The Waterboys' conceptual take on Hopper

Touring again: Mike Scott, left, leads The Waterboys onstage during the opening night of their 2025 tour.

It promised to be a show with an unusual concept, and so it proved as The Waterboys opened their 2025 tour before a near-capacity audience at Basingstoke's Anvil venue.

Amongst those on stage was Mike Scott, the band's founding and sole ever-present member. It is said that since forming in 1983, The Waterboys have had more personnel than any other group, with the tally of past and present members now hovering north of seventy. The current five-piece unit have been together for a good number of years and it showed in the tightness of their performance. 

A Pagan Place, the titular song of the group's 1984 second album, was their opening gambit as they ignited the evening with a string of back catalogue gems. A powerful rendition of Glastonbury Song soon followed as they hit their stride. Album track How Long Will I Love You - a cover of which was a major hit for Ellie Golding - proved to be another audience pleaser.

As the evening unfolded it became clear the set was divided into three phases. The opening and closing featured career highlights, while the middle section delved into songs from the newly released and somewhat concept album Life, Death and Dennis Hopper. This celebration of the late actor echoes the treatment given to WB Yeats in 2011, when the band paid homage to the Irish poet with an album and tour.

So why now Hopper? Scott explained that the actor's life and career was tightly interwoven with cultural turning points in the second half of the twentieth century - from appearing alongside James Dean in Rebel Without A Cause and Giant, to directing and co-starring in the counter-culture movie Easy Rider. Also, it allowed a dive into a rich tapestry of Americana including Hopper's friendship with pop culture artist Andy Warhol, and his eight-day marriage to Michelle Phillips, of The Mamas & Papas. One of the night's songs was a ballad to Ms Phillips.

The Hopper section of the concert featured contributions from Barney Fletcher, the youthful guest backing singer who appears on the Sun Records-released album and adds strikingly unusual - and somewhat otherworldly - vocals. Also augmenting the core line-up on a few songs was support act Zervas & Pepper. 

Among the Hopper album tracks played were Hopper's On Top (Genius), Golf They Say, Andy (A Guy Like You) and the best of the new crop of tunes I Don't Know How I Made It.

A towering back screen behind the band was occasionally illuminated with video clips and photographs of Hopper, adding to the conceptual mood. One video showed Steve Earle singing Kansas, the album's opening track co-written by Earle and Scott.

Other notable guests on the album include Bruce Springsteen and Fiona Apple. Springsteen's contribution was on the song Ten Years Gone, which was played during the evening - alas, without an appearance by The Boss.

When the Hopper segment ended it was followed by further tunes from The Waterboys' past, with a clear leaning in to the 1985 album This Is The Sea, possibly to mark its 40th anniversary, but maybe also as a tip of the hat to former band member Karl Wallinger who died last year. That album's Scott-Wallinger composition Don't Bang The Drum, along with Medicine Bow, The Whole of the Moon, and The Pan Within were all performed. On the latter, the duelling keyboards of Brother Paul (Brown) and James Hallawell provided one of the evening's memorable moments.

Having already played the band's most famous tune The Whole of the Moon, it was the group's other signature song, Fisherman's Blues, that rounded off the encore to leave the audience happy as they departed.

In Basingstoke, on the opening night of a lengthy tour with many sold out gigs ahead, The Waterboys showed how they are continuing to push frontiers on their musical journey.

End of the evening: The Waterboys react to the cheers of the audience at the Anvil in Basingstoke