Jim Kerr

That's right, Mr. Simple Minds! We cover everything from Bowie to Iovine to Hynde to his hotel in Sicily... Jim is a charismatic raconteur, you're gonna dig this.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Said Podcast.
My guest today is Jim Kerr of Simple Minds. Jim,
so great to have you on the podcast. A reel
thrill the Pleasure's main, Bob. I've been a follower for
a long time, as you may well know, the ratings
and then eventually the podcast. So I'm really looking forward

(00:29):
to the chat and thrilled that you invited me. So
how do you end up living in Sicily? It's a
heck of a long story. Well, but it's really a
love affair that began with Italy. I was very fortunate
in the sense that my parents sent me on a
school trip to Italy when I was thirteen, and even then,

(00:49):
I mean compared to Glasgow, the city that I'm from,
growing up there in the sixties early seventies, I think
the best way to describe it is to see that
it was a monochrome existence. And as soon as I
got off on the plane in Italy, I discovered the
world was in color, and I said, well, you know what,

(01:13):
when I'm an old geezer, I'm gonna come and live
here in one day. I always had it in my mind. Um, however,
at the age of about twenty. We're very fortunate not
only to be in a band, but in a band
it was already getting quite a lot of traction throughout Europe.
Italy was one of the first places that embraced my band,

(01:33):
and I got to another country very well, north and south. Now,
the south is a different deal from the rest of
the country. Back then, everyone says, you don't want to
go be going down there. You don't want to be
playing down there. The Marfael steal your guitars and Marfa
will steal this. You live a horrible time. Well, we
went down at the time of our lives. And how

(01:54):
many years now, well, oh my gosh, thirty years more.
Um So, still he has been a part of my
life lately. I mean I am now fully Italian resident.
Brexit was a final straw for me there. I thought, no,
I'm not being dragged out of Europe by some buffoon,

(02:14):
and so um I am. You could say I'm almost
Italian national, which not many people emigrate to Sicily. It's
usually a history of immigrating from Sicily. But I'm very
fortunate to people they had accepted me and the stories
within stories within stories, Okay, why Sicily as opposed to

(02:36):
shall we say the mainland? I think the best way
to say this. I mean it's a bit, a bit
of a vague word, but Sicily is cosmic. The history
of Sicily. I mean, that's what it all kicked off.
That's going back to, you know, way before the Romans,
It's the Greeks. It's an It's an amazing place. I mean,

(02:56):
where I am in Sicily, you could say that Africa's
probably nearer than Rome. So you've got that continental drift,
you've got all that history. I mean, it's mind boggling
and right in the middle of the island. And there's
a story there as well. Um, there's a huge volcano,
Mount Etna, that I see every day. Um my grandfather

(03:19):
used to talk about it. He was in the Highland Infantry.
He was insicially during the war and I think he
had the time of his life. Yeah, I think he
had a story there as well, because every time he
had a couple of whiskeys, he would go on about
how beautiful the Italian women were and how great the
Italian people. When I would say you were there in
the war, what about the fighting? He said? He said,
I didn't fight with anyone. Um, it's the greatest place.

(03:43):
And he kind of planted the seed, you know when
your kids and people are talking about volcanoes and all
that stuff. I think he planted the seed. And all
these well, all these years later, Um, if only he
would know, if only he could have known how things
have ended up. So Um, there's a lot of thoughts
that I haven't quite joined them up. But that's only

(04:05):
the short answer. Now you own a hotel there, Well,
that's right, Um, I think let me see a run
about where am I? Twenty years ago? Um, things weren't
looking too great for simple minds. I mean, the wheels
had come off, A new generation had come along. Um,

(04:30):
it's the expression you use. A lot or cheese had
been well and truly stolen. And to my songwriting partner Charlie,
he says, I only I only felt this way for
about two days, but I definitely felt plan bes needed now.

(04:50):
As I already said to you, Sis, Italy was in
my heart and I thought it was the time when
the career was going down the tubes, divorces and all
that it happened. I thought I'm going to go down
there for a year. Get the language see what evolves,
you know, And I thought, you know, we've been doing
this for ten twelve years. Even the Beatles couldn't make

(05:12):
it last more than ten years. I didn't want it
to the last moment. Ten years. I mean the other
thing we also felt, We didn't feel. We weren't embittered
or anything like. We felt no one knows is anything?
What a great time? Maybe that's it? So um all
that sounds very practical, but there is the other sage
you think, well, who am I? What am I going

(05:33):
to do? How do you be ex? Gim care? How
do you be how do you be ex simple? How
do you be an ex rock star? There's not really
a guidebook for that. But I thought, I'll go down
and I'll just maybe I was in my hemmingway face,
I'll go down and I'll be I'll fish for tuna,
I'll get the language, I'll fall in love. Well I

(05:55):
didn't fish for tuna. I did get the language, and
inevitably I felt in love. Was all as a woman involved,
as I'm not, um so, there's always a lover involved.
Um So, all of that came to be and I
was loving it. I was staying in this Uh, friends,
apartment the basement of his place, and I felt so

(06:18):
full of vitality and I thought this, this is the
place for me. And just as I was thinking that,
a piece of land became available next to us, and
I thought, hmm, bed and breakfast. Maybe I could make
that work because it had a planning permission now, and
from a family of builders as well, back in Glasgow.
And I spent a few years in building sites just

(06:40):
before getting into music. And you can imagine when I
told the bank manager back in Scotland, and when I
told our accountant that I was going to buy land
in Sicily and I was going to build what has
become a hotel. They said I was crazy. They said
it is the worst place. Italy was the worst place

(07:02):
in Europe to invest. Sicily was the worst place in
um Italy to invest. And I said, okay, I hear you,
I hear you, I hear you. I won't do it.
I got up pretty much the next day and signed
the papers and we haven't looked back. Okay, so why
build as opposed to just buy something? Well, the old

(07:28):
hotels they come with all these planning permisss. Sorry you
you can't get planning permissions you know, when you go
in those those old, ancient places, I mean, it's very
hard to make it work in terms of well, unless
you've got gazillions. This place was available with a certain
kind of planning permission for a certain kind of building.

(07:50):
Is not the most beautiful building, but it has the
most beautiful views. And that was a big, big part
of it. And obviously I had friends there as well,
a partner who shall we say, had all the right contacts,
and you know, I mean there's a whole book in

(08:12):
in that. But it wasn't all plane sailing. I mean
some nights I woke up in the middle of the
night in the colts were thinking what the heck have
I done here? But as soon as the place opened,
it's been open now twenty years. People go there with
people who content fifteen years on the trot. They love
it as much as I do. And it goes without saying.

(08:36):
I'm not involved in the running of it. Thank God
for that. It would be more like faulty Towers if
I was involved in the running of it. Um it's
run by professionals, and and we keep adding to it
as well. I have to say. During the two years
of pandemic. Obviously it was closed, and we keep adding

(08:57):
to it. I mean the futures calling though, I'll have
to decide the years to come. Just cause it's my
passion doesn't mean I says my kids passion, And you know,
I'm not going to be here forever, so there are
decisions to be made. But but it's been great for
me um as much as it's great at the end
of the night when people come to a concert and

(09:19):
you send them home, happy, revitalized, you can imagine that equally.
So perhaps even more so the people that come on
holiday to a place and you you know, they came
in from London, or they come in from Stockholm, or
they came in from whatever, and you know they look
a bit gray and their shoulders are down, and a
week later they're full of color and revitalized. And uh,

(09:44):
to be of service is a great thing. So how
many rooms does it have and how many people can
stay at one time? Well, we when we started it
was fourteen that was the original planning. We're up to
just just under fifty now, so yeah, mostly double rooms.
And where do you live? I live nearby. I mean

(10:06):
it's that thing I don't go in every day because
you go in every day you just see things that
are wrong. People are having a whale of a time,
but you justly see things that are wrong, and you
think I told you to fix this last week or
you know, or haven't we got that together yet? I
mean that makes me sound like I'm a perfectionist. I'm not.
And then I look around and actually see people chilled

(10:27):
and having a great, great time, and I think, well,
maybe it's not so bad. I mean it's not. I've
gotta see. It's not some rock star seehy hotel. It's
a nice place. It's got sold. Um, people feel good
sitting there and um. So you know, sometimes I do

(10:47):
a blitz. I go in when they're at least expecting me.
I don't tell them when I'm going in. Let's go
back to your inspiration for building it at the moment
you thought Simple Minds was reaching the end of its life.
If Simple Minds had reached the end of its line,
how are you doing financially? Obviously need something to occupy

(11:08):
your time. But if you were, you set for life
when Simple Minds was, you know, up in the air. Well,
we were very fortunate because we've been looked after I
have to see. I mean, um, we've done well, particularly
the last say that was twelve years up until that

(11:29):
time of thinking maybe the game's up here behalf of that.
It was very lucrative. Um but as you know, a
divorce here and a divorce there on a tax bell here,
an attax bill there. But since I was young, I'd
always made pretty good investments as well and properties, and um,

(11:52):
we really had been looked after well. Good accountant. A
woman called Sandra Dodds who was probably more like miss
Jean Brodies you more like a headmistress to us, who
kept us on a straight and narrow you know. She
would tell you, what do you need two cars for?
Are you crazy? What are you talking about? A boat?
What's this? What's that? And she would basically kick her ass.

(12:14):
And at the time she would talk about pensions. When
we were you know, we would only twenty two and
you think, penchion, I'll never be sixty five, Well I'll
be sixty three next month. Um. So um yeah, if
we would have been we would have been okay, had

(12:35):
we remained sensible. So we're in an era where people
are selling their rights. Do you still own all your rights?
Just recently up until just recently above UM, but no,
we have now sold their rights very recently. So what
happened recently? It was time there was an offer there.

(12:56):
It was time we looked at what the publishing had
been bringing in. We looked at the offer, We looked
at how we could be intelligent. UM. The way we
set that up over about a period of two years.
It was a lot of back and forth. We thought
about our kids, We thought about investments that we have
and how we could possibly do better. We considered everything.

