April 29, 2025 • 27 mins
Join @thebuzzknight for another legendary interview with a music icon.
On this special episode of "takin ' a walk" Buzz talks with Jim Kerr, the frontman of Simple Minds. From the early days of the Scottish post-punk scene to global stardom with timeless hits like “Don’t You (Forget About Me),” Jim shares his journey through music, creativity, and the stories behind the songs that defined a generation. Discover how he balances artistry with leadership, the evolution of his sound, and his passion for connecting with audiences worldwide. Whether you’re a longtime fan or new to his music, this conversation offers inspiring insights into the life and legacy of a true rock legend.
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Buzz Knight
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Taking a Walk.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
If you go on with a bit, yeah, I'm not released.
Speaker 3 (00:04):
It's a Shoesday night, and some in the Boon Docks,
there's no Boon Docks. There's no Shoesday night. It's the
only night in the world when you go on stage,
because it's the only you're in the there, and then
you're in the here, and now the there and then
tomorrow night doesn't exist. Last Night's history. And I think
(00:26):
when you attack it like that, Thatt Awards come back
ten times.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Welcome to this episode of the Taking a Walk Podcast,
and today we're joined by one of the most iconic
voices in music, Jim Kerr, the charismatic front man of
Simple Minds, known for their hits like Don't You Forget
About Me? And Alive and Kicking. Jim has been a
driving force in the music industry for decades. Jim Kerr
(00:52):
joins Buzz Night Now on the Taking a Walk Podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Jim Kerr, It's.
Speaker 4 (00:59):
An honor to have you on Taking a Walk, sir, Well, how.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Could I resist a title like that Taking a Walk?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
I mean, I still.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
From the earliest days that was my whole thing, and
I'm still a walker. I'm still a hiker. I'm still
a whatever. That's how I get around. So for that
reason alone, although I hear many great things about your show,
but for that reason I role you had me at
(01:32):
the title.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
Oh you're so kind, Thank you. So since it's called
taking a walk.
Speaker 5 (01:38):
Though, I do have to ask you this devilish question
of mine that I do start out the podcast with,
If you could take a walk with somebody living or dead,
who would that be and where would you take a
walk with him?
Speaker 3 (01:56):
Oh? Wow, God, that is a devilish question. You absolutely
ray for all the obvious reasons. Right now, I'd love
to take a walk with my old dad, that's for sure.
He's no longer here, but he was a walker, and
he and I were very fortunate we got the chance.
(02:16):
Especially once my band got successful. I was able to
take him with me on quite a few trips and
we would go off peace.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
You know.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
There would be the gig and the tour and all that, which,
of course was what it was all about. But as
soon as there was a day off, we would go
off around whatever city or whatever desert or whatever national park.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Walking and talking and thinking was our thing.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
So I've been very lucky in my life the amount
of people I've met, everyone from Nelson Mandela to the
Dalai lama Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
And if I had mentioned those names.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
You would have I'm sure you would have said, yeah, well,
I can understand that, but I'm still gonna go with
my old dad.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
That's a good one.
Speaker 6 (03:10):
And I will tell you many folks who I asked
the question, they either bring up their dad or their
mom as someone they would like to take that walk with.
Speaker 4 (03:23):
So you know, and I can't disagree.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Well, the people who taught us to walk, the people
who taught us to take our first steps.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Yeah, that's so great. Well, congratulations on the City of
Diamonds release Live in the City of Diamonds, which goes
across four decades, which clearly shows how much joy you
have in performing live and continue to have in performing live.
(03:54):
There's also a documentary we'll talk about as well and
the making of that. But I did want to ask
you what was the earliest moment you knew you were
connected with music for a lifetime.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
I had a great opportunity last year where I was
able to.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
BBC asked me to do a program BBC Radio on essentially.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
My favorite ever rock.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
Group who just happened to be American the doors, and
the reason they asked me was that the producers had
heard me elsewhere telling the story of being in the
back of my dad's car he had just got. It
(04:49):
wasn't a new car, it was a second hand car,
but it was her new car, and I was afraid
in a summer night, and.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
He came back with the car.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
We were all excited, and while mom was making the
and he said, come on, give you a right and
we went. The big thing about the car. You will
laugh because I know, being American, the idea of cars not.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Having a radio.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
But when I grew up, the first few years I
grew up, most cars didn't have a radio. So not
only was it his new car, the new family car,
but it had a radio. And so we drove to
the outskirts of the city, and being very scotty, she said,
I just got to go to this pub and see
(05:33):
your friend. He's always in there, and I'm just gonna
have a ten or fifteen minute.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Chat you and your brother.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
You know, listen to the radio. Big deal. Great.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
And he came out and brought some chips and.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Christs and stuff. And as I tell you, this is
so unlikely. The weather in Scotland can change like that.
And within he said it'd be ten minutes. He was
probably there an hour and within that hour the weather
changed and as we were sitting in the car, the
(06:10):
clouds got kind of doom and gloom late and thunder.
