SPILL FEATURE: THIS GENERATION STILL NEEDS TO HEAR THE FACT THAT THEY CAN DANCE IF THEY WANT TO – A CONVERSATION WITH IVAN DOROSCHUK OF MEN WITHOUT HATS

THIS GENERATION STILL NEEDS TO HEAR THE FACT THAT THEY CAN DANCE IF THEY WANT TO

A CONVERSATION WITH IVAN DOROSCHUK OF MEN WITHOUT HATS

During the punk explosion of 1976, Ivan Doroschuk formed a band in 1977. The band, Men Without Hats, and once a few adjustments were made, namely bringing in a synthesizer and other 1980s technology, Men Without Hats taught the world how to dance safely in 1982. They went on to have several more hits including “I Like,” “I Got The Message,” “Where Do The Boys Go?” and “Pop Goes The World,” and are still going strong today. The 2025 lineup looks a little different than in the 1980s, but Doroschuk and company are still attracting large audiences all over the world. For the record, the current lineup of the band is Ivan Doroschuk (vocals), Sahara Sloan (keyboards and vocals), Sho Murray (Guitar), and Adrian White (drums).

Their most recent album was Again (Part 2), but they have recently released a new single, “I Love The ‘80s,” which has been a huge success. They have some plans for the rest of the year, including more live dates with one date in Toronto on November 20 at The Mod Club. I had the chance to speak with Doroschuk recently to talk about the new single and also to reminisce about his incredible career. But first, we discussed the new single, “I Love The ‘80s.”

“Well, I just wanted to write something anthemic. I wanted to pay tribute to the ‘80s and there seems to be a resurgence of ‘80s music these days. Our shows are getting bigger and bigger, and we are getting more and more calls. It is on an upward swing, so I just thought I would pay tribute to the decade that made me, as I say in the song [“I Love The ‘80s”]. I tried to bring back a lot of good memories for a lot of people. It is a decade that touched a chord with a lot of people and it is still going on. That generation of music listeners seems to have passed it along to their kids and so the next generation is really into it too. When we do shows, I see my original fans, but they often have their kids, sometimes even their grandkids.”

Although there is an appreciation of the music by fans, newer artists are influenced by the 1980s sounds. Bands like The Killers, for example, certainly pay homage to the 1980s music with their sound.

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“You can hear it in the music today, you can hear it in contemporary pop music. You can hear the influences,” agreed Ivan. “The big drum sounds, the synthesizers, the robot voices and whatnot. There were just a lot of good songs in the 1980s. I think it boils down to the ‘80s produced a lot of really good, memorable melodies. I think it transcended generations and stood the test of time. The 1980s have really been passed along. I never listened to my parents’ music. I have only recently started listening to Frank Sinatra and stuff like that. Not growing up, I wasn’t listening to their music at all. This generation knows the stuff and the music.”

Men Without Hats were a big part of the 1980s. Of course, they have done music outside of that decade, but in terms of the most well-known songs of that era, Men Without Hats certainly created more than a few. Their first big hit, “Safety Dance,” is a staple on the radio and the dancefloor to this day. “In the case of “Safety Dance,” I think that this generation still needs to hear the fact that they can dance if they want to. It was a song talking about doing your own thing, not following the crowd, marching to your own drummer, following your heart. Especially today in this climate of social media, where there is so much pressure on people to conform and follow the pack, I think “Safety Dance” has a message they still need to hear. In the case of “Pop Goes The World,” we wrote that at the beginning of the green movement, the message there was ‘if we don’t start treating mother earth with more respect, she is going to blow up’. That is another theme that is on people’s minds these days. I think we were just fortunate enough to have touched on larger themes. And that is the case of “I Love The ‘80s,” just touching on universal themes.”

Even though Men Without Hats got their successful break in the 1980s, they were a band that stood outside of the mainstream or even alternative crowd. And for many reasons they appealed to a variety of audiences. “We appeal, right across the board, to a lot of people who like different genres of music. We have New Wave fans, but we also have heavy metal fans and punk rock fans, even classical and jazz fans. I think one of the reasons is “The Safety Dance” was basically, if you can make an S with your arms, you are in. In the case of the video people were expecting me to be the New Wave John Travolta teaching them how to do the dance. But when they saw this medieval piper character with a dwarf and the dancers, and this crazy blond, it is pretty inclusive, one of today’s terms. There was no dress code. You can look back on videos from the ‘80s, and you can kind of chuckle at the hair, the clothes, the pointy shoes, the colours, the zippers and what not, but when you watch “The Safety Dance” video it is kind of timeless. I think things like that helped us out.”

Our conversation gave Doroschuk the opportunity to reflect on Men Without Hats and their history. The band has been through some serious changes over the years. “When we first started out, the band started off as a guitar band, a punk rock band and we were doing Contortions covers, a real punk thing. And at one point I decided that I wanted to reach more people. This is all fun and everything and I still like guitar driven music, but I wanted to be a pop band. I made a conscious decision to be a pop band. At the time, I thought Top 40 radio was the biggest platform. If you had something to say, Top 40 was the biggest platform for an artist. Back in the day, punk/new wave was that one bin in the back of the record store but we had the same ideology, we shared politics and DIY mentality. Coming out of the 1970s with the dinosaurs, the 80s heralded a time when you didn’t have to be a virtuoso, you didn’t have to be a wizard on guitar. You just had to have a great idea, a cool hairdo and cool clothes and you were in.”

Even though Men Without Hats were part of the new music scene, they also played with some of the artists from the 1970s, namely Ian Anderson (Jethro Tull), who played on their Pop Goes The World. “The story behind that was that we got signed to Polygram records in New York by a fellow by the name of Derrek Shulman who was in Gentle Giant and he’s the guy who brought in Ian Anderson. He just liked the idea …I think it was the clothing. He saw “The Safety Dance” video, saw what I was wearing and thought it would fit with Ian…this is a match made in heaven. Gentle Giant used to open for Jethro Tull quite a bit in the 1970s, so he was our connection to Ian. But I was always a big Jethro Tull fan myself, Aqualung and Thick As A Brick were staples in my listening habits. He was a good fit. I was really nervous, but he was great. He had obviously practiced it and learned it and it was basically one take.”

They were exciting times. When “Safety Dance” broke, we were in the studio making the second album. We were making the follow-up, the album had done well enough that we were able to do a second. We were over the moon, super stoked…we thought we had made it. The record label wanted a 12-in, and when that made number one on the dance charts we had to pause the second album and go back on the road. But that is just how it was back then. We were happy enough just making another record, exciting times.”

“We go to get one out there,” laughed Ivan. “People are asking for it. It would be good too, because the hardest thing about that song was picking out the references, because if we had put in all the references, the song would have been an hour and half long. It will give us a chance to stick in some more ‘80s references, it will be good.”

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