Simple Minds — this sound has been with me all my life

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Simple Minds have some incredibly moving, slow songs. And yet their music always brings this one image to mind: a man sunk deep into his armchair, the music blasting towards him so powerfully that his hair blows backwards and even the lampshade tips to one side.

When ‘Waterfront’ starts, I know exactly why.

That bass, that force, that forward drive. I already love it on their records. But live, this music takes on a whole other power. Energy comes off the stage and passes straight into you. Sitting or standing there, you feel the music carrying you along.

When I need energy, Simple Minds are simply wonderful for me.

From my father’s car to the present day

My father used to listen to Simple Minds in the car. Later, when I had my own first car, I played them constantly too. I had fitted Canton speakers and a Sony car stereo with a CD changer. When that powerful sound kicked in, it was wonderful.

Whenever I think of my first car today, somehow I always hear Simple Minds too.

They were a fixture of my youth. ‘Don’t You (Forget About Me)’ was the ultimate anthem. It came out in 1985, and all it takes is the opening bars for that feeling to return.

That still happens today. Some bands you rediscover at some point. Simple Minds have really always stayed with me.

The voice has remained — and so has the friendship behind it

Whenever I think of the band, Jim Kerr immediately comes to mind. For me, that voice and the way he stands on stage are inseparable from Simple Minds.

I had almost forgotten how many other musicians have come and gone over the decades. The other constant is guitarist Charlie Burchill. The two have known each other since they were eight. I find that remarkable: two school friends become musicians and, almost half a century later, they are still sharing a stage.

Simple Minds emerged in Glasgow in late 1977 from the world of punk band Johnny & The Self-Abusers. If you mainly know the big anthems, try the early records. Much of that music is more angular, electronic and experimental than you might expect.

With New Gold Dream (81–82–83–84) in 1982, Sparkle in the Rain in 1984 and Once Upon a Time in 1985, that sound grew ever bigger. Musicians including bassist Derek Forbes, keyboard player Mick MacNeil and drummer Mel Gaynor made a crucial contribution.

By Direction of the Heart in 2022, the official count had reached 18 studio albums. Then there are the live albums and special projects such as Acoustic. There is plenty to discover. But beyond all that history, what excites me most is the power this band still brings to the stage.

When ‘Waterfront’ begins

Few songs represent Simple Minds for me quite like ‘Waterfront’. I hear that bass and I am immediately drawn in.

That makes the story of how the figure came about all the more lovely. Derek Forbes was experimenting with the sampling function of a Dynacord amplifier. A short passage repeated, and suddenly that pulse was there. Essentially a single note — and something like this comes out of it.

Forbes has described Jim Kerr sitting on top of his large bass cabinet, writing lyrics in his notebook while Forbes played him the figure. I can picture it perfectly. The bass runs below, while the singer sits above and senses what it might become.

Kerr was thinking about the changes in his home city. The Clyde shipyards were closing, and Glasgow was losing part of its industrial world. But walking by the river, he also saw a sign of something returning: salmon were swimming in water that had previously been polluted.

Knowing that story may make you listen a little differently. For me, the song has always had something uplifting about it. It starts moving and takes you with it.

Simple Minds live in Nuremberg: what these songs can do

I have seen Simple Minds live twice. That acoustic concert at Nuremberg’s Meistersingerhalle in 2017 has particularly stayed with me.

Acoustic had come out the previous year. For it, the band rebuilt their songs with acoustic instruments. Where electric guitars and electronic textures usually create that huge sound, several acoustic guitars now interweave, supported by bass, percussion and vocals.

You have to hear ‘Waterfront’ and ‘Someone Somewhere in Summertime’ this way. Then perhaps you will understand a little of what fascinates me about it.

Some of it comes across on the record. But in Nuremberg, that power truly overwhelmed me. The force they generated with those guitars, the way they drove the sound forwards — it completely knocked me out.

I knew the songs already. And yet I stood there hardly able to believe what they were doing with them.

The band had worked extensively on the arrangements for this project. Following a radio session and their appearance at Zermatt Unplugged in 2016, the album eventually took shape. For me, it reveals how well these songs are built. Give them different instruments, approach them in a completely different way, and that power is still there.

The London acoustic performance also became a concert film, Acoustic in Concert, released in formats including a CD edition. But Nuremberg remains something of its own for me. It was even more powerful than the record.

