Tony Hadley on growing old gracefully, a blessing from Sinatra… and the rift that destroyed Spandau Ballet: I wish one of the band would have the guts to admit what they did to me

Say the name Tony Hadley to anyone who was young in the 80s and they’ll instantly imagine him as he was at the zenith of his Spandau Ballet fame, all ruffled shirts, satin suits, costume jewellery and cantilevered hair. 

Speak to the man himself, however, and he’s mortified by the idea of being forced into a pair of leather trousers ever again. ‘There’s nothing worse than seeing people from a certain decade who are 50, 60, 70 years of age, still dressing as if they were teenagers. Embarrassing,’ he shudders.

‘I think you have to grow old gracefully. Look at Robert Palmer, he was super cool, a sort of gentleman rocker. I like that.’

Forty years on from when Tony’s voice was the soundtrack of my teens, he could lay claim to being a gentleman rocker himself. 

He’s craggier these days, has a dodgy knee (he slipped in Italy this August) and has abandoned his former peacockery in favour of well-tailored suits from Savile Row tailor Souster & Hicks.

But that voice, the one that helped define a decade and made Spandau Ballet a supergroup, well, nothing’s changed there. It’s still a thing of raw power and rich emotion, just as it was when lyricist Tim Rice described it as a gift ‘few of his contemporaries came near to matching’. 

Tony says, ‘Whatever I sing I sound like Tony Hadley. I just keep moving forward, making music. The last thing I want is to become my own tribute act.’

This cheerful acceptance of the arc of his long career, with its triumphs and hardships and his own advancing years is – endearingly – not very rock’n’roll. 

Tony, now 63, doesn’t mind recounting the time he fell down a long flight of stairs, landing in front of 10,000 fans at Wembley, because he’d forgotten to scuff the soles of his new cowboy boots. ‘A schoolboy error.’ 

Or admitting, more recently, he forgot the lyrics to the evergreen Spandau hit Gold on stage at Cheltenham Jazz Festival. ‘Someone in the audience did something which distracted me and I lost my place. I just said, “That’s jazz…”’

Ask him for a real rock star anecdote, something to do with groupies or private jets or 24-hour benders from the era when he fronted a band that’s sold 25 million records, and he laughs and says, ‘Oh no, I’m a real Norman Normal. I decided that was going to be the case from the start.

‘There was no way I wanted to live in this gilded cage, which annoyed some of the Spandau boys in the early days, because I would still go to the pub with my oldest mates. I just do a job, it happens to be a wonderful job, a blessed job, but it doesn’t make me any different from anybody else.

‘Plus you have a responsibility to that job. The one thing that’s going to cancel a show is the singer – it’s not going to be because the amp doesn’t work or the strings have bust on the guitar or the skins have gone on the drums. 

‘Touring, I’d literally have a couple of beers and go to sleep. If you stayed up until four or five in the morning clubbing, screaming, it’d be a miracle if you were able to perform the next day. I couldn’t do that.’

So the Hadley voice is still in mint condition and he sings in the same key he always has, unlike some vocalists who are unable to reach their heyday high notes in older age. He has an album due out soon, a full diary of summer 2024 festival bookings plus a new swing show touring the country in March.

Swing was the music of his childhood, his mum Pat playing standards by Ella Fitzgerald, Tony Bennett and Frank Sinatra as she made the Sunday roast at the north London family home. 

Later, when a teenage Tony told his mother and his father John (who worked for the Daily Mail as an electrical engineer) he wanted to be a pop star, they insisted he learn his craft by listening to swing classics as well as the Sex Pistols, The Clash and Buzzcocks.

Tony actually met Sinatra when he was a 17-year-old wannabe, ducking security and diving across the stage of the Royal Albert Hall to thank his idol for the show. ‘Sinatra said, “Hey son, good to see some younger people here!” which is exactly what I say to people today.

‘He asked me what I did and I said I was at school but I was also in a band and wanted to be a professional singer. He shook my hand and wished me all the best. Six years later Spandau Ballet played the Albert Hall.’ So it hasn’t worked out too badly then, has it? ‘It’s not worked out badly at all,’ he smiles.

He’s happily settled with his second wife Alison, whom he married in 2009. They have two daughters, Zara, 16, and Genevieve, 11, and he has three children from his previous marriage. (Touchingly, the girl with whom he shared his first kiss at 13 in the back of her dad’s van still occasionally comes to his shows.)

Career-wise, he just wants to keep on doing what he’s doing. ‘I’m never going to retire. I have another 20 years in me. I’m not good at golf, I hate gardening, I don’t collect stamps. I’m still like a kid in a sweet shop when it comes to making music.’

He loves his new material but has never tired of the songs that made him famous. He’ll be singing the crooning Paul Anka version of True and a swing version of Gold in his forthcoming show. He’s pondering how to include his favourite of all the Spandau songs, Through The Barricades. 

Straight, on the piano, he thinks. ‘It really annoys me when artists deny their past because if you have an established past, then you have to give people what they want. It’s disrespectful to the fans because those musical moments in time trigger memories, they trigger emotions, so give people what they want.’

Except that, no matter how much we Boomers and Gen X-ers want one, there won’t be another Spandau Ballet reunion. Not after their recent split in 2017, which followed a 2009 reunion after two decades apart. 

‘That’s a no, it’s not going to happen,’ says Tony. There won’t even be the consolation of a biopic in the manner of Elton John’s Rocketman. ‘Not with me involved. Sorry. I’d want nothing to do with it.’

The band first fell out over royalties, culminating in a court case where Tony and two other band members sued songwriter Gary Kemp (brother of fellow band member-turned-actor Martin Kemp) and lost. 

He’s not ready to reveal why he walked away for good in 2017 after two smash-hit comeback world tours. ‘It’s not for me to say. I really wish one of them would have the guts to admit, “We did this to Tone and that’s what forced him to leave the band.” 

‘Maybe one of them will have the courage to do it one day. I have fond memories of wonderful times but in 2017 I completely resigned. That’s life.’

Then he brightens. ‘That’s Life! That’s one of the songs I do in my swing shows. It’s a song that sums up most people’s lives, they’re up and they’re down but you just have to keep moving forward.’

• Tony’s The Big Swing Tour 2024 starts 3 March. MyTicket.co.uk.