Simple Minds - Street Fighting Years

An Excellent Album!

I bought this album (my 7th SM album), and immediately liked "Soul Crying Out", "Take A Step Back", and "Mandela Day". These are the best tracks, backed up by other almost equally stirring songs like "Belfast Child" (one of my favourites songs SM did) and Peter Gabriel's "Biko." Every track on this CD is very listenable, making it one of the rare albums where you can listen to *every track* from start to finish and not get tired of it.

This album shows that Simple Minds is capable of producing excellent (though critically underacknowledged) rock hits, and then turning around on the same album and making songs that are slower but equally stirring. I much prefer SM to U2, if you're lookig for a comparison.

This is one of my favourite Simple Minds albums. On a couple tracks they even get 'back to their Scottish roots' and include bagpipes ("When Spirits Rise" & "Biko"...the bagpipes in no way overpower the music but are very evident).

While the CD does have some political themes, it's easy to just get into the music and listen for the sake of enjoying the sound.

It's a must for any Simple Minds fan, and a great CD to add to any collection.

I give this album 5 stars. July 21, 2006

GREAT SIMPLE MINDS ALBUM

I remember when Belfast Child made #1 in the UK & Ireland.
Belfast Child to me is the best track SM ever released I also
think SFY is their best album.Maybe it's because I'am Irish I
share a similar background to Jim Kerr & Charlie burchill.
I guess what I'am trying to say is that you need to have come
from a galeic background to understand where The Simple Mind's
are coming from on this album.There is a galeic theme right
through this album and I think SM had a lot of ball's to deal
with issue's in Northern Ireland with the song Belfast Child.
Contrary to one reviewer's remark about Belfast Child based on
a Sottish Traditional is wrong it is in fact based on an Irish
traditional folk song She moved through the fair.I would strongly recommend to buy the remastered version of this cd. June 27, 2006

Majestic - Some of Their Best Music . . . A More Mature Direction for Simple Minds . . .

Coming after their breakthrough album ONCE UPON A TIME (which followed their big breakout single "(Don't You) Forget About Me"), STREET FIGHTING YEARS was virtually commercial suicide. It was a step toward a more earnest, "adult" sound with more easy going tunes although it does rock in places. Instruments from their native Scotland (bagpipe, penny whistle) color the arrangements and several of the songs are overtly political. By the time it was released, SM were reduced to a core trio (Jim Kerr - vocals, Charlie Burchill - guitars, Michael Macneil - piano, keyboards, accordion) although one time Simple Minds Mel Gaynor (drums) and John Giblin (bass) contribute.

some notes:

"Street Fighting Years" - starts off with a stand-up bass sounding a bit like a song Van Morrison might do. Soon becomes very grand and epic sounding. This one really soars. ****1/2

"Soul Crying Out" - possibly the best track. A soulful organ and a soulful vocal delivery from Jim Kerr in top form. *****

"Wall of Love" - a powerful song, cool bass guitar, but somehow less convincing - still good, though. ***1/2

"This is Your Land" - great song, great melody, especially the vocal melody from Kerr. Features a small vocal contribution from Lou Reed. *****

"Take a Step Back" - Rocks in its own way in typical SM fashion, i.e. - finesse instead of banging you over the head with power chords, distortion and the like. ****

"Kick It In" - starts off easy then rocks out, but like "Wall of Love" doesn't make a total connection. Despite perhaps less convincing themes, both these songs have some great lyrics in there. ***1/2

"Let It All Come Down" - This one's rather easy going and majestic too, courtesy in particular of Burchill's heartfelt performance. From here the album gets more subdued and enters that sort of "adult" territory, if you get my drift. ****1/2

"Mandela Day" - truly majestic - predicted the release of Nelson Mandela (anti-apartheid activist, political prisoner for 30 years who became president of South Africa) by a year or more. *****

"Belfast Child" - I read somewhere this is based on an old traditional (which I assume falls into the "public domain" category and therefore didn't require Simple Minds to get permission to copy it), this is a very moving song with a powerful climax. *****

