Simple Minds hadn’t set foot in Phoenix since once upon a time, promoting the “Cry” album more than 20 years ago. So they came at the city with all they had, threatening to blast the Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre pavilion to sputters as sounds exploded into wide-open night. They were joined in this effort by fellow ’80s survivors Modern English and Soft Cell. With catalogs like these, honestly, who needs roofs?
The Minds have changed a bit since 2002. Only frontman Jim Kerr and guitarist Charlie Burchill remain of that incarnation, certainly of the original configuration shaped in ’77, when most Simple Minds acolytes — many of whom hailed them Sunday night in a wash of faded roots and off-key howls of approbation — roamed school corridors, scrawling band and crush names onto notebooks.
Yet no one in the audience matched Kerr’s charisma or Burchill’s ceaseless attack. The former’s shed nothing of the consummate showman, storming across the proscenium with outstretched arms, an at-his-command repertoire and good-natured patter. He even broke the fourth wall, descending stairs during “Let There Be Love” to grasp hands beyond the barricade. Constant shouts of “We’re just warmin’ up!” came across as fulfilled promises more than threats.
Meanwhile, Burchill uncorked a lifetime of solos and hooks, granted his own showcase for “Sons and Fascination/Sister Feelings Call” instrumental “Theme for Great Cities,” once just a 1981 demo to which words were never assigned, tonight a multilayered vibe abetted by swirling, spooky Erik Ljunggren keys. Drummer Cherisse Osei capped it with a workout thrashing before everyone settled into “See the Lights,” the sole representative of 1991’s Real Life.
Which was, really, the only post-1990 track in Simple Minds’ set. Missed were “Barrowland Star,” “Blood Diamonds” or even the recent “Your Name in Lights,” which would have complemented the side-screen ads for band doc “Everything Is Possible,” slated for a mid-June debut.
Instead, they drew from their ample ’80s discography, diving straight into Ged Grimes’ “Waterfront” bass loop, then crashing into pulse-shifter “Speed Your Love to Me” and refusing surrender for 105 minutes. The night’s surprises were a back-to-back “Sweat in Bullet” and “Hunter and the Hunted”; the former hadn’t been heard live in America since an ’81 tour stop in Hollywood and, of course, sounded amazing in its skittery grandeur.
Naturally, Simple Minds devoted considerable attention to 1985’s Once Upon a Time for its 40th anniversary. Helpful animated backdrops displayed album-cover fragments for each number as a memory-jogging scrapbook. Harmony vocalist Sarah Brown came out for the title track and never left, augmenting “Oh Jungleland,” “All the Things She Said,” “Alive & Kicking” and encore closer “Sanctify Yourself” with the divinity they so deserve. She also took a whole pavilion to church with a solo interpretation of 1984’s “Book of Brilliant Things.”
Naturally, everyone came for the songs that brought these bands to the world. And naturally, all three saved those for the end, ensuring no seats were filled for long. Modern English, joined by gloriously’ stached Tucson guitarist Gabriel Sullivan, tore through a short set spanning four-plus decades, smashing 1980’s “Gathering Dust” against 2024’s “Long in the Tooth,” then pulling a reverse into 1982’s “Someone’s Calling,” from the seminal After the Snow, where also lives what frontman Robbie Grey cheekily called “that song,” the one that spawned generations of fast-food licensing and keeps the movie Valley Girl alive in hearts today. “I Melt with You” sounded fantastic chasing 1979’s “Swans on Glass,” and the crowd hummed and chanted along to extend the nuclear-age clinch past five minutes.
Normally a twosome of Marc Almond and David Ball, Soft Cell was joined on this tour by soul-crossed vocalists Bryan Chambers and Kelly Barnes. On Sunday, they buttressed a provocatively weird songbook fashioned ages ago in the sub-sub-basement of an art school’s fetish disco. Between the covers (two very famous ones), the quartet toured “Monoculture,” “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye,” the Pet Shop Boys-free Pet Shop Boys collaboration “Purple Zone” and “Bedsitter” plopped between a “Memorabilia” with Vicki Sue Robinson and Madonna turns and a Lene Lovich-ian perspective of The Four Seasons’ “The Night.” The latter carried a two-blip fakeout that eventually yielded the “Tainted Love”/“Where Did Our Love Go” double shot that dominated charts everywhere in 1981.
Simple Minds, of course, controlled the Western Hemisphere in May 1985. Jim Kerr ruled American youth from the historic shadows of Knebworth House’s Banqueting Hall, singing a song he didn’t write (minus, as he confessed, a few well-placed “la, la, la, la, las”) for a movie he knew nothing about. Yet 40 years later, “The Breakfast Club” and “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” remain an indelible stamp upon the culture. It’s the reason everyone stood at attention, heads flooding with memories as the band smashed into that angst with a “Sing it with us!” And we did. For 12 minutes, dragging the chorus, the “heys,” “oos,” “whoas” and “las” as far as we could. “One more time!” Kerr shouted multiple times, Burchill at his right, obliging his lifelong friend. That night, we were all gloriously alive and kicking.
Here are the full setlists for Simple Minds with openers Modern English and Soft Cell at Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre on May 25:
Modern English:
- “Gathering Dust”
- “Long in the Tooth”
- “Someone’s Calling”
- “Hands Across the Sea”
- “Swans on Glass”
- “I Melt with You”
Soft Cell:
- “Memorabilia” (featuring Vicki Sue Robinson’s “Turn the Beat Around” and a Madonna medley of “Holiday,” “Get Into the Groove” and “Like a Virgin”).
- “Torch”
- “Monoculture”
- “Nostalgia Machine”
- “Purple Zone”
- “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye”
- “Bedsitter”
- “The Night” (Four Seasons cover)
- “Tainted Love” / “Where Did Our Love Go” (Gloria Jones/The Supremes cover)
Simple Minds:
- “Waterfront,”
- “Speed Your Love to Me”
- “Sons and Fascination”
- “Let There Be Love”
- “Once Upon a Time”
- “Someone, Somewhere in Summertime”
- “Sweat in Bullet”
- “Hunter and the Hunted,”
- “Oh Jungleland”
- “Promised You a Miracle”
- “Theme for Great Cities,” Cherisse Osei drum solo
- “See the Lights”
- “All the Things She Said”
- “Don’t You (Forget About Me)”
Encore:
- “Book of Brilliant Things,”
- “Alive & Kicking,”
- “Sanctify Yourself”
