In Here The Sun Shines So Bright – From The “Burning Gold” Memories.

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Looking in from the outer, I see some tentative improvement on “The Group”. At least a few more memories are filtering through and the admins at SMOG (well, more accurately, the admins at SMO via SMOG…same admins? Dunno) at least asked for some participation and contributions from fans yesterday.

It may have legs yet. I still need convincing.

In the meantime, the memories shared by the North American fans and by those who travelled to the USA and Canada to see a gig or gigs have been great to see. Some wonderful phots and videos shared.

In amongst the ones I saw yesterday was this amazing snap of Jim by Cody Fulfer. Wonderful stuff.

I’m Done – Prip Has Left The Building

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I didn’t see the point of SMOG. I mean…the posting thing? I’m not concerned for myself. I don’t feel I have anything much to this group to contribute to be honest. I tend not to with any of the SM groups. Not posting to them myself anyway. Not very often. But I comment on posts and interact with others and get involved in discussions and the like.

Nothing about that on SMOG is much different to any other SM group at the moment. If anything, the official group could learn A LOT from the existing groups…where fans are free to post things and feel included.

Yes, the other SM groups are closed groups, for the most part. But the interactions and discussions fans have within those groups are great. And there is a SM group to suit everyone. And you don’t feel compelled to contribute, but you still feel part of something. There’s a spirit to them!

SMOG is a strange beast. A walled garden that people can peer into. We’ve all been given the tools to contribute, but only a selected few have been allowed to maintain the splendour of the garden. I am speaking in metaphor, yes.

Here is the stat. Today there has been a solitary post. Yesterday also just the one post. The first few days several posts were shared. There has been a total of 428 posts to the Simple Minds Official Group and just 14 post have been filtered through from the fans…the majority of those in the first 48 hours of the group being up and running. FOURTEEN in over FOUR HUNDRED posts submitted. Really?

I understand what they are trying to do. But, it just isn’t dynamic enough and fans are feeling quite…well, ignored, basically.

Either make it more apparent you want the “creme de la creme” of fan posts…or just be a little more easy with things and filter some more posts through, for heaven’s sake! This “creme de la creme” approach would make sense if all the posts so far were to…”a standard”…but they vary wildly. So…SHARE SOME MORE POSTS!

Make people feel included. And if or when that happens, I may feel like wanting to be part of it again. But for now? I’m oot.

Rant over.

Burning Gold Memories…

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Well maybe SMOG will get better. But I fear it’ll be VERY selective and VERY exclusive.

And…I have no memories from a lifetime ago…nothing of any significance to contribute so I’ll keep schtum. My memories will probably just be shared here on the blog.

This post from Carol Loudon deserved its posting to SMOG. It’s beautiful. The note from Jim is wonderful. And to have a setlist handwritten by him is just…wow!

And here I can express just how lovely it is, how much envy I have of it…how much it kind of stings with regret…how much I wish for things…and all from the comfort of my own blog. No one to tell me what a sad, pathetic creature I am. No one to spread scorn upon my feelings.

As for Carol not having met them still? Oh, I do get it. I get this thing about not wanting the myth shattered. Not wanting that…exalted image you have of someone be tainted. But having met Jim several times now, albeit them all very briefly, I would never want it any differently. He’s beautiful. What else can I say? I feel absolutely inferior in his presence. I always will. But…just to be there. I adore him.

Aside from Jim? They are all so lovely. Charlie at the meet and greet last year tried to engage with me…get me talking..and I was just a clam. Lol. But he’s lovely. At Bridlington in 2017, there was a man who was so, so nervous! He wanted to get his tour program signed but was too scared to ask. As Charlie was leaving to get on the tour bus, I stopped him. “Charlie, this man (pointing to the man in question) would love to have his tour program signed, but he’s too nervous to ask. Would you please sign it for him?” Of course he did! The irony of ME stopping Charlie to ask if he’d sign a tour program for a nervous fan was not lost on me. But…I just knew how that guy was feeling. And he was right there! He’d have regretted not asking all the rest of his days.

I’m pretty sure Jim signed it too. But once Jim appeared, my memory turned into a haze. Lol. Such a silly mess of a girl I am.

Meeting Brian McGee last year. And Bruce Findlay too. Having my drumming lessons with Cherisse. And meeting Mick MacNeil just last month. They are all so lovely, patient and kind.

So, yes, I see some good in SMOG…but I’m worried about just HOW exclusive it’ll feel and I feel somewhat immediately ostracised from things. Time will tell.

SMOG – You Can Sense It In The Air…

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Well, what the Simple Minds fandom really needed was yet ANOTHER Facebook group.

Sigh.

I’m already in f*** knows how many. But the latest is “official”. Excuse my initial cynicism but…what’s the objective?

Simple Minds Official for band news only? Jim posts there. Fuck all the wonderful interactivity that used to happen? No more visitor wall? All that is now meant to happen at Simple Minds Official Group (aka SMOG…aka Fans In The Mist)?

Only today did I look on my blog as to what I am pretty sure was my last piece of interactivity with Jim. I’d posted on the visitor wall about a review of a gig from back in the day from a guy called Johnny Waller. Jim had responded and talked about Johnny, saying he’d run a local fanzine and also mentioned Lindsay Hutton too. He said he’d wondered what happened to them. Of course, like a good little researcher/investigative journalist I went on a search and found out for him.

As always, it was a lovely exchange that I’m always so appreciative of. That was in February. It’s now nearly September.

I know he has his dad’s health to consider. I am always mindful of it.

But even at his most busy times, Jim always seemed to take the time to interact. I mean hell, one exchange we had he was in the middle of the Night Of The Proms stuff in Germany leading up to Christmas 2016. I had mentioned an interview in which Noel Gallagher sang the praises of David Bowie’s latter work. Something Jim has rarely expressed being a fan of.

He replied to me…with a rather extensive response, and it was amazing. Those exchanges I absolutely cherish!

I worry that SMOG is the signalling of change…and not necessarily for the better.

It feels like the magic is being slowly sucked out of things.

I shall see how things go…but unlike when I first started to be around the fanbase and Jim was around and as he got more aware of me things just…evolved and there was that great chunk of interactivity…it has all but dried up. Yesterday’s news is now today’s fish supper wrapping.

Adios amigos…

Flown off on those angel wings.

As for me interacting with fellow fans? Well…there’s…oh, take your pick…SMI, New Gold Dreamers, Fans, Fans Club, Fans Club Italia, Sardinia, Spain…on and on and on…

Not to mention fan pages just for Jim…

And one on one and private chat, etc, etc.