Maybe a little less mobile on stage, certainly a little tubbier than in their heyday, but Simple Minds are still very much Alive and Kicking.
A gathering for old people in Dubai, some wags remarked of the crowd at the gig at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Stadium on Thursday night.
Considering the Scottish band’s heyday was the ’80s, and they’re actually just shy of their 40th anniversary, there was truth in the quips that the majority were there to reminisce about songs of their youth.
But what a gathering it was.
Backstage is the most enviable of all gig passes, but with the tennis court in front of the stage packed to the back, and the seats round them all taken, some gig-goers were left with no option but to choose a vantage point in the chairs positioned right to the side of the stage.
They had the perfect view though as frontman Jim Kerr, aged 56 now, swaggered (Glaswegian men never walk, they always swagger) on stage to begin with Waterfront.
Fans Alan Ewens and Chris Fraser, both Scottish, were delighted to hear I Travel on the set-list next.
“Nailed it, destroyed it,” was Fraser’s verdict on the concert, with New Gold Dream and Big Music, the latter the first track of the band’s four-song encore, the other personal favourites of his they played.
“Scottish royalty,” was Ewens’ description of Kerr, Glaswegian guitarist Charlie Burchill and drummer Mel Gaynor (whisper it though, Gaynor’s actually English).
“I’ve been following Jim and the boys since I was very small,” admitted Ewens, the Dubai-based media director of Spicy Lemon, originally from Kirkcaldy in Scotland.
“I saw Simple Minds at the Glasgow Barrowlands in January 1985, singing New Gold Dream with Bono on stage with them. To then watch them do New Gold Dream 31 years later in Dubai was spine-tingling. I still think they are as relevant now as they were then.”
The passionate Raith Rovers Football Club fan, who also saw Simple Minds play in Dubai 12 years ago, added: “You forget how big the back catalogue is. It’s one hit after another. Some people forget. I think some were nudging their friends saying ‘I didn’t know they did this song, I didn’t know that was a Simple Minds song’.”
The big hitters were there on the two-hour set-list.
Don’t You (made uber-famous by cult film The Breakfast Club) brought out the famous Glaswegian banter in Kerr.
“Sing it to me in French!” he urged the crowd of the tune’s “La, La, La, La,” outro.
Promised You A Miracle was well received too, as, of course, was Alive and Kicking.
Only the lack of Belfast Child disappointed Englishwoman Emma Lane, who said the show was “epic”.
Kerr’s costume changes were another part of the entertainment. From various dashing jackets to the skinniest of jeans to prancing about stage in his shiny black patent leather shoes — “still on the balls of his feet,” laughed Ewens, “he’s a catman!” — to at one point even coming back out wearing a scarf, albeit on a brisk night more suited to Duntocher than Dubai.
He ended the evening’s entertainment clad in a bold tartan coat.
“I love the tartan jacket,” said Ewens. “I think the tartan jacket should be compulsory for anyone who performs in Dubai.”
Indeed. Haste Ye Back, guys.
