Tom Dunne: All these years later, Sparks still light up my life

Irish Examiner

14-05-2025

'Would you like to talk to Ron and Russell Mael, aka Sparks?' asked the nice man in the record company.
I said yes before he'd finished saying Mael, but as I made space in my diary I couldn't help but think, 'Honestly, Ron and Russell STILL making music! How can it be?' I would have first heard Sparks' This Town Ain't Big Enough for the Both of Us whilst sitting on my parents' front step in 1974. The world that surrounded me on that step has long since dissolved, but the Sparks lads: untouched, it would seem, by time.
Empires have come and gone, but every time the world changes, so too do Sparks. They have at various times been art rock, glam rock, Euro pop, new wave synth pop, hard rock, orchestral pop, concept/ opera pop, indie/ collaborative, cinematic meta and now, well who's to say?
Based purely on the sleeve that pits one word – MAD – against a strong colour background, I'd call this their BRAT phase. BRAT is the current Charlie XCX zeitgeist album and where there is zeitgeist there is Sparks. But I could be wrong.
During all this time they have never failed to experiment, evolve and entertain. MAD is no different. It is superb. They are surfing a wave of popularity at the minute. Edgar Wright's 2021 documentary The Sparks Brothers cemented that. They deserve all of it.
Post 1974, the arrival of punk sent me down a road that made my love for Sparks something that I was inclined to talk about a little less. Sparks and ABBA, my dirty little secrets. It was hard to maintain punk cool if you included Kimono My House amongst Marquee Moon and More Songs About Buildings and Food as one of your favourite albums.
I shouldn't have worried. I should have trusted my instincts. New Order have since said that Love Will Tear Us Apart owes much to Frank Sinatra and Sparks' The Number One Song in Heaven. Joey Ramone, Steve Cook, Morrissey, Johnny Marr, Depeche Mode, Sonic Youth and others have avowed undying love.
For my Zoom interview, I get Russell first. In the absence of Ron, he suggests we just go ahead. I tell him this is the moment to spill the beans on his evil brother. 'Has it been hell for you?' I ask him, but he is still laughing as Ron arrives, benign and charming to a fault.
Part of the guilty pleasure of a Zoom interview is to peek over your interviewee's shoulder and appraise their surroundings. Russell appears to collect vintage sneakers. These are nice homes if they are their homes. The boys have done good.
The press release portrays Ron as a quiet observer, sipping a coffee in the corner, unnoticed and unrecognised, but taking notes and hearing everything. An 'acutely perceptive observer of social mores' it says. He denies this, in fact they both seem to deny everything, but it is the truth.
Mad!, by Sparks
They have made 28 albums and survived and thrived in a business that has changed beyond recognition because of that quiet observation. At the heart of each great Sparks album are wry, funny, poignant observations on our crazy world and the people within it.
Those observations, killer lines and great turns of phrase are then invariable set to a musical style that nods to the fashions of the day, but which remains 100% pure Sparks. It is something they have been doing since Albert Grossman, then Dylan's manager first signed them the late 1960s.
MAD is no different. Songs like Do Things My Own Way, JanSport Backpack, Running up a Tab at the Hotel for the Fab and the stunning Drowned in Sea of Tears continue a tradition of simply unique song writing. For two of my favourite albums from one band to be 51 years apart is jaw dropping.
They are odd to interview. They both answer questions and don't answer questions at the same time. Were they tempted after Glastonbury and the documentary to do an Elton and embark on an unending final tour? They are still laughing.
I finally ask about what is to my eyes an echoing of the Charlie XCX Brat sleeve in their album artwork for MAD. They appear surprised. 'What is BRAT?' they ask. I try to explain.
'Who is Charlie XCX?' they respond. I think Sparks are pulling my leg. The boy who heard them on the front step thinks it is the best day of his life.