Jim Kerr believes that “gesture music” allows Simple Minds to continue selling out arenas.
The 66-year-old singer credits anthems such as Don’t You (Forget About Me) and Alive and Kicking for enabling the band to continue performing to big crowds after more than four decades in the business.
Jim, who has penned the new memoir Our Secrets Are The Same with his friend and bandmate Charlie Burchill, told Classic Pop magazine: “Looking back, I can see that sometimes we were trying too hard.
“If you’re trying to reach the back of the crowd, but the TV cameras are up close, sometimes you can seem a bit over the top. So the words that would come in the slipstream of that, like ‘pompous’…. I can see that now.”
The Scottish musician continued: “But let’s also be honest, the reason we’re still here today, and the reason we’re back in arenas, is because of the music we made around that time – the big gesture music.
“There might be around 20 per cent who want to hear us play Theme for Great Cities, and they’ll hear it. But if you’re bringing the wife and kids, they’re not going to be asking for our attempts at being Kraftwerk.”
Simple Minds will celebrate their 50th anniversary in 2027 and Kerr confessed that he has given some thought to how the band will bow out.
The Promised You a Miracle artist said: “It’s not like we’re going to say, ‘Here’s a gun with two bullets in it.’
“But I don’t think we should just dwindle away. I think we should give everyone the chance for a final hurrah, whenever that is.”
However, Charlie thinks that Simple Minds will be performing for a long time to come.
The 65-year-old guitarist said: “Jim has a nice line about every great story needing a great ending. And I get that. You don’t want to fizzle out.
“But in some ways, things are evolving in our favour right now. To me, we still feel like a work in progress, and we recently had a conversation that turned the whole thing inside out.
“It definitely didn’t sound like a band that’s ready to call it a day. I think you’re going to have to put up with us for a while yet.”