Review: Decades after heydays, can Toto and Men at Work still put on good shows?
Just two songs into his band’s 45-minute set — and, overall, only a third of the way through a celebration of (largely) ’80s rock of the (predominantly) yacht variety — Colin Hay was looking pleased with himself.
“You didn’t expect that,” the Men at Work lead singer boasted, perhaps referring to the decision to cover a deep cut (“Can’t Take This Town”) off of a 33-year-old solo album, but more likely nodding to the blistering solo by saxophonist Rachel Mazer that had just put a bow on the tune. Either way, he playfully offered this as an analogy, in his Scottish brogue: “You go to a party and you want to know everybody. But then, sometimes, it’s good to meet a stranger.”
Hay paused here for dramatic effect, before winkingly adding, “Sometimes.”
In a sense, that actually summed up the whole affair on Thursday night in Charlotte, where the one-two-three punch of Christopher Cross, Men at Work, and Toto hit the PNC Music Pavilion stage as part of its 2025 summer tour.
This was a party many thousands no doubt paid to be at out of affection for the music of yesteryear; for “Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do),” or “Down Under,” or “Africa,” or other assorted favorites from these artists that younger Boomers and older Gen Xers still tend to turn up whenever they come on in the car.
But to be sure, it was a party that featured a stranger here and there.
Which was — more often than not — a good thing.
Christopher Cross gets right to the yacht rock
Cross got the show started by immediately taking things back to 1983 with his soothing hit “All Right,” which wrapped itself around the audience like a warm hug even as the hot, setting sun seared thousands of the balding heads (including my own) populating it.
Of the three acts on the bill, his set actually felt the most loaded up with hits /slash/ the least bogged down by B-sides and “time to go get another drink” songs. It was, in fact, like a murderer’s row of boat-friendly favorites that would go on to include “Never Be the Same,” “Sailing,” Think of Laura,” “Arthur’s Theme,” “No Time for Talk” and “Ride Like the Wind.”
Cross — dressed in a purple vest over a white T-shirt, purple pants, a porkpie hat, and polarized sunglasses that he never removed — also was the one who most fully embodied and most openly embraced the yacht-rock label.
After “Never Be the Same,” he gave plugs for both his co-starring role in HBO Max’s “Yacht Rock: A DOCKumentary” and his daughter Madison’s stake in the 2024 film as a producer; after “Sailing,” he complimented two blond women sitting near the front of Section 1 on their accessorizing: “I like those red captain’s hats, ladies.”
That, however, is about as excited as he seemed to get.
Otherwise (and maybe not surprisingly) of the three acts on the bill, Cross felt the safest. Pleasant and polite almost to his detriment, in that the subsequent performances by an irreverent Men at Work and the almost comically rock-starry Toto came off as adrenaline-fueled in comparison.
And while Cross’s voice can often still melt, at 74, it does finally seem to be showing signs of age.
Just as I was coloring myself impressed by his falsetto delivery on the delicate chorus of “Think of Laura” — and thinking that the backing singers and his sound engineers did a nice job of producing softer harmonizing that didn’t overwhelm him — he segued into an even more imposing vocal challenge: “Arthur’s Theme.” In the face of the seemingly nowhere-to-hide high notes required for “If you get caught between the moooon and Neww York Ciiiiiiiii-iit-yy” chorus, Cross tried to hide, with his voice trailing off noticeably during the “Ciiiiiiiii-iit-yy” part and the backing singers offering a little extra shielding.
He by no means embarrassed himself. He just isn’t — as it turns out — holding up quite as well as Colin Hay.
Colin Hay and Men at Work have some fun
You might remember Men at Work from your childhood or young adulthood as an Australian group. And back when they were basking in the initial glow of “Down Under” and “Who Can It Be Now?,” they were. Well, All-Australian, with a dash of Scot in Hay.
Today, Hay is the only remaining original member, and the touring band now features three Cubans, one American and one Peruvian.
It’s also no longer Men at Work. It is, in name. But there are also two women.
One is Hay’s “esposa,” as he referred to her (that’s Spanish for “wife,” and yes, she’s his): Lima native Cecilia Noël, a whirling dervish of a pint-sized woman who refused to be still for the entirety of their 45 minutes on stage while serving as backing vocalist and tambourine, maracas and cowbell player. The other is California’s Rachel Mazer, responsible for re-creating the most iconic of the band’s riffs, including the sax on “Who Can It Be Now?” and the flute on “Down Under.”
The set was somewhat slow to launch, for me — Hay led with the more-obscure selections “No Restrictions,” “Can’t Take This Town” and “Down by the Sea” — but once he found his way to the hits, it soared.