(13:21):
It was time as basically the answer, and who did
you sell to? B MG? And did you sell a
hundred percent? Or do you still retain anything we sold?
And that's the publishing. What about the record royalties? The
records now they're they're still there, But of course we
don't own our records. We get the royalties, as you say,

(13:44):
but I don't own them. So what do you do
with the money. I haven't done anything yet, Bob. You
know about some training shoes last week. I guess what
I'm saying is, when you have publishing, they pay you
every six months. Probably your deal with be even though
they can not to pay of what your rode and

(14:04):
then then you get a check, you pay the taxes
and then you can put it in the stock market.
You can leave it in cash. So you know, have
you just left it in cash waiting to see or
you invested it. It's so recent and we have conversations
about it every week about what's the next move. But

(14:25):
guarantee we won't be going and spending it on post cars,
that's for sure. What Scotsman. So why does Scots have
the reputation of being cheap? Is that real? No, it's not.
That's something to do with Walt Disney. I think one
of those cartoon things where you and um, I don't know,

(14:46):
but uh and my experience that is not. But we
like to play up to it. We like to have
fun with with that. Um. But it's certainly not real. Okay. So,
prior to Brexit, Scotland was constantly talking about seceding from
the UK. Now subsequent to Brexit they're talking again. What's

(15:07):
your take on that? I mean, it is a strange thing.
We grew up to tell you, it was really we
grew up in a place industrial Britain and everyone in
Glasgow really there was only one party for us. It
was the Labor Party. But that was the industrial age,
and of course you could see the political figure who

(15:31):
presided over most of her my generation's career was none
other than Margaret Thatcher, who a lot of the working
class would say was a nemesis. I mean, my take
on it was that a lot of those old industries
people had stolen their cheese as well. Globalization came, shipbuilding

(15:54):
could be done elsewhere, iron could be done elsewhere, and
a lot of these places didn't move with the times.
And then they were left the industries needing constant subsidies.
Margaret Thatcher comes along and said, no, no, no, those
days are gone. We're going to close all of this now. Again,
in a practical sense, comes to business, you would say, well,

(16:16):
that's the way it goes. But there were communities left overnight.
Not even any empathy. I mean, I know you have
that in the States as well. Just nothing. Um so
she everyone I grew up with in Glasgow. I don't
think hate is too strong a work to you. They

(16:36):
hated her and they couldn't wait for the dawning of
new labor. A new labor finally came with Tony Blair,
Gordon Brown and people in my generation thought okay, we'll
see a much more sympathetic, we'll see a much more
intelligent But I have to see from my perspective the

(16:57):
time they came in within weeks it looked like that
was a fallacy as well. Basically the right and left
they had all come into the center, into the middle,
and in the case of Scotland, in the case of Glasgow,
most of the population of Scotland's in the central belt.
They turned their back on labor the war as well,

(17:20):
and this idea that Blair was bushes puddle didn't go
down well and the Scottish Nationals started to play a
card then and everyone almost as a protest vote, because
you know, no one was really thinking about what's the
currency going to be as the oil going to run out.

(17:41):
Everyone was just saying, we want nothing to do with
these people in ten Downing Street anymore. And to a
degree that's still the case. I mean, the true nationalists
will tell you that Scotland can exists in the same
way Denmark and Norway in Finland do. But let's be honest, Norway,

(18:03):
Denmark and Finland have had a long time to practice
at in Norway, Denmark, in Finland, you can't just turn
it over night. I there would be a general look
at the upheaval with Brexit. I mean there would be
another colossal upheaval. Um. People would really have to think
about that. I don't know if they do. I mean

(18:25):
what we really wouldn't need. I think with respect to
the people that's in charge, they're just now you would
need a supervisionary to pull that off with some applume.
I don't see that supervisionary from where I'm standing. But
you've got to remember I'm not there anymore. I'm in Italy.
So you talk about living in Italy. You know, we've

(18:47):
been exposed for a long time of people who are
tax exiles from the UK. The stones other acts are
their tax advantages? Do you live in Italy? I mean
a lot of the European countries now have incentives, but
but I would still pay a lot more tax in
itly than most Italian people. Okay, And just to be

(19:12):
very specific, irrelevant of Scotland's place in this, what do
you think of Brexit? Oh? Horrendous? I mean, no one
really took it serious. That's the problem. No one took
it serious. Um, And we woke up that day I mean,
I think I think I'm rating seeing this. The biggest

(19:34):
disappointment I believe i'm rating seeing is the demograph young
kids didn't turn out to vote, ironically, and it was
their future that was a stake why they didn't turn
out to vote. Um, the anti Brexit movements they put together.

(19:55):
There was no campaign that she thought this is a joke,
it'll go away. And and I think we heard that
about Trump as well, did we not leading up to it?
This is a joke, This isn't gonna happen, This is
not gonna be um. I mean, everyone seemed to be
against him, the media, tech, you name it. Everyone was

(20:15):
against him. It seemed apart from a lot of people
on the ground who wanted to kick out at something.
That's what it looks like Brexit. And I would imagine
there'll be some parallels with the Trump voughte. Okay, now
you know there's all kinds of issues with visas and equipment.

(20:37):
Now in terms of your being members and equipment, are
you sourcing that all from Europe? Or do you have
VC issues? Are you caught up in the Brexit world.
They tell me it's been a nightmare. They tell me
everything is ten times harder. Um, that's coming from you know,
our production guys. I mean even today I have to say,
it's like a whole catalog and stuff you've got to

(20:59):
deal with. Um. I came off a bus today, fourteen
hour drive from Luzanne. Now you said, well do you
have to take the bus? No, normally we wouldn't with
that kind of drive. But traveling just now anywhere between
just as chaos. Some air travel and airports trying to
get their act together after the pandemic. But also I

(21:21):
mean even getting on a plane two weeks ago to Oslow.
When we turned up in Oslo, people were UK passports.
We were in a queue with everyone else for about
fifty minutes just trying to get into Oslow on on
an otherwise quiet Wednesday afternoon. Whereas for the last well,
all my entire life you just walked through. Um, so

(21:46):
it's it's still um. It just seems a real message.
It seemed like, um, well, as you know, the slogan
for Brexit was just get it done, and it sounds
like as though that was all that was going to count.
There was no thought about and what's next, and what's
next and what's next? So um, everyone's left, everyone who

(22:09):
was traveling, everyone who does business internationally with Europe um
as paying the cost right now, you know, and something, Yeah,
it'll get sorted, it'll get sorted. But I don't see
any rush towards that. I don't even know what it means. Um,
I have to see I spend my time in Europe.
Of course I live in Europe, most of our friends.

(22:30):
I find the whole thing embarrassing. So you talk about
this moment approximately twenty years ago we said, hey, is
there a future for simple minds? What turned you around? Said?
There is a future? Well, funny enough, probably probably about

(22:53):
two years after turning up in Sicily and thinking those thoughts, Um,
you know, nothing seemed to be on our side with
without a record deal, we're without a publishing deal, without management. Um.
I really felt this is this is going to be

(23:13):
a tough one. No one in the media was interested.
But there was a couple of things came along. An
amazing thing social network where if you were a band
and you would fans still in the world, you could
talk to them direct, so you could say there was
a glimmer of hope there. But actually what happened was

(23:37):
the phone started to ring if you're a good band,
if you're a great band, and I would like to
think we're certainly the former, and we challenged to be
the latter. Every night it seemed the phone would ring,
people started asking us to play. Now. The thing was, yeah,

(23:59):
but how are we going to play what kind of things?
I mean, I don't want to be disparaging, but we
didn't want to do those eighties kind of sad you
know what I mean, all these eighties acts bundled together.
We definitely didn't want to do that. Um, So we
turned a lot of things down. But what we did
do was we started to write songs again. I mean,

(24:21):
the big, the real big thing was at that point
you find out who you really are. And I'll say
to you like this, if you're in the back of
a van or mini boss driving past the stadium that
you once sold out, on route to a club that

(24:41):
is not sold out, you really find out a lot
about yourself. First thing you find out if you've got
the stomach to continue, you ask why you do it?
And he said, well, what's the answer to that. I
remember when I was a kid looking at the old
blues guys. I think, you know, I mean, I mean,

(25:02):
those guys didn't even get paid initially for the longest time.
John Ley Hooker and Chuck Berry and those guys didn't
eventually be be king. But you looked at them and
they were the only old guys then, and it was
written on their face why they did it. It's who
they are. Well, we found out then that that's also

(25:27):
who we were. We were by that time, twenty were
by that time fifteen years in. How do you stop
writing songs when that's what you've done since you were thirteen?
You somehow have to silence the voices that are telling
you this is pointless. It's never gonna be the same,
It's never gonna be what it was. And you have

(25:49):
to decide what are we gonna do here? Are we
gonna go around like just punch drunk boxers because we
don't know what else to do, or are we gonna
recome it like we did when we were kids. Now,
when you're a kid and there's nothing else in your life,
you're eighteen, you're seventeen, you commit everything that nothing else
in your life. You can't believe you're getting the chance
to make music night. Indeed, that's all we ever wanted

(26:12):
to do we've got a record deal. Finally that was possible.
But then you know, you get older and you've got
a room in your life or other kids, success comes along,
you've got some money. You you know, you're living a
much softer um. Are you gonna You've gotta turn your
back and all that and going to a crappy old

(26:34):
rehearsal room again and re engage and going there Monday,
if Friday and work through. Back to the songs, back
to try and make the band great again, back to
finding a great manager, back to finding a great age
And are you really going to engage when you don't
have to because you've got enough pastor you've got enough

(26:56):
of I mean, you know there's billionaires out there, but
I'm very fortunate as much that at the time in
my life. I've always felt rich because I always felt
I had enough. And when I say I had enough,
it's more than people I want to school. So the

(27:20):
thing was, can we engage? Can we really try and
draw something out of ourselves here? And that's what we
decided to do. We were flat lining. We had to
get up, we had to get off the table. We
had to we had to get the ignition going again.
We had to we had to turn the cat around,
get it going in the right direction, and then we

(27:43):
had to find out how many miles we could take
it down the road. And well, here we are whatever
fifteen eighteen years later, and it's gone down the road
and it's gone great. Okay, Simple Minds has been through

(28:04):
many personnel changes and the two continuusing members of yourself
and Charlie Burchill. When you said you got an inspiration
to write songs, was that something individually? Did you call
up Charlie? Did Charlie get ahold of you first? What
actually happened? Well, I've known Charlie since we're eight years old.

(28:27):
We're both from Glasgow, we're both from southside of Glasgow. Um.
At the age of it, we moved into this new
housing ski well you call them housing projects, but as
a housing scheme, a high rise, high rise apartment which
they just started building in the major cities and the

(28:49):
UK and particularly Glasgow. I mean those buildings quite soon
got a bad raw, but we loved them anyway. The
first day literally moving in, my mother said, you know,
as you did at that time, only want one brother,
she said, get out and play, going out and discover
the neighborhood. Now they were still building this housing project

(29:13):
cement sand bricks, and we went down the street and
there was these kids playing on this huge sand castle
and the kids sitting at the top. I later discovered
his name was Charlie Burchell, and we said, um, you know,
can we play? Yeah, you can play, let's play. So
that was the first time I met Charlie. But the

(29:34):
real key moment with Charlie was, and I remember this
clearer than he does apparently, was but three years after that,
at the age of eleven. Um, you remember this because
they I think it was an idea that came from
the States. Do you remember, Um remember with cigarette packs

(29:54):
you got coupons and if you if you saved them up,
you could there was a g catalog. Well, Charlie's mom
saved up a ton of Embassy coupons and she got
charlie six string Spanish guitar. And I still say to
this day, if Mrs Burshell hadn't done that, you know,

(30:15):
I'd be driving a taxi. But I remember Charlie getting
because he was the first kid I knew that had
a guitar, and it was a summer's night he was
in the street with that. Everyone was looking around um
and it seemed like within a few months he could
play t Rex songs, she could play boys songs. He

(30:37):
could and you know, to me, it was just it
was magical. And that's really how we how we started
to hang out. I mean we were in the same
class at school. There was a few of it. Everyone
was starting to get into music, but there was a
few of us who were really into it at that time,

(30:58):
the same time, age or twelve ago. My first job disgusting, really,
but my mother got me a job cleaning the back
store of a butcher's shop, amongst all the blood and crap.
But here's the thing. The first week I got paid
five pounds, well five pounds. Then to give you, they

(31:20):
give you some perspective. I bought my first concert ticket
sixty pence and it was for the matenee of David Bowie.
Ziggy started us tour. Now sixty pence had five pounds.
I was Frank Sinatra. I could take you an album
cost one twenty and pretty soon I had this huge

(31:41):
album collection that matched Charlie's Elder Brothers collection, and him
and I would swap and we would be everything from
Bowie to Roxy Lou Read, all the prog rock stuff, Um,
Alice Cooper, the Doors just we're told a lot of
people you've had on the show, Todd Rungren Sparks, Um,

