Songoftheday 11/20/17 - Summer's gone winter's in your eyes, I can feel the thunder storms inside...
from the album Real Life (1991)
Billboard Hot 100 peak: #40 (one week)
Weeks in the Top-40: 1
Today's song of the day comes from the Scottish new wave band Simple Minds, whose 1985 album Once Upon A Time, which followed their breakthrough in America with the Breakfast Club soundtrack #1 hit "Don't You (Forget About Me)", had scored them an additional three top-40 pop hits with "Alive & Kicking", "Sanctify Yourself", and "All The Things She Said". With their big sound and emotional and pensive lyrics, it seemed like they were on track to being the Scottish equivalent to Irish friends U2; in fact, with their next album Street Fighting Years, they did what Bono and the Edge didn't, and that was to tackle political issues head on. In fact, while U2's Rattle And Hum seemed like a step back for them lyrically in 1989, lead singer Jim Kerr, guitarist Charlie Burchill, keyboard player Mick Macneil, and drummer Mel Gaynor gave mighty weight to the songs in Street Fighting Years. In the UK they were rewarded with the biggest single of their career with the Ballad Of The Streets EP that topped the British singles charts (it had album cuts "Belfast Child", "Mandela Day", and a remake of Peter Gabriel's "Biko"). But in the U.S., while three songs reached the top 20 on the modern rock radio chart ("Mandela Day", "This Is Your Land", and "Take A Step Back"), none of them touched the pop Hot 100 in America at all.
The group, now officially a trio with studio musicians filling in after the departure of MacNeil, came back in 1991 with their ninth album Real Life. Produced by Stephen Lipson (Pet Shop Boys, Annie Lennox), the album's lyrics were more toned down, and the production back to the late 80s arena rock standard. The first single from the record, "Let There Be Love", was a decent international hit, reaching #6 in the UK and hit the top of the singles chart in Italy. The second release, "See The Lights", was the track that brought American success back. Written by Kerr and Burchill, it would be their final top-40 hit in the States, with a reserved, mature sound more akin to Winwood and Sting than Bono and the Edge...
"See The Lights" became Simple Minds' fifth and final top-40 pop hit in June of 1991. The song did much better on rock radio, topping Billboard's Modern Rock list for two weeks and climbing to #10 on their Mainstream Rock tally. Internationally, the song reached the top-40 in Canada (#10), Ireland (#16), the UK (#20), Italy (#24), and Sweden (#27).
Their follow-up single, "Stand By Love", got to #4 on the Modern Rock chart and #42 Mainstream Rock, but missed the pop Hot 100 altogether (it did reach #13 in Britain). The title track "Real Life" nabbed them a fourth top-40 hit in the UK from the album at #34.
Gaynor left Simple Minds a duo of Kerr and Burchill with supporting musicians after their greatest hits set in 1992, which scored another top-10 hit in the UK with a re-release of their 1981 single "Love Song". After a break, the pair along with producers and studio help recorded Good News From The Next World. The lead single, "She's A River", landed them back into the top ten in the UK (#6), Canada (#3), and Italy (#2), but while the song made it to #6 on Billboard's Modern Rock chart, it stopped short right under the halfway mark on the pop chart at #52 in the U.S. A second single, "And The Band Played On", was their most recent American success, slipping on to the modern rock tally at #40 in 1995. Their next record, Neapolis, contains their most recent British top-40 hit with "Glitterball" (#18, 1998).
In the new century, Gaynor ended up returning to Simple Minds, and they have been releasing studio and live work periodically ever since. In 2005, they nearly made the top-40 in the UK when "Home" from their Black and White 050505 record stopped short at #41. The bands most recent studio album is their Acoustic collection of their previous songs remade, which got to #16 in the UK in 2016.
(Click below to see the rest of the post)
Here's the group performing live in concert in 1991...
... and again appearing on the Arsenio Hall show to promote the album...
Fast forward to 2009 with a concert in Switzerland with an ill Kerr...
and finally, their version from their Acoustic album from 2016..
Up tomorrow: A Canadian rocker steals from the rich and gives to the poor for the biggest hit of 1991.
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