Didn't hear a lot of thunder with thunder. It was kinny,
scary lone Behold. As we're listening to the radio, the
song comes on with the sound of thunder and rain
at the beginning of it, and then there's this haunted
(06:33):
voice and there's a killer on the road. His brain
is squirming like a toad. Take a long holiday. Let
the children play Oh Man Riders on the Storm. Now.
I would have been ten, and that's when I knew
(06:55):
there was another kind of music other than just the
pop hits that we listened to on the radio. And
it's amazing. A couple of days later, driving in the
same car my dad, it came on. I said, I
love this song, and my dad said, that's a great song.
(07:16):
And then he went that young fellow just died and
I said what He said, Yeah, it was in the
newspaper he just died. I said, what's his name?
Speaker 2 (07:26):
He said, Jim, same as you, same as me.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
My dad' said Jim as well, And listening to that,
there's such a haunted, the echoes, the whole thing, beautiful poetry.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Something bad's about to happen.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I think in terms of your question, that's when I
first developed a deeper curiosity about music.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
Oh what a beautiful story. And I always wanted to
go back to Scotland from a trip about a year
ago because we had this cool driver who had a
soundtrack actually that he put on to kind of accompany
us on the drive, and that's the only thing that
was missing. I mean, we had our share of great music,
(08:21):
everything from Simple Minds to Genesis to The Strawbs, but
we didn't have any doors.
Speaker 3 (08:29):
So well, there you going. Well I would have liked
that because I'm a Genesis fan, and I and the
Strobs was also a band that everyone respected.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
So what inspired you then to form Johnny and the
Self Abusers in.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
Nineteen seventy seven.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
That was this just I don't know what happened, but
out of nowhere came this thing that was cold punk rock.
So obviously there was a huge music element to it,
but it was more a philosophy and the philosophy to
(09:10):
mostly young British working class kids was like a bolt
of lightning, because not that we resented our stature in
life or anything the working class communities and it was
a great pride in that, but there was a feeling
(09:31):
that a viewer from working class that you couldn't be
an artist, or you know, you have to come from
Paris or Vienna, or you have to go to the
great arts schools in London or whatever. It was just
a step beyond not very many working class certainly no
people we knew, but out of nowhere, somehow this punk
(09:52):
thing came along with the theology, very simple theology that said,
you know what, any one can give it a go,
and anyone kind of gave it a go, and.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
We were one of those who gave it a go.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
It wasn't like you were going to be judged because
you couldn't play like Eric Clapton. A year before you'd
be judged because you couldn't play like Eric Clapton, or
or you couldn't play keyboards like Requitment, or or you
didn't go to music college. It was something much more visceral,
like that, have you got something to see and can
(10:32):
you see it, and whether you said it through music
or kids were starting their own fashion label, some of
which have become world beating, and still people were making
little documentaries, publishing their own fanzines published.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
There was this great energy and we were swept up
in that.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
We being Charlie Burschell, my songwriting partner who lived in
the same street as me in Glasgow. We met when
we were eight years old and in our case we
took our whole passion for music and this punk wave
that came swept us up in It carried us along.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
To the extent of rather than just sitting saying one
day we're going to get a band, we got a band.
We knew.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
We knew we didn't have the chops, we knew that
we hadn't done the ten years of wood shedding. But
we got up, we plugged in, We did our thing,
and something happens that usually never happens when people start
(11:44):
a band. The audience went mental. They went crazy.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
I when I say the audience, I'm talking about fifty people.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
But you know it was a little pub. They went't
crazy like and we know because we used to go
and see the band's playing on bars and the audience
never went crazy. They went crazy, which made us think
we had a vibe. And before we came off, I
(12:13):
found myself already haggling with the bar owner to try
and get her free up from ten pounds a week
to twelve pound a week because I could see, I
could see our value instantly, beers were being bought. It's amazing.
Speaker 5 (12:36):
How do you maintained such a great creative energy, you know,
all these years?
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I think, well, it's great that you mentioned energy, because
it all comes down to that. I think you know
your spiritual energy, your physical energy, your creative energy, you
name it. But I think it comes through a combination
of things. We don't even have to try to remember
(13:07):
how lucky, how fortunate we are. And when you feel
like that, you're already you know, you're just you retain
the only energy that you hadn't It doesn't diminish as
well as realizing how lucky we are, because who wouldn't
(13:31):
want to be you know, who wouldn't want to have
a life doing something that you love? Never made the
success and the extra rewards that alone. So the great
fortune in because the amount of you know, the amount
of people that start bands and want to be musicians
(13:51):
and want to you know, we're in the zero point
zero point zero point one percent, so we're incredibly fortunate.
But along with that, and to an equal amount, there's
a fantastic sense of purpose, especially.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
When you're tooling, because well, what do you do.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
You know, you turn up on a tone and you
go out that night and it's always at the end
of the night. Although actually I quite like watching the
audience coming in as well. They come in and they
have a certain kind of energy because they've been excited
and the gigs there and maybe they haven't seen you
for a long time, maybe never seen you at all.