(32:03):
on and on, and there was a few other guys
in class as well that had that same overwhelming passion
and really simple minds grew out of that. Okay, let's
go back to the beginning. So what were the circuits dances?
Financially if you growing up, what did your parents do

(32:23):
for a living? How many kids in the family. Well,
my parents were my dad was he worked in construction.
My dad or my uncles there were some of them
were tradesmen, some of them laborers. So it was building sites,
cement and sometimes a Saturday if he was building a
garage for someone or we would go and help and

(32:45):
would get some extra pocket money. But we grew up
with those kind of physical guys. Um and Mom on
the other hand, she was from a family of nine.
All the interesting thing was being in Glasgow were obviously Scotts,
but Glasgow is such a strong Irish community. Grandparents on

(33:07):
both sides were Irish, so it was almost brought up
with an Irish culture inside of Scotland, so we weren't
quite sure who we were. We knew that London seemed
the long place away. Um we weren't Irish because it
was real Irish people, but we were definitely brought up
with this culture. Mom she was a machinist. She was

(33:31):
she worked in the factories, heavy garmentree police uniforms, army uniforms,
hard working girls. And I was thinking today because you
know I was, I knew were going to speak. And
my earliest music memory was Mom would get paid once
a month and my aunt would take us up to

(33:52):
meet her at lunchtime. And two things great about that
was would go to this car where we had nicker
Boker Glories which were just wow ice cream and fruits.
And then she would go to the record shop and
she would buy a single, usually the Beatles, um, sometimes

(34:14):
the Rolling Stones, and we go home and she'd put
it on, she'd dance, and um, that was the first
music I was conscious of. On that side, he was
also a big, big music fan. He liked people like
fat Dominos. He liked a lot of the country stuff

(34:35):
we called the country and Western then Patty Lane, Jim Reeves,
all of that stuff really big in Scotland, Johnny cash
Um and a lot of Irish rebel songs. So that
was that was the kind of music that that was
the background. People would work hard, they would enjoy themselves

(34:56):
on a Friday and Saturday night singing and dancing. Glass
was still like that. People Glass region spend their money.
Edinburgh's old money. Um, they hold on to it. That's
the cliche. But Glasgow, and it's the time I grew up,
it had more dance halls than anywhere else in Britain.

(35:16):
People just love to have a ball. If probably Glasgow probably,
I mean to your American audience, if you could imagine
probably Detroit or New Jersey type of environment. Okay, so
how many kids in the family. Well, there's two brothers. Um.
I was the eldest. I am the oldest. UM. But

(35:37):
the interesting thing was you'll find this interesting because you
you mentioned the band. But at the age of five,
kid upstairs from us, because we lived in a tenement.
Then kid upstairs his parents split up and it was
kind of odd. It was very odd at that time,
it was unheard of, but it was his Motherhoo had
left and he was left. He was loved with it

(35:58):
dad and as dad remember his dad coming down. I
remember clearly there was a bit of a commotion and
basically my mom said his name was Joe Joseph was
going to be coming for lunch and dinner and and
he might be staying for us with us for a while,
and which he started great. Another friend, Joe was already
my my friend. Well, Joe stayed with us for about

(36:20):
the next fourteen years. And Joe also was in a
band called The Silences, who you mentioned just recently. Another
music fan. Another another one who wasn't prepared just to
listen to records, wanted to actually get around to making them.
So essentially it was like four boys eventually four boys

(36:41):
and uh and the one one family. What kind of
kid were you? Were you popular? Did you do well
in school? How did it end with school? I think,
going back, the first thing that really marked me out
young I had a very quite pronounced speech impediment, a
stutter or stammer. There was no one else at school

(37:02):
had that, and I wasn't bullied or anything like like that,
So I'm not gonna go down that that road. But yeah,
you know, people got used to that. But whenever I
went outside of you could say my safety nead of
people who knew me, I would I would be quiet.
I was very quiet, and I think I realized this

(37:25):
later on. UM being being quiet forced me to have this.
I think I also had a great inner dialogue. And
I also made me listen much more to people, because
if you're not talking, you're listening, or you should be,
or you're noticing. And only recently I thought, God, that's
that helped me a lot, you know, in terms of

(37:48):
being a writer or or UM. At the time, it
didn't seem to be an advantage. But anyway, it was
super announced that, you know, they wanted to send me
to UM, a different school, and my mother was having
none of that. UM. But other than that, I was popular.

(38:09):
I was popular at school. I was kind of I
was pretty bright as well. I mean when I when
I tried, I would I would get casual one year.
The pressure would be on to do well, and I
would do well, and then I'd get casual the next
year and the results would go down. So I enjoyed school,
I am. The teachers were great, as I said to

(38:31):
you earlier, even on a school trip to Italy. The
age at thirteen. You know that teachers would take us
there and show us the world um or begin what
became a hunger to see the world. So I was
I enjoyed. I I really enjoyed school, enjoyed the cameraderie. Um.

(38:54):
But the big thing was going back to Dad. That
was a construction worker. As I said, you know, it
was all about the pubs after work. And but the
one thing so different from Dad and all his mates
was he was a reader, a real reader, educated himself.

(39:15):
And I remember him taking me to the first library
when I was six and getting me signed up and
him telling me, you don't know what you've got in
your hand. Well, the first thing you told me. He
was so proud because the local library, the local library
was funded by Carnegie, who everyone in America, of course
is aware of Carnegie and what he did there. But

(39:37):
he was a Scotsman from dun Firm one. He told me,
this man has done this, He's built these libraries. What
you have in here, this is a golden ticket. Kids
around the world would die or have this. And I
remember him, and boy was he right. I mean he
was he was banging on there. So that's a kind

(40:00):
of that's the kind of background. Okay, I'm six years
older than you, so what do I remember. I remember
we had transistor radios, we were listening to sports. We're
kind of aware of the uh, you know, the popular music.
Then the we all wanted to be athletes. The Beatles

(40:20):
came along. Everything changed. Everybody bought a guitar, everybody wanted
to be in a band. So when you grew up,
you talked about meeting Charlie etcetera. Did you think you're
gonna be a musician or did you think you're gonna
be somebody else? And when did you say this is it?
This is what I'm gonna do. Well, no, I mean

(40:41):
you've been six years older. You you remember the Beatles,
you know, appear on TV. For the first thing, for me,
the Beatles were more my mom's thing, even though because
you know, they were just your mom and dad danced
to them, and so it wasn't until for me it
was seeing Mark Boling where that was the first thing
that I thought, this is main Mark Bowland appeared on

(41:05):
top of the Pops and you know it was like
the coming of Jesus. Well we thought it was Jesus,
but it was probably more John the Baptist Jesus was
still come. That was ziggy Stardust. But seeing Bowling, Uh,
that's when we started buying our own records, not our
modern dad's records, are not our big big Brothers records.

(41:26):
This was our thing and that was something. But it
really began with a life thing because having the money
to go to concerts. Now, um I told you about
you know the boy ticket that the the other great
memory was seeing um you know when you turned up
and for some reason, tours with start in Glasgow. I

(41:47):
think the agents would say send them up there. You
know whoever it is, the Glasgow audience is a great
one to get a start with. Well, I remember it
would go like this. Let's say it was Genesis with
Sell in England by by the Pound. They would be
on the whistle Test. They agree whistle Test, which was
our rock program on a Tuesday night. The Wednesday, I

(42:09):
think Enemy would come up on the train from London,
so we had the New Musical Express talking about the
tour coming. Thursday would be Sounds, the next magazine Friday
would be Melody Maker. All this build up and tours
would begin on a Friday night and usually I would
be there in those years. But I like telling people

(42:32):
this story. This is I really looked out. There was
a kid in my class who said to me, you
know you're gonna know all this muse all this weird stuff,
gigs and all that. He said, I can get you
into any gig you want to go to, which is
quite a statement. And I said, how come? He said,
my brothers the head of security at the was the

(42:54):
Glasgow Greens. Then I can get into any gig. I said,
your kid, yeah, let's school. And indeed we went and
his brother would open the door and we we got
to see the Stones come through, Bob Marley came through,
you name it, um Zeppelin, the Who. And then eventually

(43:18):
his brother took quite a shaming to me. He said,
you're really into this. I tell you what. Um, sometimes
we need a few kids to run out and get
beer and cigarettes and all this for the bands, and
you know, like a runner, you know, come up and
you can do so. We then got to see sound
checks and we got to watch on the side. We

(43:39):
were just just kids and my There's there's a lot
of stories that came from that, but the one I
like telling the best is that the band that I
loved at that moment, I really loved them as a
band called Mott the Hoople. I know you you. I
think they're spoken to Ian and they were my band.
And he said, well, you know, Thursday night, Mott the
Hoople come up after school. I didn't even he didn't

(44:01):
even go to school. I ran up. I remember getting
the bus into town and the head of the road
cruise said, no, not the Hoople aren't gonna sound check. Uh,
they're doing Top of the Pops. They're not doing a
sound check. Um, go over there and help the support band,
help the drummer. And I said, who's the support band?

(44:22):
And he shrugged and went, I don't know. A band
called Queen. And so I remember clearly being on the
stage and then it just before Queen had come through
with seven seas Awry, Freddie was already in the suit,
the black and white suit. I already knew on hearing
the guitar, what what is this? And so I stood

(44:48):
by that night and watched Queen Blowmat the Hoople off
the stage like like there was no stage, that's just
one and ignored. But in some ways it was like
this is getting to your question. And someone was like
it was amazing education. Did I look at Freddie Mercury
or David Bowie and think I could do that? Not

(45:09):
at all. Did I look at that world and think
I've got to get involved with that world somehow? Yes
I did. I would have been happy to be in
a roadie. I would have been happy to be in
a tour manager. I've been happy to being a manager.
And um, it didn't dawn on me someone with a stutter,
a starmer who was afraid to stand up in reading class.

(45:31):
Why would you throw yourself in at the front plane
and make an absolute laughing stock yourself. No, that wasn't
on the agenda. Okay, I've never been to Scotland. Actually
is Scotland? I mean it's not wouldn't be identical to
Kenna the United States, but some countries, even though they
bud each other, it's like having a glass wall and

(45:55):
you look at the other side. Was Scotland fluid with
London and UK saying oh yeah, I know, to mere
Chest or wherever it was that like a big leap.
Well again, it's funny enough it was. It was a
big leap. London was a hell of a leap, you know.
And of course not so much in Scotland, but you
became aware as you get older of a class system

(46:17):
now already explained to you that this is a phenomenal figure. Um,
we were from manual workers. The percentage of people in
Glasgow who went to university that came from parents who
were manual workers is something like not point three percent.