"Biko" - great and rather unusual cover of Peter Gabriel's salute to the South African journalist and martyr. Very heartfelt. A different rhythm delivered with bagpipes and Scottish style. I really love that line, "You can blow out a candle/ But you can't blow out a fire." Kerr adds, "You gotta wake up, you gotta face up/ You gotta open up/ Never turn away." *****

"When Spirits Rise" - features more bagpipe and stands as a grand coda for the album. *****

This recording certainly deserves 5 stars, but to be perfectly honest, I just don't listen to it very often. For perspective, I currently own about 1200 CDs with a wide range of styles (trip-hop, krautrock, classic, death, goth, grunge, etc.) In the final analysis, I'm more likely to pick up, say, SPARKLE IN THE RAIN or REAL TO REEL CACOPHONY when I reach for Simple Minds - it just depends on the mood I'm in. But STREET FIGHTING YEARS is great music and you certainly don't need to be an oppressed Scot or Irish native to be able to appreciate it.

Incidentally, Simple Minds is not a self-effacing name as some on this forum would have it. To put it simply, it alludes to a sensible, less stressful way of looking at life. April 14, 2006

Should have stayed an instrumental.

After rolling across every continent on the planet on a huge tour, Simple Minds needed a break. The hunkered down to manage the production of a great live album that chronicles the Once Upon a Time tour then got a long deserved rest. The musical core of the group, guitarist Charlie Burchill and keyboardist/piano player Michael McNeil got together to start an instrumental that was to be called Aurora Borealis. Not long after that Simple Minds were asked to play at a Wembley show honoring Nelson Mandela, leftist icon and the man who helped make Johannesbourg the den of violence that it is today.

They were also asked to produce a special track for the event. They penned Mandela Day for the event and the Aurora project got swallowed up by a bombastically political record that has great musicianship, singing, drumming etc. but started the downward spiral that the band has struggled with ever since.

Some would call this integerity, perhaps they are right but I would have thought that the coming fall of communism in Europe would have found its way into Jim Kerrs lyrics if he was trying to be politically aware on this record.

Much of the wall of sound that gave this band its uniqueness was paired down to organs and more traditional sounds. Many times it works but when the goofy lyrics to Mandela Day completely ruin some great music it leads one to wonder. I think the band had a great opportunity to show its new fans the great exclusive musicians they had to offer and how they built such a great and passionate cult following before the Breakfast Club days.

Instead this record fell upon deaf ears in the United States and a band that sold out huge venues in America couldn't come back a few years later. I don't suggest that the US is the center of the world but a band that did so well there should have known to foster that relationship with their new fans with a rocker that highlighted the talents that got them on top of the US charts rather than steer away from their new fans.

My favorite tracks on this record are Street Fighting Years, This is Your Land, Let it All Come Down and When Spirits Rise. The stinkers are Mandela Day, Kick It In and the odd remake of Biko.

They came back with Real Life, kind of glossy but incredibly inspired lyrics and musicianship on this one. Something like this may have done more to keep the Once Upon a Time fans. October 14, 2005

To this day I cannot understand why this album is so disliked...

In my opinion Street Fighting Years ranks in the triarchy of this bands greatest album-length achievements. There have been other diamonds in rough by Simple Minds to be sure: a couple from Real to Real Cacophony, Sparkle in the Rain, and Good News from the Next World - and even three PHENOMINAL gems from Real Life (sadly, on an other wise crap album). Street Fighting Years however, ranks up there alongside New Gold Dream & Once Upon a Time as their best work. So what's the criticism? Its always about it being overly political and self-righteous. Sure, right. Anyone ever listen to U2? Talking Heads? Sex Pistols? My God - ONE of those tracks was originally recorded by Peter Gabriel. This album is truly a well crafted masterpiece by Scotland's brother to INXS & U2. Unless you are deaf, you can hear how much work has gone into its production and texturing/balancing. The emotional intensity of Let It All Come Down and Belfast Child. The powerful lifting of your spirit that comes from listening to Kick It In and Take a Step Back. The self-titled epic intro Street Fighting Years itself accomplishes both. But best of all - is the all to often overlooked non-vocal finale When Spirits Rise.. complete with bagpipes and layered synthesizers.. this is a track that MANY friends & family that have never even heard of Simple Minds (or given them a second thought if they did) simply fall in love with from the first time they hear it. August 26, 2005

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