Songs that come straight back

‘Someone Somewhere in Summertime’ still sounds sensational to me. It has a spaciousness that continues to grab me, electrically and acoustically alike.

When I read that Bono had chosen it as one of his Desert Island Discs, I could understand completely. He also talked about the influence Simple Minds had on U2. With this song, that does not surprise me at all.

And then ‘Alive and Kicking’. ‘Sanctify Yourself’. These are exactly the songs that bring back that picture of the armchair.

On ‘Alive and Kicking’, it is worth listening closely to Robin Clark. Her voice is an important part of the recording. She had previously sung on David Bowie’s Young Americans, and producer Jimmy Iovine brought her into the studio with Simple Minds. For me, her interplay with Jim Kerr gives the song even more power.

With ‘Don’t You (Forget About Me)’, I love the fact that the band initially did not want to record the very song that would become such an anthem. They wrote their own songs; this one came from Keith Forsey and Steve Schiff for the film The Breakfast Club.

Fortunately, they tried it after all.

Even the famous ‘La-la-la’ at the end began as a temporary idea from Kerr because some lyrics were still missing. Forsey insisted on keeping it. Today, it is hard to imagine the song without that ending.

The studio record that belongs on my shelf

If I were to recommend one Simple Minds studio record alongside the live albums, it would be Street Fighting Years from 1989.

It is simply wonderful.

At first, I had even forgotten ‘Let It All Come Down’ when thinking about my favourite songs. Yet I think it is sensational. And the same record also contains ‘Mandela Day’, ‘Belfast Child’ and ‘Biko’.

Here you hear that other kind of power Simple Minds possess. Slow songs that move you and are allowed to take their time. For me, that is precisely what makes this record so special.

‘Belfast Child’ is a wonderful example. That quiet opening, Jim Kerr’s voice, and the way the song develops. It still moves me.

The melody comes from the traditional Irish song She Moved Through the Fair. Bassist John Giblin once played it on the piano. Kerr was so impressed that he asked when Giblin had written it. The answer was, in effect: about 200 years ago.

Kerr connected this old melody with his shock at the 1987 Enniskillen bombing and the suffering in Northern Ireland. Knowing that gives the song another weight. There is grief and loss, but also a longing for life to become different again.

‘Biko’ has a similarly serious background. Peter Gabriel wrote it about Steve Biko, the South African anti-apartheid activist who died in 1977 following abuse by the security police. Simple Minds recorded it on Street Fighting Years.

Their connection with Gabriel extends to the stage: at the huge concert for Nelson Mandela’s 70th birthday at Wembley in 1988, they performed ‘Biko’ together. Simple Minds had also written ‘Mandela Day’ for that occasion.

Having these songs together on one record makes Street Fighting Years a particular recommendation for me. The band can grab you with sheer force. But they can also move you deeply with a slow song. Both belong on this album.

Three live albums you should hear

And then, of course, there are the live records.

Live in the City of Light from 1987. Live in the City of Angels from 2019. And Live in the City of Diamonds from 2025.

I think you should hear all three. They are absolutely terrific.

The first was recorded mainly at the Zénith in Paris in 1986. Many of the big songs were still very new then. Angels takes us mainly to the Orpheum Theatre in Los Angeles, for a concert in 2018. Diamonds captures the evening at Amsterdam’s Ziggo Dome in April 2024, in front of 17,000 people.

The names also tell a little travel story: City of Light refers to Paris, the city of light. City of Angels takes us to Los Angeles, whose Spanish name means ‘the angels’. And City of Diamonds represents Amsterdam, with its long history as a centre of the diamond trade. Three cities give these live albums their names, each preserving a different moment in the band’s life.

The band themselves see them as a connected trilogy. Almost four decades separate the first and last releases.

I find it fascinating to hear a band live across such a long period. And still to feel that energy in the later recordings. For me, Simple Minds have lost none of what excites me about their concerts.

Sources for this story

V Tour 2027 · Official announcement

Official band history

18th studio album: Direction of the Heart

Acoustic tour 2017 and Nuremberg

Acoustic: background and musicians

Waterfront: Kerr and Burchill tell the story

Derek Forbes on his basslines

Once Upon a Time and Robin Clark

The making of Don’t You (Forget About Me)

Kerr and Burchill on Street Fighting Years

Peter Gabriel on Biko

Live in the City of Light

Live in the City of Angels

Live in the City of Diamonds

Someone Somewhere, Bono and Paisley Abbey