(46:38):
So there was this feeling of oh, we just don't
do that stuff. That's the class system, that's the way
all above us. We're gonna have to find some other hustle.
And so there was we we you know, and then
people with those plumbing accents and Eaton and Oxford and
Cambridge and all of that stuff that could have been Mars. However,

(47:02):
there was a kinship with people in Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham
who who were all in the same kind of industries.
There was a kinship there. But the biggest thing, you know,
transformative events in my life, one of the greatest things.
People don't do it anymore. We discovered at the age

(47:24):
of fourteen this thing called hitchhiking, where if you went
down to the motorway and stuck out your thumb you
could go on some kind of adventure. And indeed both
Charlie and I started to do that quite a lot.
Initially it was hit shaking too. There must have been
a year when the local venues in Glasgow we're getting

(47:47):
re refurbished or something. So the bands we wanted to
see where coming north that was stopping at Newcastle. Let's
hit shake down to Newcastle and see aggy pop and
we would hitch shakedown I mean lesson two hundred miles.
But of course when you got there sometimes you didn't
even see the gig, but you met someone that became friends,
a whole other adventure. It it's um. It was almost

(48:12):
like for a lot of people the world ends at
the bottom of your street, but for us, the world
began at the bottom of our street. And I remember
getting this is quite cute a letter from a friend
who had moved to London, and he said, there's this
thing called punk rock, the Sex Pistols, and it plays

(48:33):
every week. You've got to get down and see this
hitch hikedown. You can stay with me. Now, what year
woul dat have been? We already had were already sort
of tuning into the ramons Paris Smith's first album. We
knew about this punk thing, but up until then it
was a New York thing. New York that was of
course prior, but this English punk thing, the Stranglers. We

(48:56):
heard John Peele was starting to play the Stranglers and
we could really feel somehow the gates were opening something else.
So Charlie and I hitch hiked down all the way
to London and we started to see these bands at
the Marquee and and hoping anchor Elvis Crystello playing UM

(49:21):
and Enemy was starting to rate about this stuff. And
I remember, after going, I think I want to see
Elvis Corstello in It was a tiny pub and it
was it was electrifying, you know, he was just so wired.
The band was so wired. And then on the way
back it was the first ever festival I want Bob
Dylan was playing in Black Bush at the Clapton and

(49:43):
with the greatest respect, I couldn't relate to it anymore.
After seeing Elvis Costello pumped up and playing those I
just we that's where it is. After seeing the Stranglers,
that's where it is. Um it's really m And of
course before we knew it, this um let's call it

(50:04):
the punk Revolution had cutlet wildfire through the UK and
for the first time. It really was the the lunatics
had taken over the asylum in a way that I
could never imagine before. Before we knew it, kids like
us were starting bands. Kids like us, we're starting fashion labels,

(50:25):
kids like us were making documentary, starting fanzines. Suddenly it
felt like m It felt like the shackles were off.
It didn't matter what school you went to. It didn't
matter if you had a rich daddy, it didn't matter
if if you had a manager in London. And the

(50:48):
liberation of all that set certainly set me on course,
and people are my A lot of artists from my
generation set us on course to you know, still to
where we are today. Okay, it's unbelievably hard to make
it talented, is it? Most fifty percent? So needless to say,

(51:11):
you and Charlie made it. Who was the driving force?
Was that you? Was it? Charlie was a third party?
Did you ever waiver say Okay, we've seen the future,
We're gonna go, We're gonna get there. I mean, you

(51:31):
could say it's all about music, and certainly Charlie plays
the music. But I've got to give great credit also
to the guys in the band Michael McNeil and keyboards.
Denck Forbes was really a guitar player who played basslines
as well as a guitar. The everyone was chipping in,
but as you know, there needs to be a vision

(51:51):
of a writing. There needs to be a vision. What
kind of band are we going to be? What's the
ethics gonna be, what's the ideal is gonna be? Was
the looks gonna be, Who's the producer we're gonna work with,
who's the artwork? It was me and it still is me,
and um, Charlie's absolutely cool with that. I mean, on

(52:15):
top of the fact that I write lyrics and melodies.
But it goes back to this thing and I just
didn't want anything else in my life. I mean, in
those young years, I have to see now, I really
regret it. I was horrible with the girl friends and
and and the wives and all when they when anyone came,
when anything that caused work to stop. I was an

(52:36):
anti social because I was just so into it. Um
And I'm still so into it. Um. But I I
I kind of well if if the people who knew
me around and they say that when I whenever I
turned up with my demo, cassette. Listen to this, this

(52:56):
is what what we're gonna do. There was all there
was always some kind of plan there, There was always
some kind of vision there. Um. I don't know how
I was able to do that. I don't know, you know,
because there was no there was no rock school, there
was no there was no you couldn't go along to
the guy along the road whose uncle was in a
band and could show you how to do There was nothing.

(53:17):
So it was all on and sheer instinct. Um, but
I am. It's amazing thing. On Sunday there we played
a gig in France and this time there was a
lot of eighties bands playing playing there and names you'll know, Madness,

(53:38):
the undertones um oh m D. And the amazing thing
was you talking to those guys. They all went to
school together. Now, I'm not sure what other industries where
I guess it doesn't happen now. Bands really even happen now,
But they all went to school together. Now, I'm not
even sure what other industries that ever happened. I mean,

(54:00):
of course we know about Bill Gates and you know
the how Microsoft began and a rather Apple and and
those guys they were, but it is amazing. I mean,
of course that goes back to the ly Beatles and
the Rolling Stones and the Who and all of those bands.
It was really it was a school thing and everyone

(54:23):
has their part to play and it um fits together
to a point where it stops spitting together. Okay. You
know when bands get together and they start to rehearse,
and it's probably you. There's always someone say okay, we
gotta get gigs, we gotta get an age, and we
gotta get a manager. How did that all come together? Well,

(54:46):
I remember, you know people talk about, you know, in
the early days was also thing of you know, selling
out and you know you're treating this like it's a business.
I'd be like, what are you talking about? It is
a business? For example, business skilled business, lesson one or
first over a gig playing in a pub in Glasgow

(55:06):
and we couldn't believe we're even getting the gig, but
the owner gave us the gig a Monday night that
would be otherwise empty. We filled it with our friends
and I went down a storm and you know, we
looked around. We get paid fifteen pounds. Basically it went

(55:28):
something like it costs about five pounds to rent the van,
five pounds to rent the p a, five pounds to
get a couple of guys to help us, a driver
or whatever. Basically, it costs us twenty quid to put
the gig on and we got paid fifteen. So we
were bankrupt on the first night. That was us. Now,

(55:52):
as soon as the gig finished, I just thought, how
are we going to get to the next gig? You know,
we're five we're five it down. How is this going
to ever work? So I remember going upstairs and I
got I got sent upstairs. He was upstairs the office
to challenge him. It's pretty funny. It's a little Greek guy.

(56:14):
And I said, listen. He said, you bands great, come back,
you can play every Monday. I said, no, you this
won't work. We're bankrupt. What are you talking about, I explained,
and said, you have to pay us more more money. No, no, no,
I'm not paying what I said. You have to pay
us more. We'll fill This place would've been empty, and
I've been here on Monday nights empty. You have to
pay us more. We can't make it work. Finally he said,

(56:37):
all right. It was a steakhouse that the seller was
the music upstairs and we're reading steak and stuff. He said,
I'll do you a deal. I'll give you twenty five
pounds if you turn down. And I said, we can't
turn down. We can't turn down. People have to feel it.
We can't turn down. It's too loud. I said, what

(56:58):
makes you say it's too loud? You're up, Pierre, He said,
the peas are bouncing off the plate. He said, people
are complaining up here, the plates are rattling. Well, we
played there for the next six months and every time
I'd go back and hit him up for more because
we were then wanting to spread, going playing Aberdeen, going

(57:21):
playing Dundee, going playing, studdling, and it became a real lesson.
It became a real you know, a real uh lesson.
It was. It was already a company. And that's a
dirty secret, okay. The dream of a band is to
get a record deal. So you had a manager. It

(57:41):
was associated with the airs. Do you get a record deal?
How did that all come together? Well, that was an
amazing thing. Um Our parents, they were great. Our parents
chipped in to give us a hundred pounds to go
into a studio in Glasgow to make a demo type

(58:01):
um about five or six songs, and I had a
friend in the local record shop who said, I can
get you the name of all the and our guys.
We didn't really we didn't know what in our guys.
We we came in you but he said, no, you
just take it down. You give him your tape. He'll
give it a listen. You know. We were so green,
but at least being he worked in the record store,
he was the cool guy. He gave us a name,

(58:22):
you know, Island Records and whoever the CBS so we had.
I had checked down with my friend David Henderson. Well
go around there again. Can we see that in our guy? No,
are you crazy? You're an appointment? No, no, you've what
are you crazy? So um usually be girls at the
front desk, you know, and we would say, oh, that's

(58:43):
a drug, you know, and maybe you'd like a cassette
and bob. It took me two weeks to hitchhake home.
But believe it or not, but tell you my hedgehake home.
A couple of people had called that the girls had
been playing the music and the recess usually you know,
the interns and the receptionists and stuff. They and our

(59:06):
guys walking through on the way to lunch. What's that
song called? Who's this? As? These Glasgow guys anyway? Big time?
We had no manager. Obviously by time I had hedgehacked home.
My mom said, oh, a couple of guys have called
for you, And I said, well, who was it? Oh,
I don't know. I didn't have a pen at the time.

(59:26):
I was making your dad's dinner, right and I would say, well,
was it CBS? No, I don't think that was it?
Was it? E M I No, that sounds familiar a
christ you know. She said, if they like you, they'll
call back. Well they did, and don't ask me where

(59:48):
we got the hootspa for this. But two or three
called back and they said, listen, we want to bring
you down play a gig in London, do a showcase. Uh,
we'll let the rest of the people in the company
see now. To hear those words was so you know,
people would have died. The local bands where we were

(01:00:10):
would have died to hear the words. To every one
of them. I said, no, no, no, no, you've got
to come up here. What At that time people didn't
travel the provinces. You had to go to London that's
why a lot of Scottish bands failed. That we go
to London sudden they would be broke and then they
would fall out. They'd be living in a squad. I
knew all that. I said, now you've got to come

(01:00:30):
up here. Now we don't, We're not gonna. I said, well,
you know, we play up here. I knew. We played
every Sunday night in a place called the Mars Bar.
And by that time, not only were we getting good,
people would come and see it. They knew every word.
So when they in our guys eventually made their way
up and they did, it was like every song was

(01:00:52):
a hit because the audiences knew all the choruses and
and we had worked it out really so well. You know,
we had our own little light show. I mean it
was I'm talking about a tiny pub, but in our
mind it was Madison Square Garden, and we already knew
and you're gonna laugh at this, the I and he
we already knew the label we wanted. We wanted to

(01:01:13):
be an arista why lou Reid, Patty Smith, iggy Pop,
and it was an American and our guy there, you
you may be known, guy called Ben Edmonds who who
I really liked us, so we eventually saying and we thought, God,
we're in the coolest label out. I remember going down

(01:01:33):
to the Plush Offices and Marble Arts thinking home of
lou Reid, Patty Smith, Iggy Pop. They only have one
huge portrait on the wall. When we walked in Barry Manilow,
I thought, what is this and then I realized that's

(01:01:54):
Botty that's paying for all of this, because none of
the other three were. Let's be honest, um, but yeah,
that was It was a dream to get a record deal.
It was a dream too for someone who hung out
and record stores all my life. To the first day
when you see your single in the window of the
store and I can't tell you that thrill of that,

(01:02:18):
it's something that will never leave me. Okay, Now, all
those early albums didn't come out in America. The first
thing we saw was New Gold Dream, which was on
A and M Virgin through A and M. It was
hard to follow what went on before, even though all
the press SAIDs I mean, so what was going on
when you run Arista? Well, unfortunately not a lot in

(01:02:41):
terms of sales. I mean, what happened was there was
there was always a couple of says to simple means.
I mean, we really started out wanting to be an
art rock band for for lack of a better term,
and indeed we still do, to be honest with you,
but we couldn't help ourselves in the sense it there
was always a few pop tunes in there that would

(01:03:04):
make us different from Magazine, that would make us different
from Wire, um, that would make us different from the
early ultro box um. But there was always this what
is it gonna be? And our first album came out
and based on based on the live work. I mean
even before even before we played in England, our album

(01:03:29):
was out and in the chart just in Scottish sales alone.
But that was the life thing. The record came Now
radio weren't up for it. Um. We didn't like it either.
The debut album I remember thinking, I mean, it was
a great experience. We worked with legendary producer John Leckey
and I remember when you think about this, well, but

(01:03:51):
John in his well, it was a wisdom. Um. We
recorded in this residential place with the Rolling Stones mobile
truck and John thought we'll do that. That was a
thrill to be inside the Rolling Stones mobile truck. But
we'll save the budget and I'll take you to Abbey
Road for ten days. Now. I guess he was thinking

(01:04:14):
what an education that will be, and it certainly was,
because as soon as we went into an Abbey Road
I completely froze the magnitude of the whole the magnitude.
I thought, who you know that you're walking past? Where
you know the Beatles plugged in here and we're pink
Floyd did? I thought, who the hell needs us? It
just we should have stayed in Glasgow and stayed in

(01:04:37):
the little studio and worked on a much raw sound.
I mean not all the guys thought that. Some of
the other guys thought this is great, but I it
was like being a rookie and you know you're already
playing the World Series or something. You haven't even up
until then. We've only been in a studio in Glasgow
for one hour. I mean it was like, what is this?

