we love the '80s

Flamboyant pop icon Boy George and Culture Club bring good karma to Houston with '80s faves Berlin and Howard Jones

Any self-respecting '80s New Wave/New Romantic/pop fan would no doubt possess a mixtape — or at least a Spotify playlist — featuring Boy George and Culture Club, Berlin, and Howard Jones. Now, Houston fans of all three can ditch the Maxell cassettes and experience the real thing, as all three acts head to town on a new tour.

Flamboyant '80s pop/fashion/culture icon Boy George and his act Culture Club will hit the The Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion on Friday, August 11 as part of The Letting It Go Show, a 25-city summer U.S. tour featuring the three Big '80s acts. The day before The Woodlands stop, the tour will hit Dos Equis Pavilion in Dallas on Thursday, August 10 and Austin's Germania Insurance Amphitheater on Saturday, August 12.

Tickets for the Live Nation-produced show will be available starting with a Citi presale beginning on Wednesday, April 19. Expect more presales throughout the week ahead of the general onsale, which starts at 10 am Friday, April 21 at livenation.com.

As for the show, fans can expect Culture Club's singalong faves such as "Karma Chameleon," "Church of the Poisoned Mind," and the reggae-inspired song that started it all, "Do You Really Want To Hurt Me.” Boasting seven straight Top Ten hits in the U.S. and UK, Culture Club became a pop powerhouse through the early and mid-'80s, before pausing and eventually disbanding.

A lighting rod for identity politics and a style maverick who often donned androgynous and even head-scratching looks, Boy George (née George Alan O'Dowd) made a grandiose return in 1992 with his haunting, ethereal cover of Dave Berry's "The Crying Game" became the title song for the Oscar-nominated film of the same name. His resurgence led to his autobiography, Take It Like a Man, which was published in 1995. Devotees rejoiced when the Culture Club trio reunited in 1998, issuing the two-disc set VH1 Storytellers/Greatest Hits. (The current Culture Club lineup features George with bandmates Roy Hay and Mikey Craig.)

A favorite of '80s dance clubs long before they hit the mainstream, electronic dance/New Wave act Berlin shocked and rocked with its single "Sex (I'm A...)," which sparked bans and outrage with its (then) outrageous lyrics and lead singer Teri Nunn's sultry, breathy stylings. Chart toppers "No More Words" and the clubby "The Metro" followed, but the band struck solid gold with its lush ballad "Take My Breath Away," the unforgettable love scene track in Tom Cruise's Top Gun. Herself also an '80s icon, Nunn is seemingly ageless and was recently ranked No. 11 on VH1.com’s “100 Greatest Women in Rock.”

Photo courtesy of Culture Club

Boy George and Culture Club headline The Letting It Go Show tour.

With more than 10 million albums sold worldwide, Howard Jones has transitioned from '80s and '90s pop act to current relevance thanks to his poppy, hummable hits be9ing used in screen hits like Stranger Things, Breaking Bad, The Watchmen, and more. Bursting on the scene as a hot new British act with "New Song," Jones (or HoJo as fans know him) followed with anthemic hits like "Everlasting Love," "What is Love," and "Life in One Day." Cherished for those smash singles and the slow singalong "No One is to Blame," he returned in the '90s with feel-good single "Lift Me Up."

Here is the full schedule of The Letting It Go tour dates:

Thu Jul 13 – West Palm Beach, FL – iTHINK Financial Amphitheatre

Sat Jul 15 – Tampa, FL – MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Amphitheatre

Sun Jul 16 – Jacksonville, FL – Daily's Place Amphitheatre

Tue Jul 18 – Atlanta, GA – Cadence Bank Amphitheatre at Chastain Park

Wed Jul 19 – Charlotte, NC – PNC Music Pavilion

Thu Jul 20 – Nashville, TN – Ascend Amphitheater

Sat Jul 22 – Bethel, NY – Bethel Woods Center for the Arts

Sun Jul 23 – Wantagh, NY – Northwell Health at Jones Beach Theater

Tue Jul 25 – Mansfield, MA – Xfinity Center

Wed Jul 26 – Holmdel, NJ – PNC Bank Arts Center

Fri Jul 28 – Bristow, VA – Jiffy Lube Live

Sat Jul 29 – Darien Center, NY – Darien Lake Amphitheater

Sun Jul 30 – Philadelphia, PA – TD Pavilion at the Mann

Tue Aug 01 – Toronto, ON – Budweiser Stage

Thu Aug 03 – Tinley Park, IL – Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre

