Mark Burgess
Just like their namesakes, The Chameleons have hid in plain sight for the past four decades. Formed in the UK in 1981, the band conjured moody atmospherics reminiscent of peers such as Echo & the Bunnymen or The Psychedelic Furs. But the Chameleons never had breakout singles like Echo’s ”The Killing Moon” or the Furs’ “Pretty in Pink” to land them on MTV or American radio. And so they remained that cool cult band you might hear on a Goth night or a college station.
But the next generation of musicians were listening: British bands like Oasis and The Verve and Americans like Interpol and The Smashing Pumpkins have cited them as influences. More than forty years after their founding, The Chameleons are taking a long victory lap, playing their spooky music on a tour that takes them to South Florida.
Original drummer John Lever died in 2017, but founding singer/bassist Mark Burgess and guitarist Reg Smithies are in the touring four piece line-up, making this a legitimate reunion. Burgess has a good context of where The Chameleons stand historically — as a post-punk band rather than a rock band. “I think the last rock ‘n’ roll band was the Sex Pistols because I think rock ‘n’ roll was really, chiefly about stirring the pot and giving youthful rebellion a voice and an identity, and I think that kind of ended with the Pistols,” Burgess told the Arizona Daily Sun in a 2022 interview.
Burgess also said then that his band’s music is more introspective than rebellious, adding, “People [are] telling me that they needed what we gave them that night. They needed it for their soul … and those are the reactions that we’ve consistently had, all the way through on this tour.
Burgess has several solo records and side projects to his credit, but as he told The Big Takeover back in 2019, The Chameleons is “going to be the strongest thing that I’ve ever been part of.”
The Mission UK, The Chameleons and Theatre of Hate play 7pm Sunday, September 10 at Respectable Street in West Palm Beach. chameleonsmark.com ~ David Rolland