(01:04:57):
So when the records were making the record, thank so
the engineers and the production, I realized, now it sounded good.
What has sounded? It sounded professional, but it was hollow.
It didn't have the vibe and I we weren't. I was.
I seen me the only one with the problem, but

(01:05:17):
it just didn't make me feel as the demos were feeling.
So it was the first case of demo whitis. We
should have just worked on the demos, so we we
didn't like the first record, but we always kept this
thing of playing live, and even though we weren't getting
radio play, we would go round and round, and at
first there'd be two men and a dog, and then

(01:05:39):
you go back a month later and there'd be ten
men and a dog, and then promoters were starting to say, listen,
I haven't seen that reaction that you got tonight. So
we always kept alife then going, even though the first
two or three records. But by the third record, and
of course now this is insane, you wouldn't even get
the chance to make one reagon. Now it the third record,

(01:06:01):
we were in a heck of a lot of debt
um and looked like we're gonna get dropped, and who
knows what was going to be. But just at that moment,
this new romantic then came a lot where anyone that
had a synthesizer and a bit of a disco beat

(01:06:22):
um in our guys, we're up for you know. Duran
Duran we're coming out Spando Ballet, We're coming out these
the dance charts and billboard. Um. And we had a
couple of songs that started to feature in that. And
I have to say by that time our favorite record
label had become Virgin. That's so much great stuff from

(01:06:45):
sex Pistols, xtc um, so on and so forth. Um,
Virgin started to kind of put out the feelers, well,
if you get dropped, we're here. And we didn't get dropped.
To be honest, we had to buy ourselves out. Um.

(01:07:05):
That was a bit painful, but Virgin picked us up
and they were the greatest label to be with, and
then threw them eventually in Them, which was another great
grit grit label to be with. But the thing with
Simple Minds in Europe, UK and States, it was always
out of kilter because as you you said, those for
three records were released in America. So who bought you

(01:07:30):
out of areas to yourselves or Virgin version brought us out?
The the the bought us out I think for thirty
five grand and the first record we did with them,
Clear the Debts, and from then on in the next
four or five or number one albums, Okay, so as

(01:07:54):
I say, from an American perspective, new Gold dream comes
out comes out on Gold. Ye know, it really gotta push.
What was the perspective from your end? It was exciting.
I mean it's still you know, it gotta push college radio.
Great friends of hers and especially the younger kids that

(01:08:14):
ain't Karen Globear. Jeff Gold was a kid then when
Isaac's people like that on our side, um starting to push.
But even with that, Bob, it didn't make a dent
like it did everywhere else, I mean American Canada and
make sure we got played there and started to started

(01:08:37):
to feel like what we're getting places, you know, selling
out the Massy Hall, and and and Australia. We were
having hits, it seemed everywhere else. Let's just say we
were at the door. We were at the door of
going into the bigger league. Of course, there was this
thing just about to come over the horizon called them TV,

(01:09:00):
but no one knew about that. Then. Okay, how do
you end up working with Steve will lily White? What's
that experience like? And how do you end up with Waterfront? Well?
That was I mean Steve at that time, that really

(01:09:20):
was not very many um not going to see young
ish rock producers and Steve he had made a bit
of a name for himself, especially with Peter Gabriel's album,
that Third Album which blew all our minds. But then
of course the YouTube records, Big Country. There was a

(01:09:41):
point where it just seems Steve was the only guy
everyone was using drum machines. There was a point where
it just seemed like Steve was the only guy that
could make a rock record in the UK. M that's
not quite true, but that's how it seemed. He everything
he from XTC, you to UM so it was always

(01:10:05):
imminent and then we ended up playing well, we ended
up playing a few festivals. But this time when I
said we're going through the big league, same same life,
we started to get asked to beyond some of the
bigger festivals in Germany, Holland, Belgium, and then you would
get to meet really get to meet some of your
contemporaries and people would hang out. One of the festivals,

(01:10:28):
it was a two day festival where we finally caught
up with you too, and Steve was there with them
the first day. UM, I gotta get this right. They
went on before us and the second day we went
on before them, and that was a heck of an experience.
They had just come back from the States with a

(01:10:50):
gold album with War and to say they were main
blowing was I mean, there were I could I couldn't
work out whether the noise were coming for it only
looked like when you see now the huge show. Back then,
it looked like there was just a vox ump um
and they were mind blowingly good. Um so good. In fact,

(01:11:12):
I remember someone said to me recently, Um, did you
did you think then they would become the biggest band
in the world. I said, well, I knew they would
become the biggest band in the world. And she said,
how did you know? And I said, because Bono told
me they would. Um with that level of self assuredness
and confidence. Um. But anyway, Steve was there, He's a

(01:11:35):
charming guy, had made great, great records, and we were
we were wanting to be for sound up. Were brought
in a much heavier drama and it all seemed to
be It all seemed to be right. So what was
the experience like in how you know my favorite song
from that album's Waterfront? How did that come together? But

(01:11:57):
that's a song that was written. Really, I mean it's
it's it's even hard to cause it's not a song
in a traditional sense, but um lyrically, it's about the
rebirth of our city, or city Glasgow, as many cities,
originally began as a fishing village and it goes through,
it grows, the industrial age comes, the city grows, it

(01:12:19):
gets rich, the river dies all that pollution. Then the
industrial age ends. There's rust everywhere, there's no more work.
Guess what, the salmon's back now. I'm not saying the
whole city could live in salmon, Bob, but there was
something in this about renew, rebirth. Take me to the river. Um.

(01:12:44):
When I got the music. Usually the way it works,
as I get the music, and nine times out of ten,
I'm blown away with it and I can just hear
an atmosphere in it. I see a picture in it,
and usually it's in sync with some words I've been
thinking about or something. And the first time we played
that song was at a festival and the song hadn't

(01:13:06):
even a song. We hadn't even finished right in the song,
but sonically it was so strong we thought we could
just start with this as I kno with and see
where the audience goes with it, and well they went mental.
So we knew we were onto something and Steve brought
a great, great focus to it. But it was the

(01:13:26):
base players melody Derek Forbes. I've got to say that. Now,
what else? You'll be on the phone to me tomorrow. Okay,
So I have you right here. There's a lot been
written about tell me the story of Keith Forcey. Don't
you forget about me? How it happened? Did you like
it at the time? Did you not want to do it?

(01:13:47):
Word was that you resented? That was a hit? What
was going on? And what are your feelings about it today? Well,
everything you said there is true. There was, there was.
I can tell you our story, of course, I'll tell
you our story. I now keep hearing everyone else's story,
and I think I don't think that's true. You know,
I keep hearing that it was offered to this person,

(01:14:08):
and offered to that person, and offer this person. It
may well have been, but I'm maintained if it was
offered to them, it was offered while we were refusing
and Deli dallow and you might say the whole approach
was wrong. We you know, we're all we're young, we
were brattish. We thought, why the heck would we do

(01:14:31):
someone else's song, especially when we had just written this
thing called Alive and Kicking, which wasn't out yet or recorded,
but we thought it was the Bee's knees, and we thought,
why would we do someone else's song? What's this about? Well,
it turns out that Keith had come to see us play,
had come backstage. There's a lot of people backstage. I

(01:14:51):
didn't get to meet him, but he had given the
cassette of the song and said, you know, the record
company is going to be in touch with you soon.
He had given it to the keyboard player who put
in his pocket and didn't listen to it for weeks.
So it was going nowhere, and we started getting this
these calls UM basically in him, in him, we're kind

(01:15:12):
of saying we should have pushed harder with New Gold Dream.
They saw the success it hid everywhere else. We should
have pushed harder. Um your next record. And you remember
the great Charlie Minor. He was on the phone, you
gotta do this, you gotta do this, this will set
up your next record. Great. For those who don't know,
he was one of the greatest promotion guys ever. Um,

(01:15:35):
when Charlie got on the phone, it was like, oh,
this is serious. He said, this movie is gonna be great,
and um, this will this will set you up so good.
You'll love it and you'll love the song. And I
said what song? And he said, UM, I thought you
were I thought we were writing this song. None all
the songs there, they've got the song for the movie.

(01:15:55):
It worked with the script. And that doesn't sound good.
We're our own songs. We'd never the idea of doing
someone else's song was alien to us. Anyway, we listened
to the song, and we don't think it's a bad song.
And I gotta say to you the other day talking
about the how the way songs turned up on the
internet now that the original demos, I love to listen

(01:16:18):
to the the Jerry Rafferty song and how that dispute was.
What a great thing to hear that. I played that
track actually about twenty times the demo. Um. Anyway, we
listened to it and Keith was singing this song don't
You Forget About Me, which to me sounded much more
like the Psychedelic Force, who incidentally is a band we

(01:16:40):
all liked it didn't sound like a simple main song.
It didn't sound like a lyric I would write. Um,
we just couldn't see, you know why. And we really
dragged our feet. And I'm not sure about this, not sure,
not sure. And the way I remember it is that

(01:17:04):
Keith eventually turned up, and the story was, you see,
I already I know will come to him. I already
had in my men. I wanted to work with Jimmy Iovine.
I thought we needed someone really to pushes and writing
better songs. But Keith turned up, and I see, I
know you're not going to do the song, but maybe
we'll work in future, and all that well alone, behold,

(01:17:26):
we love Keith. Doesn't so much love his song, but
loved him. And you know, you hung out a couple
of days and they happen. Why not just try? He would,
very he would, very shrewd kind of codjoulders. Let's goin
for a couple of hours. If it works, who knows,
If it doesn't work, you get the record company off
your back. Shrewd. Well, we went in and you know,

(01:17:51):
literally was about two hours, and we mocked up the
start to their song with a he he has and
then we this whole breakdown thing. There was no words
for that. So I started to sing the corneyst thing
that came in my mind, La la la la, And
before we knew it, it was there, and I'll kept

(01:18:12):
saying no, no, I got it back. I can't leave
that quota like that. I have to sing meaningful worlds.
But they weren't having none of it. And isn't it strange?
You know? It's the way life throws up these things
that were not You try, you're very hardest, it's something
it doesn't work, and then something you couldn't care about.