Fri Aug 04 – Clarkston, MI – Pine Knob Music Theatre

Sat Aug 05 – Cincinnati, OH – Riverbend Music Center

Tue Aug 08 – Kansas City, MO – Starlight Theatre

Thu Aug 10 – Dallas, TX – Dos Equis Pavilion

Fri Aug 11 – The Woodlands, TX – Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavilion

Sat Aug 12 – Austin, TX – Germania Insurance Amphitheater

Mon Aug 14 – Rogers, AR – Walmart AMP

Fri Aug 18 – Phoenix, AZ – Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre

Sat Aug 19 – San Diego, CA – North Island Credit Union Amphitheatre

Sun Aug 20 – Concord, CA – Concord Pavilion

Movie Review

Offbeat drama Pillion features command performance by Alexander Skarsgård

Photo courtesy of A24

Alexander Skarsgård and Harry Melling in Pillion.

Describing the new movie Pillion is almost an act of futility. It contains a variety of seemingly disparate parts that coalesce into a whole to make it utterly fascinating. Few other recent films have been able to walk the line between filthy and wholesome in quite the way this one does, and that’s only because few other filmmakers would actually dare to try.

It centers on Colin (Harry Melling), a meek man in his mid-thirties who still lives at home with his parents, Pete (Douglas Hodge) and Peggy (Lesley Sharp), while working a dead-end job giving out parking tickets. While performing in a barbershop quartet at his local pub, Colin catches the eye of biker Ray (Alexander Skarsgård), who summons him for a clandestine hook-up the following day (which just so happens to be Christmas Day).

With barely a word exchanged between them, Ray establishes a dominance over Colin that quickly leads to them starting a relationship in which Colin does anything Ray asks. And that means more than just sex: Colin, whether desperate for any kind of affection or unlocking a side of himself he hadn’t known, readily agrees to cook, clean, shop, and basically do whatever else Ray wants him to do.

Written and directed by first-time feature filmmaker Harry Lighton, the film is astonishing in the way it’s able to mine humor from Colin and Ray’s atypical bond. To call Ray “unfeeling” might not be totally accurate, but the way he treats Colin borders on cruel. However, the way Lighton structures the film, it’s easy to understand why someone like Colin would be willing to go along with the situation. It’s both hilarious and heartbreaking to see Colin debase himself in a variety of ways.

On the flip side is Colin’s heartfelt arc with his parents. It’s established right away that Peggy, who is sick with cancer, is a bit too involved with Colin’s love life, with the opening scene featuring her setting him up on a blind date. But their easy acceptance of his queerness and desire to see him find love is as heartwarming as it gets. The juxtaposition between the wholesomeness of their family and Colin’s new life is also the source of a good amount of comedy.

Lighton does not shy away from the sexual side of Colin and Ray’s relationship, and the scenes he depicts are as graphic as you are likely to see in an R-rated film. Some go up to and a little past what might be expected in a mainstream movie (including the use of a certain fake appendage). Other times they play out in a comical way to illustrate just how far Colin has progressed from the person he was when the film started.

Skarsgård, who stole the show in the Charli XCX movie The Moment, is the attraction in more ways than one in this film. The part calls for someone who’s not only impossibly handsome, but also a person who can stop dissent with just a glance, and he lives up to both qualities equally well. Melling, best known for playing Neville Longbottom in the Harry Potter movies, also embodies his role perfectly. He plays Colin as weak enough to be run roughshod over by Ray, but not so hopeless as to not be worth rooting for.

Pillion (which is the name of the secondary seat on a motorcycle on which Colin rides multiple times in the film) operates at a storytelling level that is difficult to achieve. Many people will not fully understand the film’s central relationship, but the way it is showcased by Lighton makes it compelling, gut-wrenching, and sexy.

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Pillion is now playing in theaters.

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