So, what do I say here? This is the inaugural post for Fanatical Friday and it can be about anything music related. It doesn’t have to be about Simple Minds…but…this first one will be.
Last night I listened to “Traffic” and the Acoustic Mix of it. That aspect I will leave for discussion on Monday for MMM.
After listening to the Acoustic version of “Traffic” – I never normally put song titles into quotations but I’m finding it hard to deal with the shortened name. I still can’t fathom WHY the word “human” has been taken out of the equation when the song IS meant to be about humanity and people and how we deal with the world from day to day. Anyway, again, a discussion for Monday!
I digress. After listening to the song, I thought about listening to the album and…I just can’t get past this aversion I have! I can listen to individual tracks but when I start to think about playing the album, I just can’t commit to it. And it’s not even because I am finding it hard to like the album musically. I really like it! I just….can’t bring myself to listen to it. Whether that is STILL down to the album signing crap with Banquet Records, or more a general feeling of disassociation?? I don’t know. That “tribe” stuff Jim was on about a few days ago? I can’t tell you how much I feel on the outer fringes now. And for the most part, it stems from him. There’s a …. Cooling off. I can’t help but feel that. And the more I feel that, the more I go running to the fantasy of 40+ years ago. To the Jim that can’t possibly hurt me because that version of Jim stopped existing 40+ years ago. And I know that THAT version of Jim would be sssooooooooo disinterested in me. And I don’t mean as a winch and a lumber (as they say in these parts), I mean just as a person who he’d find interesting and want to strike up a “conversation” with (and I mean reciprocal talk and not any other OED definition. Lol).
So, all that kind of plays on in my mind, I guess. I feel a disassociation and a certain…disinterest – from him. I mean….why on earth would he be interested in ANYTHING I have to say or do or think? In the early days of my fandom when he seemed to express an interest and we had little exchanges, no one was more incredulous about this stuff happening than me! Like, honestly. Very few people EVER showed an interest in me in ANY capacity. I can’t even begin to express how disheartening it feels to watch my Other Half’s eyes glaze over when I start to talk about university with her. She literally could not give two shits about what I’m doing. That’s how it feels. I just never talk uni with her now because I just don’t see the point.
So, I think this struggle to get into Direction Of The Heart ultimately stems from this…disconnect. Whether it is all in my head or whether Jim has genuinely grown tired of me and has lost all interest (of what interest there felt like there was – perhaps I was delusional?)…I dunno. But it is having an effect on me engaging with the new material – especially in the full album format.
I am there, laying in bed and still wanting to listen to them, the music, him…his voice. I didn’t want to fall back on studio recordings. Play Sons And Fascination YET AGAIN – even though I could quite happily listen to it every day for the rest of my life. “New Gold Dream? Nah. Well…not the studio album anyway. Let’s look at the bootlegs you have.” I look through the list – Manchester, 28 November 1982. That’s the one! A most excellent New Gold Dream Tour gig. Wonderfully recorded. It starts with the title track and – there are ssoooooo many fans that either choose the City of Light version or some other version as the best live recording of NGD – but THIS ONE is it for me. Just listen to it! Listen to how up for it Jim is! Listen to that vocal and how incredible the band sounds. Mel’s drumming, Derek’s basslines, Mick’s “festival riff” and Charlie underpinning all of that. The wails from his guitar after Jim delivers that “and the beat goes crashing all along the way” line. It’s absolutely frigging EUPHORIC!
The song comes to an end and I think “Yep! Right choice girl! This is the shit!” Even just the things like Jim’s thank yous and little intros to the next song. How nervous he sounds! He’s such an old hand at it now, with his little repertoire of jokes and anecdotes. He’s absolutely unphased now. But then, you can hear his nerves with every song intro. And I find that stuff absolutely INTOXICATING!
The sound of the mix as well. How clear it is. How much you can hear his voice and how well the instruments come across. Little subtleties of the way Jim delivers the lines to the songs. The setlist order. Everything. It’s as near to the perfect bootleg – especially for the 1982 leg of the New Gold Dream tour as you are ever likely to get.
As tired as I was getting…feeling sleepiness getting the better of me, I wanted to stay until The American. I really missed it from the set this year. It is my favourite live track. I ADORE IT! It is my highlight of the gig, usually. There’s something about it that is a signal of, I dunno. Everything is just right with the world when I’m at a Minds gig and The American is being performed. It’s a weird kind of – I can’t describe it well – it’s the point where I am right in my element. Right place, right moment. The sum of all things.
So I stayed until the end. The American was the last song on the bootleg’s setlist order. I didn’t fall asleep. I had a skin irritation that was driving me crazy and keeping me awake. I stayed awake for hours afterwards. That gig and Jim – thoughts of him from that time circling ever present in my head. Will I ever stop being awestruck by this man? I really do doubt that. I think it’s an affliction that will remain everlasting. Most days I am happy with that. I let it consume me, fully aware of the consequences of it. I let art be an outlet. “Art.” The more serious stuff. Beautiful creations I can make in which he is the centre of it all, much like being the centre of my world. Other times in making him an object of fun and hijinx, I mock myself and this ridiculous obsession I have. I think that’s why the Christmas parody “art” keeps coming. Just me making a fool of myself in full mockery mode. Ultimately an exercise in not taking myself, Jim, or the situation as a whole too seriously.
I still don’t know where I am right now when it comes to Simple Minds fandom. I am starting to worry, and have real concern that I will end up “one of them”. One of those pre-Don’t You lovers. I never wanted that.
Someone recently suggested a reverse 5×5 Live thing. Five songs from the most recent five albums. I’d probably go to gigs, but it doesn’t exactly appeal to me. I’m not even sure Jim’s suggestion to one interviewer in recent months about having a full album setlist of Sparkle In The Rain and Once Upon A Time appeals. Once Upon A Time has always been well represented in the gigs I’ve been going to, with Alive And Kicking and Sanctify Yourself played at EVERY gig I’ve been to and rotations of the title track, All The Things She Said and Ghostdancing there as well.
What would I have instead? What idea for a setlist would I have? Title tracks? Lead singles? A mix? A theory here….
Here goes:
Life In A Day
Real To Real
Cacophony
I Travel
Today I Died Again (because of the line “is this the age of Empires and Dance?”)
Sons And Fascination
The American
New Gold Dream
Book Of Brilliant Things (“I thank for the lighting that shoots up and sparkles in the rain” – not that that particular line is EVER sung anymore)
Once Upon A Time
Street Fighting Years
Real Life
Night Music (“Good news from the next world”)
War Babies (needs to be performed instead of Glitterball – even though it’s the lead single)
Cry
One Step Closer
Hello (“I’m sure our fantasies are quite the same” – near enough to “Our Secrets Are The Same” and a nice curveball to throw in there!)
Jeweller To The Stars
A Life Shot In Black And White
Graffiti Soul
Blindfolded (in lieu of the title track – Blindfolded is better)
Walk Between Worlds
First You Jump (in lieu of Direction Of The Heart – it couldn’t even make the standard version of the album it titled, FFS!)
Act Of Love
24 songs. A very different and unique setlist. Would it have promoters keen? Nope! Probab;y likewise with a proposed reverse 5×5 Live. The promoters want the hits and they’ll only keep booking SM if they’re promised the hits. I honestly don’t know how the band and management sold the original 5×5 Live concept but bloody hell, kudos to them for doing so. And fucking hell, I wish I had been around then to see even just ONE gig! Damn
Anyway, I’ve waffled on and I need to be working on my assignment for uni.
Here’s that wonderful Manchester gig. Enjoy!