(01:18:34):
You just do it and it becomes, you know, kind
of a song of his generation, and some might even
say subsequent generations. So how do you feel about it now? Well,
the first thing I feel is the first thing I
feel is this is where it's childish to have any

(01:18:56):
problems with it. What I feel about it now is
when we went in that day, we put our heart
and soul in it. That was the thing, and we
put our heart and soul in it. Every night we
played because that song has given the world over so
much pleasure to people. Do we play it as sound checks? No?

(01:19:16):
Do we played at rehearsals. No. Are we grateful for
everything it brought to us, Yes, but I also think
we had a problem. Is it's a stupid problem. We felt, God,
We've got all that success with that thing, and we
didn't We didn't deserve it. I think there's a feeling
that we didn't deserve it. Um. Only therapists could work

(01:19:39):
that out, Bob, but none of us go to therapy. Okay,
so how do you end up working with Jimmy Ivy?
You know, he just seemed again as a fan of music,
so many great records. His name seemed to be there.
I mean the obvious obviously born born a run and
then a Smith's Tom Petty dire straits. Um. I mean

(01:20:06):
that's not bad right there, I have induced I have
his name kept popping up. The one thing I felt
after working with Steve, which was the record prior to
working with Jimmy and Bob Clear Mountain. We can't leave
Bob out in this, um, I felt Steve. The record
we did with Steve was a game of two halves.

(01:20:28):
You know, the first half I think has got great tracks,
but the second half not so. I mean one of
the reasons was we were constantly touring, and we would
take six weeks to do a record and we will
be bluffing it. But you can only bluff it so far.
And I thought, we need someone to really put his
under pressure with the songs. And someone must have told

(01:20:49):
me that that was Jimmy's thing, that he really beat
you up before you got anywhere near the studio. And
and I was up for that kind of I was
up for that that kind of challenge. But unfortunately we
couldn't get Jimmy to bait for the longest time. And
he tells the story of he had gone down to Australia.

(01:21:13):
I think you remember, well, I know, you know he's
brilliant Colin hey men at work, who you know. I
also had this kind of freakish success in the States
um and I think they weren't playing ball with the
American record Company as I held it, and they wanted
to send someone down, and Jimmy got the offer. He

(01:21:33):
went down. When he got to Australia, he found out
that those Australians don't take anything from no one. So
Jimmy told the story of he was making his way
back to the airport and he was in the taxi
with a kid Driver, what do you do? And Jimmy,
I'm a record producer. Really, who do you work with? Well?
I worked with Springsteen and I work with you two

(01:21:54):
and blah blah blah. Now we haven't been able to
get Jimmy on the phone anyway. Taxi driver kids, sister, Jimmie,
this is my band and he plays on Waterfront and
Jimmy went, wow, that's that band. Um. And of course
we met up at the time he was I remember
going down to the studio he was working with Lawn

(01:22:18):
Justice and we were so keen, you know, and he said, so,
what do you got to play me? I should I
haven't got anything yet, you know, we're just Oh, you
haven't got anything. And he said, well, you know there's
that song you've got that. Don't you forget about me?
Song that's on fire. You better have stuff and I said,
we will have stuff. We we will, We'll have stuff,

(01:22:40):
will have good stuff. The bands and forum just now,
h yeah, I've heard all that before. He said, I've
heard it all beat before. I'm not going to near
you until you have the songs that you can play
me the songs. And I said, okay, I'll be back
with songs. Um, he said one. I said, about six weeks.

(01:23:02):
He said, he said, You're gonna have ten great songs
in six weeks. I said yeah. He said, are you
fucking Bob Dylan? I mean, I've been looking for you.
I've been looking for you all my life. And I thought,
oh God, I'm in with someone tough here. And that's
the way it started. And and I have to say, um,

(01:23:25):
at the time, Jimmy, we didn't know this because although
his name was involved in those records, it seemed to
be the jury was out. What he actually did. I
later found out, Um, so what he's a vibe merchant,
or he creates a culture or whatever. Well, all of
that's hugely important. A Shelley Yakistas does it. It's Bob

(01:23:46):
clear Mountain that does it. But I have to see,
even to this day, I have been, by far has
been the best motivator, coach, all around good guy I
came across. And I'm not saying that just now because
we're best friends. I haven't spoke to Jimmy for gazillions
of years. But when I look back now, I mean

(01:24:08):
what a coach Jimmy was, And and he knew the
thing he knew was maybe technically he couldn't articulate it,
but he knew when it felt right. And for me,
whether it's movies, whether it's music, where there's books, whereas
people you hang out with, whether it's food you eat,
it's all about how it feels. It's all about how

(01:24:29):
it makes you feel. And God, Jimmy was so great.
So you had phenomenal success with that album. Why didn't
you work with Jimmy again? Because I think we we
I think we were good at very few people did
we work with again. I mean, you get a lot
of bands that don't get wrong with the producers or
the resenter producers are, or they see them as something

(01:24:50):
that's forced on them. Quite often, that's that's the case.
We loved other producers we worked with, but I think
we got the best out them on the one we
we we got it. Okay, that songwriting thing, I got that.
Now I'm never going to do that again. That that
lessons learned? What else is out there? Well, you know,
Trevor Horn comes knocking. That's not bad. I mean when

(01:25:12):
you think of the records he was making and so um,
you know it was time for the new adventure. Okay,
so that album with Trevor Horn has Belfast Child tell
us the story there, Well, Trevor was. I mean the
thing about Trevor is when you think back then, you
think of those record breaking I mean everything he did

(01:25:34):
was epic um where it was yes, whether Frankie goes
to Hollywood, whether it was ABC seal. And he came
up at the time, we're working in this studio and
the countryside. And as soon as he comes and he
goes to his um, why have you never made some
kind of Celtic sounding record or song? And I said, well,

(01:25:56):
that's the stuff I grew up hating. UM. I mean
I didn't want to know about all of that stuff
when I grew up. I wanted to know about New York.
I wanted to know about Detroit, I wanted to know
about Los Angeles, wanted to know about the doors. I
don't want to know about my grandmother's highland home and
her music and all that stuff. And he said, well,

(01:26:17):
I think you're making a mistake there. So he planted
a seed. And we were working one night, took a
break for dinner, and I came out in the base
player we're working with at the time, A fellow called
John Giblin, a bit older than us. John, and he
he didn't know folk music, and he didn't know a

(01:26:37):
lot of the Celtic stuff. As I came into the room,
he was there alone and he had taken the base
off he could play a bit of keys and he
was playing the most hauntingly beautiful melody. And I just
sat down listened and at the end I said to him,
when did you write that? I assumed he had written it,

(01:26:59):
because he had he had written a couple of things
for us. I just assumed he had written it. And
he said, oh, about two hundred years ago. What are
you talking about? He said, no, I didn't write this.
This is from a traditional Irish air called she Moved
through the fair And I said, really, well, just that

(01:27:20):
week there had been it was before the peace process
in Belfast, there had been a horrendous incident and it
was all over the news. Now, growing up in Glasgow
on a clear day and just down the course from
Glasgow you can actually see Ireland literally, so we grew
up with all that on a doorstep, all that sadness

(01:27:42):
and tragedy of those years, we felt very close to it.
And with that album, Street fading years. I guess I
was better at thirty. Then. I guess at a certain time,
you you kind of you feel the need, you want
to write about the big themes, the big subjects, and
at that I'm Mandela apartheid, human rights on a door

(01:28:07):
step Belfast. And when he came up with that Irish well,
when he presented that Irish melody, he said, go and
check out the song. Someone back and I got obsessed
by the song. I I, of course, it's the days
before the internet. But I I ended up with so
many versions and I thought, I wonder if you can

(01:28:29):
just rap your own words to it? Because it was
obviously public domain. I wasn't a publishing issue. And I thought,
I wonder if that is I wonder how kosher that is? Um,
Because for some people in the folk world it's a
sacred cove, but for other people that's a very nature
of folk music that they often changed the worlds, and

(01:28:52):
every generation came along and they adapted and they put
their own things. So eventually I thought, fuck it, Um,
I'm going to write my own story. I'm going to
write my own song to this melody. Um. Trevor thought
I was a great idea, and in a sense what
we put together was it's almost the version of Stairway

(01:29:15):
Heaven because that also begins very folk, and then the
song expands, you know, the band, the solo, and then
it well again it's a case of well, we'll do it,
but it will never work. Well it goes to number one.
I don't know how many countries I went to number one.

(01:29:35):
Unfortunately it wasn't for America. But it was Trevor who
pushed this into that and then for the longest time
we didn't play it, who started playing it again. It
seems to have found its time because even though thankfully
situation in Northern Ireland has changed dramatically, the real lessons

(01:29:56):
to the song is about the victims of Irelan somen
war and right now as we speak, certainly in Europe,
um that's very prevalent. So whenever we play the song, yeah,
it's about Belfast, but it's no longer about Belfast, It's
about wherever war is going on. Okay, the next album

(01:30:18):
you work with Trevor's guy, Stephen Lipson, um you do
Let there Be Love, which is my favorite Simple Minds song.
So I'm gonna ask you how that came together well.
I mean Stephen was when we realized working with Trevor
that Stephen was such a huge part of it. I mean,
Trevor wouldn't deny that he was a brilliant programmer. He

(01:30:41):
could play as well, Steve, you know something, he would
just give me the guitar, you know, and he would
play Elaine and other people you like, hang on a minute,
but it would be a great idea. So he was
also a collaborate or Um. We were under pressure, Bob,
because after after Belfast Child and that Street Fighting year's
record that didn't do anything in America thankfully did well elsewhere,

(01:31:04):
we were under pressure to try and get back to
a more classic Simple Minds song in relation to a
sort of alive in kicking or something. So if I
was being crude, I would say that we we threw
ourselves and they're trying to get something in that vein
again and it worked. I mean again, it's a song

(01:31:26):
when we played live, very soulful verse, but big soaring chorus.
I mean they say that writers only have one or
two themes, whether you're Bob Dylan or whatever, and there's
always been a great optimism simple Minds music I think
a great feeling of don't give up, keep the faith,

(01:31:51):
and essentially under a lot of the lyrics to those songs,
that's that's the message. Okay, you know I love the
next five good news. But if you look back at
this period, which ultimately leads to your h the Danu
mar In pulling away, would you do anything different? I

(01:32:15):
mean what what we would have done different was not
leave so much time between albums. I mean, you know,
if you leave two or three years between albums, I mean,
you're asking for problems. But there was reasons for those
gaps as well. I mean, we as a touring band,
if you tour for a year and when we throwed,
it would be the best part of a year because
you know, that was still how we made our coin,

(01:32:37):
and that's still the life we wanted to live. So
if you tour for a year, m the time you
come off of that, and by this time, we're getting
older and and and you know, you have other things
in your life. Kids, wife's obligations, parents are getting older. Um,
you've got to give time to that. Then you got
to right and then it's you know, before you know it,

(01:33:00):
three years is gone. Um, and a new generation comes along, so, UM,
that is it. But I but I don't know. You
can't have it all. Maybe some people can, I don't think.
So you can't have it all. Something has to give,
and you lose out in one area, you hope your

