which is really, really strange,” Oakey admits, chuckling at the absurdity. “He was just a lovely guy who was crazy about music, as we all were. He’d always said that he would have loved to work with Kraftwerk, which he never did, but because we were in that synth area, he took an interest and he did everything he could to help us.” That included a direct line to chum Iggy Pop, who took the Human League on tour across Europe in 1979 as they got their feet wet.
The band’s relationship with Bowie eventually drifted over time. “We just thought we were a little bit lucky to be able to talk to him at all. And we thought we could spoil this if we keep bothering him,” Oakey jokes. But as we talk, he remembers one key piece of advice Bowie gave the band that has always stuck with him: “He said, ‘Don’t ever be a support act from now on, be the headline act. Even if no one turns up, be the headline act.’ And we’ve tried really hard to keep to that.”
The Human League will do so again this summer as they bring the Generations Tour to America, their first time back in the States in 15 years, alongside two great support acts, Soft Cell and Alison Moyet. Now buoyed by the lineup of Oakey, Joanne Catherall, and Susan Ann Sulley, the backbone of the group the last 45 years, the Human League will play material from across their nine-album collection including 1981’s behemoth Dare, which produced the enduring hit, “Don’t You Want Me.”
Oakey, for one, is incredibly excited about the upcoming trek, which kicks off June 2 in San Diego. “I love being in America, and it’s going to be great to do a more extensive tour. I’m actually sitting with a map and I’ve been sort of plotting out the route,” he reveals on the call from his home, which still happens to be in Sheffield.
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