Spandau Ballet star reveals hit song was written after harrowing Troubles murder

Sunday World

17-06-2025

'I'd never seen so many people come together for one person's funeral. It was very special. The queue stretched for miles along the road in west Belfast'
Thomas 'Kidso' Reilly worked on the road for Bananarama, The Jam and Spandau Ballet
Thomas 'Kidso' Reilly worked on the road for Bananarama, The Jam and Spandau Ballet
Spandau Ballet star Gary Kemp has confirmed their hit song Through The Barricades was not only written about The Troubles in the North but inspired by the murder of one of their roadies in Belfast.
Thomas 'Kidso' Reilly was aged just 22 when he was shot dead by a British soldier on August 9, 1983, while walking home.
Kidso was younger brother of Stiff Little Fingers drummer Jim Reilly and worked as a roadie in Britain for bands including Spandau Ballet, The Jam and Bananarama.
'We were born and grew up very close to one another, and Kidso's house was like a party house when we were young,' recalls his first cousin Tony Devlin on RTÉ documentary Aistear an Amhráin: Through the Barricades.
Thomas 'Kidso' Reilly worked on the road for Bananarama, The Jam and Spandau Ballet
'Every weekend my mother would bring my youngest brother and I to their house. We'd make our way across the walls to their house
'When we were young he gave me a record, by the Celtic Fans in Glasgow. You'll Never Walk Alone was on one side, and Over and Over on the other side. I still have it. The sleeve is a little damaged at this stage. But it has pride of place in my home.'
Jim moved to London with his band and sent a ticket over to his younger brother to join him.
'He was a great soccer player, great Gaelic player, he was a great dancer, northern soul, God almighty, unbelievable. Always smiling, always laughing, cared for everyone,' he explains to reporter Garry Mac Donncha.
Tony maintains that Kidso would have been in his element immersed in the music industry.
Spandau Ballet's main songwriter Gary Kemp
'You couldn't find a bigger contrast from Turf Lodge in west Belfast to the very heart of London during one of the most significant eras in music ever. And he was right in the middle of it, with groups like Bananarama, Spandau Ballet and The Jam,' he beams.
But one summer night in 1983 their world was torn apart when, after a confrontation with 18-year-old British soldier Ian Thain, Kidso was shot in the back while walking away.
His murder drew huge protests in Belfast and his funeral was enormous, with the three members of Bananarama touchingly holding a wreath each in his funeral procession and making international headlines.
John Keeble, Gary Kemp, Martin Kemp, Tony Hadley and Steve Norman of Spandau Ballet
News in 90 Seconds - June 17
'I was at home,' recalls Tony on hearing the news of the shooting. 'My parents were both out, up the road somewhere.
'And the phone rang. I picked it up, a woman was at the other end and she was hysterical. She was screaming 'they shot Thomas'. Where is your mother? Tell her they shot Thomas.' That's the first time I ever saw my mother cry. She was beside herself.
'I'd never seen so many people come together for one person's funeral. It was very special. The queue stretched for miles along the road in west Belfast. I remember holding my father's hand and I did not let go. I didn't want to get lost in such a huge crowd.'
Thomas 'Kidso' Reilly worked on the road for Bananarama, The Jam and Spandau Ballet
Jim was naturally devastated by his brother's killing.
'I was just dead inside, and hurt and angry, very very angry. It was like the Second World War on the street,' he says.
Worse was to come during the trial.
'My father had to sit through the whole trial and listen to the details, and listen to that British soldier, Ian Thain, blacken his son's name and make his son — who he had murdered in cold blood — out to be the perpetrator and him the victim,' he storms.
Thain made legal history by becoming the first British soldier to be tried and convicted of murder.
But despite getting a life sentence, he was freed after 22 months and even allowed rejoin his regiment.
Gary Kemp, who was Spandau's main songwriter, grew up in London but has Irish connections.
'My grandfather was from Ireland, although I never knew him. My mother never even knew him, because he died before she was born. He came over to work the roads, like a lot of Irish people did in the early 20th century,' he notes.
'For Kidso, coming over to see us it was that mixture of Irish and west Indian and the whole melting pot that we had in London, embracing all these different cultures
'So, Kidso worked with the band, came on tour with us.
'I just remember him being a really nice guy, hardworking, enjoying the job of being on the road with an up-and-coming band.
The Spandau Ballet single Through The Barricades
'Kidso was with us on the True tour, so we were at that time selling records around the world. News came through to us that he had been killed and it made the Troubles so real.'
While playing two concerts in Belfast, Gary decided to visit Kidso's grave and the surrounding area.
'I was shocked by the barricades stopping you from crossing into these main roads into another road, from one area into the next,' he recollects.
'I had never seen anything like that and, of course, the resonance seeing that as we walked towards the cemetery to look at Kidso's grave, with his little photograph stuck on the cross was a very powerful, poignant, and stayed with me as an experience stronger than anything.'
Spandau took advantage of Irish tax scheme for musicians and moved to Dublin for a period in the mid-1980s, renting a house in Dublin 4.
'We all fell in love with it as a city and we decided to write and make an album in Dublin,' he adds.
'I just remember lying in my bed and the chorus line started to come into my head. That was actually the first thing I put to music, 'now I know what they're saying and the music of the parade, as we made our love on wasteland through the barricades'.'
He remembers playing the song for the first time in Belfast in 1987, with its theme being about a young Catholic and Protestant having a love across the divide.
'We went to King's Hall in Belfast to play as part of our world tour, and I was really nervous about that,' he elaborates.
'I remember getting up on stage and doing that song. I saw a guy on top of another guys shoulders and he was crying his eyes out. And their arms were all up in the air.
'I remember all of us holding back the tears that night.'