(01:33:21):
life gets enriched in another area. Um, A spaces is made.
So it's kind of hard to Um, it's hard. I
mean I also think I also think we were running,
you know, we were starting to run on fumes too.
I mean, how many songs have you got in you?
How much? You know? Sometimes you just have to head

(01:33:41):
for the hills and give people a break. People have
had enough for you, time to you know, time to
move on and and see. I think the trick then
is it's getting back to super talking. You've got ahead
for the hills and try and not do anything too desperate,
you know, because it's uh, be patient, get all the

(01:34:04):
things in your life. Stock up the pool again, because
what are you going to write from. You have to
you have to fill up the well. You have to
get hungry again. Um. Your question was what would we
two different? What I would say is I'm glad. I'm
glad of something that we didn't do. We didn't get

(01:34:27):
embittered because you know, sometimes you meet people that can
have had it and they lost it, and um, it's
everyone else's fault, you know that what all those them
something Although the record company didn't do this, oh the
media wrote that all this. Sometimes you just got to

(01:34:47):
take it on the chin. You know what, are you
gonna run home your mommy? It is what it is.
So you ultimately did get married and have kids. How
did you keep that marriage going for so long as
a road musician. What are your kids up to today? Well,
I don't know if it was. I mean, of course
it's subjective of what is long. But you know, one

(01:35:11):
of the big stories in my life would always be
was meeting Chrissy Haynd and marry and Chrissy Haynd. I mean,
at the Chris, he's older than me. She she's she's
your age, Bob. I think maybe a couple of years older.
She's eight years older than me. Um, meeting someone, I

(01:35:31):
mean everyone has this image of Chrissy and I have
to say it. You know, she she does live up
to it most of the time, but there's a whole
other side of our But she's a pussy cat and
when I met her, I was twenty four. She was
there too. I don't even think i'd even met. I
don't think i'd ever even live with a girlfriend before that,

(01:35:53):
or a woman. But my band was sailing, we were
having hits. I was maybe there was a piece of
me thinking this is a piece of cake. I need
a real challenge. Well, believe me, I got one. And
but looking back now, I mean, amazing girl from Ohio.
I was such a fan as well. I mean, what

(01:36:16):
an artist she is. But she'd been around the block,
and kind of no one I hung out with had
been around the block more than me. I need. I
didn't have any older brothers or sisters. She was at
Kent State. She had all that. She from Ohio. She
knew all the Midway. She had an amazing taste in

(01:36:36):
music through listening to the radio. She in New Country,
she knew blues, she knew rock. She's the only person
now with to this day who would say, Bruce Springsteen,
give me a break. It's Mitch Rider you want to see. Um.
I mean she there was such an education there. Um

(01:36:58):
really great, great woman. But mh. You find out that
the thing that excites you the most quite often it's
not the thing that's good for you. Um. That can
be heroin, or it can be junk food, or it
can be relationships or whatever. It wasn't meant to last long.
To be honest, you see. Um hey, it makes sense, Maddie.

(01:37:23):
Someone in the same industry, they'll understand. You know, if
you work in a kick shop, Mary, whatever the other
person work, you'll understand you're from the same line. But
it's very hard to make it work together. Um. I
didn't even know who I was then. I was still
a kid. But we have not only a kid, we

(01:37:44):
have grandkids and still in touch and still good good dialogue.
And I'm still a fan. And how about Patsy Kensit
after that, well, Patsy Patsy. I I was the elder one,
and I think at the time, well, you know, I'm smitten.

(01:38:07):
My kids loved her still do Um. I think I
helped her out of a jam. Sometimes sometimes you love
somebody because because you you think you can do something
for them that makes you also feel good. And that
was the case there. I'm still a fairly young young man,

(01:38:30):
and I think a part of me felt it felt good.
But you're right, then you're going tour and then you're
not there for this, and you're not there for that,
and then resentments begin and and I mean, and I
I I mean, I have to see I'm I can't

(01:38:50):
be very selfish. I really can. I'm very selfish with
my time. I'm very selfish headspace, and I spend a
lot of time alone. Um. I love my band and
I love being out in the road, I love playing.
Um maybe it just wasn't for me, Okay, but you're

(01:39:13):
in a long term relationship now, right, Yeah, for the
longest time, I've been with a Japanese woman. And when
I said a little both finding someone who's good for you,
who can organize everything as well as make you feel good,
and everyone loves And also, I mean, the other thing
is it's so great to be with people from other cultures.

(01:39:35):
A lot of people will tell you that's not the case.
You should be with with your own only. But it's
been so enriching, not only to live in places, but
I mean, we are I'm so gladgo through and through
the rock I made from his Glasgow, through and through.
But it's been shaped by your experiences, by the people
who have been with different cultures, to get a language

(01:39:57):
to go to Japan to spend time there. I mean
it's been sort of walting. Your band has a lot
of live albums, and I gotta say, the one in
the Silver Box just unbelievable. And of course it's different

(01:40:21):
from what it was prior to the Internet. You know,
when live album was something rare, was treated like a
regular release. Now there's all this stuff on YouTube, you know,
And he thought, I mean, the Stones go on put
on a live album from every tour, but most people
do not there any thought about how many live albums,
whether to put it out, not to put it out. No,

(01:40:41):
I think you should always put it out. If if
if if, I mean if you go to hardcore, I'm
in the Grid, the Grateful Dead, they're They're the ones
where I think you should put as long as the quality.
If you believe in the quality, um then and if
you're a great live band and you're always adding stuff
or you've different versions or or then it it merits it.

(01:41:05):
I think every every couple of tours, let's let's say,
and we're still from that thing. I mean, going back
to it when I said to you as a kid
at sound checks, what did I learn at that scene? Bands?
I mean, you know, you got all these gigs, and
you see people who are good, and then you see

(01:41:25):
bands that are artists, bands whatever, who are great, and
the difference between good and great is colossal. Some people
can make the room jump up and down. Some people
can make the walls reverby, some people can the gig finishes,
you're still thinking about it two weeks later, and then
there's other bands come in the plane. You think, oh,
that was good, and you don't think about it again

(01:41:45):
the next day. Well, we knew from the early days
what kind of band we would like to be in,
and and we still wrestle with that challenge, and we
still documented, and that's where the live albums come in. Well, yeah,
let's go back to your point about you can be selfish.
Selfish has a bad connotation, but what you're saying is
you need your alone time. Does your present girlfriend of

(01:42:10):
long standing does she respect that or have you adjusted? Also,
of course there's the conundrum of needing your alone time
and then getting on stage two thousands. Well, first of all,
the partner I've had for the longest time, we spend
a lot of time apart. I'm in Sicily. She comes
out a lot but we have a place also in Niece.

(01:42:31):
She has her own life there, but of a business there,
and never once has there been a complaint. She's busy.
She does our thing and when we see each other
as great. When we don't, when we're not with each other,
we're doing our own things. We're growing up, we're adults. Um.

(01:42:55):
I think we've at a certain age. You should get
smart about things. There has to be space. There's got
to be space, and certainly for for me, I spend
I mean, I get up. It's the irony. I thought
I'd get in a rock and roll band because I
could lie in bed all day, and I find that
I'm wide awake at five in the morning. Doesn't matter

(01:43:15):
what it is. Um I never thought you would be
able to listen to rock music or right rock song
at five in the morning. Just doesn't seem the right thing.
Believe me, you can. Your brain is sharp, it's clear.
The rest of the world there's not up yet. You
can get more done in those three or four hours
than the rest of the day. Um So, And I'm

(01:43:36):
I'm very I'm very protective now of that. I said selfish,
But you know, this is the stuff that brings home
the corn. This is the stuff that puts food on
the table. This is the stuff that puts a roof
over our heads. That's the way it works. There has
to be time. You've got to read, you've gotta listen,
you've gotta think, you have to room or try things

(01:43:59):
and get them wrong. It's a full on commitment. And
Charlie's the same now his kids are grown up. Um,
it's it's a full wee go there Monday Friday, we
work Monday Friday. And and of course we don't have
to do that. We don't have to in terms of
being able to eat for the rest of our lives.
Are We're into it. That's what it is. It's a

(01:44:19):
sacred thing. If you have an art, it's it's sacred.
And your archets jail. Your archet's jealous on you as
well if you stop doing that. The muscles, the creative muscles,
and I believe there's such a thing. You know, they're
not long and this integrating. Um, it's hard to get
back on a horse. So you you really have to

(01:44:41):
keep it. You you can't do it half measures and
anyone around you. That's the deal. Like certainly understand the
selfish alone time. I mean, when I'm concentrate, I'm thinking
like a percent fair. I don't like to be interrupted,
and the average person just can't understand it because they're
just used to go out. I go for days whereout

(01:45:06):
speaking to anyone. I mean, I just go for days
whether they're speaking to anyone. I mean, I'm also very
I'm also very lucky it there is people who put
up with it um um. But I like a lot
of time alone. I mean, in sicily, as soon as
I've done my three or four um hours in the

(01:45:29):
morning working, whether I'm up in the hills, well, I mean,
so you come back to a biblical landscape. They only
sound up. There's goatbells and crickets. But I don't meditate
the way people conventional meditation. But that is my meditation.
You go walking, you hill walk, and you get into
a pace you're breathing. Problems come at the forefront before

(01:45:53):
you know it. You've got to I've got an idea
about that. Oh, I mean, I find all of that.
That's the only way I know how a function. I mean, unfortunately,
I've asked my my kids, you know, because every well, Dad,
you were never there for us were there, you were
all You're always there, you were always there somehow managed
to make it work. Um. But certainly in that thing,

(01:46:14):
I mean on the on tour, if it's a night off,
I'll never go out with the band, or and I
go on my own, I go walk around the city,
or I go whatever. Um. At the gig between four
o'clock and well after the sound check two eight o'clock,
I don't speak to anyone. I don't see anyone. Um.

(01:46:37):
The great thing about of course, you get to save
your voice. Um. And then when it comes time to
spring into action and be present, whether it's on stage
or whether it's the participating in life with your friends
or whatever, I'm fully there. I'm never there, and I'm
never there but not there, if you know what I mean.

(01:46:58):
But that's the deal exactly. So a lot of you
know their legendary stories that people become successful, they buy
their parents a house, they buy them a car. Did
you do anything like that all of that? And it
was with the greatest pleasure. I mean, I'll tell your
story here. That's pretty good because you know, Richard Brownson

(01:47:18):
gets a bad rap. But I'll tell you this. So
when I was living in Uh. I told you, I
grew up in this high rise flat. And even when
the band was still touring and just starting to break
through and being in the newspaper, has been on TV,
I think had their first hit, but we had all
that debt to pay off, so we didn't have money.

(01:47:41):
But I came back home and and I didn't have
a place in my own lit because we were always
in tour, so why would I So I'd come back
home and crash mom and Dad's council apartment. Well, I
came home and the irony because parents were always afraid
when we get in this business, that would be drugs
around and we would all end up. They saw heroin

(01:48:04):
before I saw heroin because at that time it came
into Glasgow and it was starting to come into the
housing projects and schemes. Anyway, I turned up and a
couple of houses you know, had become hangouts for drug
drug addicts and stuff. So I thought, now, it's probably

(01:48:26):
about fifty pounds a week then and I heard about
this you can get a mortgage thing, and you know,
and back then, of course, the bank managers before the
computer says no, the bank managers were kind of allowed
to um, go on a hunch, and my manager at

(01:48:46):
the time said, go along in the bank manager, simple
mains everyone in Glasgow No, simple mazer. He'll know you
and he'll listen to you. So I saw this house.
Mom and dad loved it. I couldn't see to my dad. Incidentally,
I was buying it for them because you too too
much prayed. I said it was for me and they
would look after it while I wasn't tour because it
just would have felt wrong. So we saw this house.