Hay’s voice, which in the lower registers tends to feel like Sting’s, still manages to have the same rich, warm, flavorful texture that it did four-plus decades ago. And it still seems to be well-suited for belting in the higher ones, too, whether that’s the final chorus of “Overkill” (“I-can’t-get-to SLEEP!”) or all the choruses of “Be Good Johnny.”
And on top of that, the 72-year-old added splashes of color to the proceedings that were welcome in the wake of Cross’s relative genericness.
For instance, Hay teed up “Down By the Sea” by explaining it was written “after we smoked a spliff of Sumatran tripping grass,” and that it “was originally 4 hours and 40 minutes — it might even have gone on longer, but we were gettin’ hungry.” “I’m living proof that marijuana affects two things,” he deadpanned: “your short-term memory” — dramatic pause — “and your short-term memory,” Hay said, as drummer Jimmy Branly punctuated the joke by knocking a ba-dum-bump into his snares.
A few songs later, noticing that the crowd had taken a load off during “It’s a Mistake,” he teased: “It’s a rock show, so you can stand up. You don’t have to sit on your asses for the whole night.”
In truth, so far, it had been a yacht-rock show and a new-wave pop-rock. The show hadn’t yet really showcased any real, honest-to-goodness rock.
But it was about to. Sort of.
Toto shows off old favorites, new member
Toto was also a featured artist in that “Yacht Rock” documentary, because the band also often is associated with that subgenre/subculture.
But there’s always been an edge there, too, one that was on display from the get-go Thursday. The seven-piece group kicked things off with the instrumental rocker “Child’s Anthem” and then segued into 1984’s “Carmen,” which was bolstered by blazing lead-guitar work and hair-metal-heyday-ready vocals.
Through 15 songs and 93 minutes, they did a nice job careening back and forth between driving, boisterous, jazzy rock and selections like “I Won’t Hold You Back” and “I’ll Be Over You” that showed their softer side.
And overall — despite the group being close to 50 years old, with David Paitch basically retired and Steve Lukather the only remaining original member — Toto proved that it’s holding up remarkably well. The chemistry is solid, the instrumentation and the arrangements are tight, the five-part vocal harmonies are pleasurable.
Lukather, now the de facto bandleader, proved a capable host from the start.
Raising a bottle of non-alcoholic Corona after a super-sized rendition of the crowd-favorite “Rosanna,” the long-sober lead guitarist quipped, “Going to toast you with my fake beer,” then added, “Please, have a real one!”
It admittedly can be hard to take your eyes off of Lukather, perhaps because of that Albert Einstein-esque shock of white hair; but more likely because, even at 67 years old, he’s still got some impressively fast fingers that didn’t seem to lose any steam over the course of Toto’s 93-minute set.
If there’s a legitimate challenger for the title of Most Magnetic Toto Member, it’s the new-guy: Dennis Atlas, who was added to the lineup just last year.
In his case, it might be the curly hair and facial features that combine to make him look like a young Kenny G (though Atlas’s mane is twice as long). Or it might be his talent for striking rock-god poses whether in front of his keyboards or at the front of the stage, as he did while taking lead vocals on “Angel Don’t Cry” with his shades-of-James-LaBrie-of-Dream-Theater voice.
Atlas also stands out simply because he’s so fresh-faced. When Lukather introduced the band members, he said “all but one of us have known each other for at least 30 years, if not our entire lives.” Moments later he announced Atlas as being just 27, by far the youngest person on stage in Charlotte on Thursday night — and given the target audience, among the younger faces in the entire venue.
As Hay might say, Atlas was a stranger who turned out to be good to meet.
But as Lukather knows, in the end — like, in the literal end — we all came to hear “Africa”: Before closing with their most famous, and most yacht-rock-y hit, he smiled and said, simply, “Y’all ready to hear that song now?”
Toto’s setlist
1. “Child’s Anthem”
2. “Carmen”
3. “Rosanna”
4. “99”
5. “Mindfields”
6. “Pamela”
7. “I Won’t Hold You Back”
8. “Angel Don’t Cry”
9. “Georgy Porgy”
10. “White Sister”
11. “I’ll Be Over You”
12. “Stop Loving You”
13. “I’ll Supply the Love”
14. “Hold the Line”
15. “Africa”
Men at Work’s setlist
1. “No Restrictions”
2. “Can’t Take This Town”
3. “Down by the Sea”
4. “Overkill”
5. “It’s a Mistake”
6. “Who Can It Be Now?”
7. “Down Under”
8. “Be Good Johnny”
Christopher Cross’s setlist
1. “All Right”
2. “Never Be the Same”
3. “I Really Don’t Know Anymore”
4. “Sailing”
5. “Think of Laura”
6. “Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do)”
7. “The Light Is On”
8. “No Time for Talk”
9. “Ride Like the Wind”
This story was originally published August 15, 2025 at 1:29 PM.
