The Times June 23, 2025

If the world is a cafe, its ridiculous patrons babbling ridiculously all day long, then Ron Mael is the guy on his own in the corner that you don't notice, quietly sipping his coffee. But he's watching, listening, making notes. Those notes become songs for his band, the legendary Sparks, to be sung by his brother Russell in his unmistakeable falsetto.

If the world is a cafe, its ridiculous patrons babbling ridiculously all day long, then Ron Mael is the guy on his own in the corner that you don't notice, quietly sipping his coffee. But he's watching, listening, making notes. Those notes become songs for his band, the legendary Sparks, to be sung by his brother Russell in his unmistakeable falsetto.

David Louis Bartholomew (December 24, 1918 – June 23, 2019) was an American musician, bandleader, composer, arranger, and record producer.

David Louis Bartholomew (December 24, 1918 – June 23, 2019) was an American musician, bandleader, composer, arranger, and record producer.

Listen Like Thieves may not have been INXS's biggest album—that honor would certainly belong to its world-conquering follow-up, 1987's Kick—but it is arguably the band's best album. Its predecessor, 1984's The Swing, found INXS working out how to fuse their innate "modern-rock" edge with their growing affinity for rhythmic intensity, while Kick was the sound of a band that had buffed all of their quirkier edges away in pursuit of becoming a highly optimized hit-single machine. Right in the middle was Listen Like Thieves, the very definition of a "pivotal" album, not just for what it meant for INXS, but also for a rapidly maturing "alternative" music scene. They always had aspirations of chart dominance, but were also always highly unique in their execution, merging guitar-forward rockisms, serpentine rhythms, vocal swagger, and unconventional arrangements in a way that made them instantly identifiable and a formidable live presence.

Listen Like Thieves may not have been INXS's biggest album—that honor would certainly belong to its world-conquering follow-up, 1987's Kick—but it is arguably the band's best album. Its predecessor, 1984's The Swing, found INXS working out how to fuse their innate "modern-rock" edge with their growing affinity for rhythmic intensity, while Kick was the sound of a band that had buffed all of their quirkier edges away in pursuit of becoming a highly optimized hit-single machine. Right in the middle was Listen Like Thieves, the very definition of a "pivotal" album, not just for what it meant for INXS, but also for a rapidly maturing "alternative" music scene. They always had aspirations of chart dominance, but were also always highly unique in their execution, merging guitar-forward rockisms, serpentine rhythms, vocal swagger, and unconventional arrangements in a way that made them instantly identifiable and a formidable live presence.