(01:49:10):
I think it costs sixty grand. Great part of Glasgow Garden.
All of this just beautiful. Can't believe that no one
from our family has ever had a place like this.
So I go along the bank manager and I think
I'm all prepared, and he said, yep, yeah, my my
daughter loves you and you know she's been at the gigs.

(01:49:31):
I know you're doing well and blah blah blah. What
what's going on? So I explained to him. I explained
the situation and he listens to every word. Then he says, um.
He says, well, that's great. I know that house. I
live in the area. I know the house you're talking about. Great,
so great, How are we going to do this, and

(01:49:52):
I said, well, you know the mortgage, you're gonna we're
gonna look at the mortgage and he said, yeah, what
are you gonna give me? Meaning deposit? And I said,
what do you mean is you had a guarantee. I
think I was twenty two at the time. My guarantee, Bob.
I tookout all these live reviews that that we're saying,

(01:50:13):
you know, simple Mains, Band of the future, Simple Mains,
They're gonna be huge. He looked at them and went,
that's what you're gonna give me, these three or four
bits of paper. I said, yeah, look, I mean it's
it's we're happening. And he said, no, that's not how
it works. You need to give me a deposit fift

(01:50:35):
I said, well, I haven't got any money. He said, well,
you know, I don't know what to say. And as
I was getting up, he said, do you know anyone
way any money? And I said no, no, I don't
um anyway. Two days later I got a call from him.
He says, I can't believe it. Richard Branson just phoned me.

(01:51:00):
He's going to cover it. He's gonna cover it. We're
on if Richard Branson is going to cover it. We're
on and to this day I will always be thankful.
I mean, you know, we have the whole thing with
record industries, and we know the record deals where you
get screwed for people say well, at least the bank

(01:51:21):
when you pay them back. Well, you know, banks would
never have given your money and make records, but Richard
Branson did and I will forever be grateful to him
for that. So, yeah, all of the band looked after
their parents and their stuff, and and you know now
it's to do with the nieces and the nephews and

(01:51:43):
the sons and daughters, and we try to help out
there as well. So you have a new album in
the pipeline, you obviously you're making the music because you're
driven to do that. What are your expectations? Most of
your contemporaries, if there's a together, don't even put out
new music. So you're doing this. Are you saying, well,

(01:52:05):
this is what I do, the fans will like it,
or you know, there's the old paradigm of having a hit.
Who even knows what it hit is? Today? Top forty
is certainly in America does not play this kind of music.
They're play popper hip hop. So I restate my point,
what are your expectations? We'll go back if you have
the music and you you just have to make it.
That's it. If you've got songs, I mean, how are

(01:52:26):
you gonna stop? If it's still in you and still
wants you know, wants to be held. When I say
wants to be held, I want to hear it, Charlie
wants I wants to hear it. We want to test
or say where artists. This isn't just a scam where artists.
We've been doing this since we're fourteen sixty three. We've
been writing songs out of the lace. What are we

(01:52:47):
just gonna give that up? When you love it, when
you enjoy it, when it's how you see the world. No,
but we know the realities and you have just pointed
out many of them. As it happens again with simple Mans.
Were fortunate. Our records do break even. Okay, it's the
hardcore and they buy them and all the formats, but

(01:53:08):
they're made with budgets and it works. The biggest thing
is it refreshes everything. Now, I know you're not going
to go and tour and play the whole record, but
if you two killer songs that can and think, you know,
if it's got to live up with your whole catalog,
and that's a great, great thing. It revitalizes everything, rejuvenates everything,

(01:53:34):
and you get to feel that you're just not in
a museum. You know that it's not just a museum.
I mean, I know people do and affair on them,
they go around. But we're artists, we're creative people. So
that's how we express ourselves. That's how There's always this
this thing of you know, one more swing at it,

(01:53:54):
one more swing, maybe we'll write that song. Um, And
for us it worked. So there's no way up until
now we have ever thought of given that up. What
about the issue of playing that music live? Well, as
I said last night on this tour, I gotta tell
you we were out for four months. No Um. During

(01:54:20):
the week we played about anything between four or five people,
and at the weekend it gives up to ten or fifteen.
It's not bad. We played twenty three songs um. Right
now the new album isn't coming out to October. We
play a couple of songs now. The songs we play

(01:54:41):
are not the slow, moody songs that the songs were
the big chunky choruses that even if you don't know them,
audiences go, I don't know this, but I I like it.
I'm getting it. So we always we play those those songs.
And we played one last night for the first time,
a song called first You Jump, And today among all

(01:55:02):
our social networks, everyone's talking about it. Within our gang,
everyone's talking about it, and oh, we had twenty seconds
of the song. We had this it um it keeps
the heartbeat going. So we've had this whole COVID situation,
but generally speaking, how much do you want to play live?

(01:55:25):
How many dates in a year? And can you and
where can you play? And where would you not have
an audience that you wish you could play? Well, you know,
it was great the last few years to get back
to America because there was a point what I thought
maybe that was not going to happen, and there was

(01:55:45):
a tour book there. Obviously didn't happen with the COVID
no that, but it had the radio cities in it
and what simple amazing radio city. Wow. I didn't think
that's something I would see again, and others, I mean, yeah,
there is still something about is that I wish I
wish at the time we had appreciated more, um working

(01:56:07):
in America, really getting you know, so much of that
stuff is kind of mythical to us. We grew up
with the movies, we grew up with the music. I
love going to those old halls now that are re refurbished,
and you look at the people who played them, not
just musicians, actors and and and it's a guy in
the band, a big, big Beatles fan. He'll go the

(01:56:29):
Beatles played here in nine. I say, like, screw the Beatles,
the Marks Brothers played here. I mean it just I
wish we had worked more in America. Now, um we were,
We are getting the chance to go again. We will
go again, but probably for us it would be better
to to to you know, hook up with another band

(01:56:49):
and and if you're going there, you may as well
try and get across to a bigger audience. That's about
the only place that that I wish we had worked more.
Tell me about two peak experiences. Whether it'd be meeting someone,
hearing your song on the radio, playing a gig, Well,

(01:57:09):
there's that great thing. I'm meeting your heroes and you
should never meet your heroes, or meeting your heroes, and um,
not only have I met many of my music heroes,
I've I've got to even stand at a microphone with them.
Are the ones that spring to mine is Peter Gabriel
who took us on tour and and you know the

(01:57:32):
humility and the sheer artistry of that guy, that was
really something. Lou Reid, who we managed to do a
cameo on one of our records, well, to me, that's
the equivalent of having Picasso. I mean that was just
mind blowing. But the story we tell a lot of

(01:57:52):
a good, great story because for people our generation, David
Boye was the guy, and I'll tell you a story
of them. You have heard of the famous studio. It's
actually in Wales called Rockfield Studios and it's a country studio.
So um, we were booked in to go there and
we turned up and it's really rural. There's two studios

(01:58:17):
and we're booked into the little studio and as we're
turning up we're thinking, I wonder who's in the big,
big studio. I want to watch stars there. It was
the most unlikely thing, but Iggy Pop was there? What
Iggy Pop in the Welsh country side? This is eight,
not seventy nine. Maybe, um, Iggy pops there. We're all

(01:58:38):
Iggy fans. We can't believe it, but you know, um,
it turns out one of the guys in the band,
Barry Andrews, we had met him on tour. He was
a bit of a fan. So when the Eggy sessions
we're finished, he would come over and tell us what
was going on. And at the time Iggy was always

(01:59:00):
getting the confused on the wagon. He was clean and
he wasn't drinking, and he wasn't anything well until we
turned up. That was because at midnight every night, it
was always like a a cat creeping over the wall.
He would come out of our place. And we were
young guys. We brought a lot of things with us

(01:59:20):
to the countryside, including pretty girls and and all the
other goodies. And then he would come in every day
and we just canna be like, you know, we just
sit at the feet of James Austerberg and it just
just agreed it. And one lady says something about, oh, well,
David's coming up on Saturday, and we're sure, what I

(01:59:42):
wonder if it's the David we're all thinking of, But yeah,
David's coming up David's coming up again Saturday afternoon, said
that's you know, there's a limit? Does a Bentley pulling
up outside this country? Lane? Boy gets out. I think
the album was being produced by M James. I forget

(02:00:05):
the other guy's name from the studges um um anyway,
without hours or punt of this chaos boys taken over
and all manner of breaknast. We're hearing as kind of
through the wall, but we don't think we're going to
be pretty to any of it. And run about midnight,

(02:00:25):
Eggie walks in again, and I can't believe it's a vision.
It just seems so unlikely. Boys with them. He's wearing
this black we call him boilers suit, like a kind
of industrial suit. He's got a ton of hy nicking
in his hand and a huge bit of shedar cheese.

(02:00:47):
It's the most unlikely. And they came in and they're
looking for something to smoke, and they're looking for and
her crew have got plenty of that. And then Boy said,
tell you what, asking what are you doing? What's this?
He said, listen, we're working in this song and we
need a chorus. We need like a football courtus, we
need a chance, we need ten people, Why don't you

(02:01:09):
all come in so we get to trip through into
the next studio. I mean, can you imagine Bob none, none,
None of us had a camera. No one had a camera.
Back then, no one walked around with a camera. So
we go in and Boie is very much taken over.
It's a song called play It's safe. I mean, unless
the record was there, I would still be thinking I

(02:01:30):
was imagining all of this is so unlikely. But he
guesses around the microphone and it's the chortus, and every
wants to jump in and sing this quotas and bit
by bit, but we start saying like people who don't
sing professionally step back, and at the point there was
only iggy boy, I can't believe I'm seeing this, and

(02:01:53):
myself standing at the microphone. And as I say, if
that record hadn't been released with the credits on it,
I could see people thinking that never happened. But it
did did happen. So that was a particularly great moment.
But I think the moment that really tops it all

(02:02:13):
was when we played At the time it was called
the Nelson Mandela Birthday Parties seventieth birthday were they were
still calling for his freedom, and we had a big
part of that. We wrote a song for it and
Lo and behold again. Less than a year later, Mandela

(02:02:36):
walked out and he came to London to thank all
the artists who were involved. And that was a really
special moment because little Stephen Bonsan was there. Gabriel every
you know, when you do those events and when you
write those songs, you're fully committed, but there is a
voice in your head saying does it matter? Does it
really matter? Does can music really change? Were old events

(02:03:01):
and to him and delacy he explained to all. He said,
listen when it was a great thing. He said, when
there was no voice allowed, we somehow always held the
voice of the artist. Now that may have been the writers,
the poets, the painters, the songwriters, and that was quite
an amazing thing, um to be in the presence of him. Well,

(02:03:26):
on that note, I think we're gonna call it a
day today. Man, Jim, you're unbelievable, You're intelligent, you tell
a great story. I could talk for hours more. I
want to thank you so much for doing this My pleasure, Bob,
keep up with good work. Love listening to the podcast.
So many of the people you talked to, people who

(02:03:46):
influenced me, or it's it's it's just wonderful. And also
a few places where we can listen to this kind
of thing. So I say that really is a fan
of the show and and of the writings. Well, I'm
smiling broadly. People can't see that on an audio podcast
until next time. This is Bob Left sets h