James

I think it would have been either Ric or John who introduced me to James. (I think it was Ric. I only think it might have been John as he was at university in Manchester.) I didn't really like them much but I did love their song 'What For', which made it onto a compilation tape or two.

However, I was bowled over by their album 'Gold Mother', which came along a couple of years later, and I played that pretty much to the point of exhaustion, such that I didn't buy their subsequent album 'Seven'. But I was very interested by 'Wah Wah' (1994), which was a collection of largely improvised material recorded with Brian Eno (a man whose name alongside the production credit will encourage me to buy almost any album. Except, now I think about it, Coldplay's).

After that, I think I bought most of the studio albums and liked them all, although not to the extent that I'd enjoyed 'Gold Mother' or 'Wah Wah'. Then, in 2001, they did a farewell tour, which was released the following year. I enjoyed the album but I *loved* the DVD, which I watched over and over again. It made me sad that I'd never been to see them play live.

A few years later, though, the band did reform and start recording and touring again. I've had it in my head to go and see them but at the back of my mind, I think I was waiting for the right venue. Then the Minx spotted they were playing Newcastle's City Hall and so we snapped up a pair of tickets. Quite apart from then relatively small size of the venue, the City Hall holds a place in my heart as one of the only video bootlegs I had of Simple Minds was filmed there, on their New Gold Dream tour. (I was further delighted this evening when I found our seats were pretty much where the camera was positioned at the Simple Minds gig.) 

The venue was packed when we arrived after enjoying dinner with a couple of friends who live in Newcastle. Having eaten and drunk well, I was in just the right mood for the gig and the generally good humour of the audience, who roared with delight as the band took to the stage. I must confess that I initially had misgivings about what I took to be a nostalgia crowd, especially when they started clapping along during the second song. (Clapping along is one of my least favourite things.)

It was a surprising but very enjoyable gig: I'd anticipated that they'd play quite a lot of older material but in the end there were maybe half a dozen older songs (and maybe a couple more from 'Laid' that I half recognised). I was delighted that they played 'What For' and also the acoustic version of 'Just Like Fred Astaire', which was easily as good as its electronic, studio counterpart. 

But the two things I liked the most were how much the Minx enjoyed the gig - bearing in mind that she knows very little by the band - and also how most of the audience appeared to know all of the lyrics to all of the songs, old and new. Not just a nostalgia crowd, after all.

And while I must confess that I didn't know much of the new material (despite having bought the albums), I enjoyed every second of watching the band play. Tim Booth is a great front man and I found all of the band to be very watchable, gelling perfectly after 30 years of playing together. The songs are very immediate - and very 'pop' in that sense - and almost invariably uplifting. All that said, there were no great moments for me, nothing that set my hair on end. Ultimately, I guess, I rock solid 7/10, occasionally touching on 8.