They had they're going to a show, they're going to
(14:35):
forget their problems of the day. But if you can
go on and you can deliver beyond the odds to
the extent that you know, they came in with a
spring in their feet, but by the end of the
night they actually physically jumping up and down, regardless of
their age, holding each other, hogging each other. Something is
(15:00):
transformation has happened in that. Let's face it, a lot
of these venues are pretty cold gang places when there's
no people in them. Something beautiful has happened and at
the end of the night, you get the chance to
take twenty seconds and see what you've done. It's a
(15:20):
fantastic sense of purpose.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
And so.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
I don't know how other people look at it or
think about it, but those things alone have helped us
maintain the approach and the energy that I'm glad that
you may notice.
Speaker 4 (15:40):
Isn't it amazing? Now how a constant among so many
things is when one leads with gratitude as well.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
I mean, you know, people ask for advice quite often interviews.
People will say what piece of advice would you? I mean,
I tell you what we found gratitude And it's not easy.
Nothing's easy, but we've found out this when you attack
(16:17):
things with one hundred percent but also with gratitude, with
love and our study, the doors did actually open easier
than we thought. Now, whether that's you know, this karmic
thing of just energy that you give off attracts a
(16:40):
certain kind of energy as well. People say that. I
tend to believe it because it's it's the story. I mean,
if you go on tour without see you go on
to go on tour and you think.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
It's all about you, it's not about you.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
It's the last thing you you were all about you
stay at home playing your garage, you know, to say, well,
I don't want to play those songs and stay in
your garage and do that. You're going out to be
of service. And I think when you have that attitude,
people might not articulated, but they sensed. They buy into it,
(17:20):
and they're going to work the next day and they
become your biggest sales people because they say to their friends, man,
who were at this thing last night.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It's the story of her career.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
They blew us away, or it was great, or I
can't wait to see it again. On the other hand,
if you go on, I mean a lot of people
to be tired and tour or.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
You know, things got to I didn't have a good.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
Sound, or get over yourself. I'll just get over yourself.
Someone has invested so much to come and see you,
and I'm not even goes without saying they've invested financially,
but they've invested emotionally their time. They're looking forward to
they're coming with friends from school who they saw you
(18:10):
back twenty thirty years ago. And if you go on
with a bit yeah, I'm not really it's a shoesday
night and some in the Boon Dogs. There's no Boon Docks,
there's no shoesday night.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
It's the only night in the world when you go on.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Stage, because it's the only you're in the there, and
then you're in the here and now there, and then
tomorrow night doesn't exist. Last night's history. And I think
when you attack.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
It like that, that awards come back ten times.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
We'll be right back with more of the Taken a
Walk podcast. Welcome back to the Taking a Walk podcast.
Speaker 7 (18:54):
So let's take it to First of all, you know
live in the City of Diamonds and use that as
a backdrop to this major series of tour dates that
Simple Minds is going to have. I think it's a
brilliant way to sort of pump everybody up for what
they're about to see.
Speaker 5 (19:14):
And get them all super excited. And you're playing a
lot of big, big venues and places you probably have
been and maybe some places that you have not been.
So talk about first of all, how much fun it
was going back over City of Diamonds, and then how
(19:35):
you're looking forward to this tour.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Well, I mean the very act of putting out a
live album and putting together a beautiful package and whatever
it is. You know. So the various formats, whether it's
a double or a quadruple, and all that. Live albums,
whether very nature or old school, you know, that's what
you grew up my generation. And if you favorite band
(20:01):
put out a live album, I mean it was intrinsically
a fans thing, a specific fans thing. Live tracks usually
didn't get played on radio or anything, so it was
usually capturing a moment a band wanted to capture a
moment in tame. Maybe in that moment in time there
(20:22):
would be songs the fans knew, but maybe there'll be
three or four with the live arrangement, knock spots off
the record arrangement, or the band happened to be playing
really great at that moment. Because when you think, you
know the way, it's a bit back to front. You
write songs, you've never played them.
Speaker 8 (20:41):
When you go and record them and then you go
and play them live, well, it's not till you go
and play them live you think you know what, there's
something about this live version.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
It could be the looseness of it, or it could
be the tightness of it. There's something in that spirited
thing and through the year simple Mains. I mean, our
first ever live album was to quite a nice little thing.
We got gone here. First album was recorded in Paris
(21:15):
in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Six eighty sexuy five.
Speaker 3 (21:21):
It was called Live in the City of Light. And
then we recorded a certain point an album of loss
in Los Angeles Live in the City of Angels Amsterdam.
It's quite actually, it's quite caused a.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Bit of a ferrari because.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Right now as we speak, people from Antwerp and Belgium
will jump up and down and say we're the city
of diamonds. But historically, historically, historically, historically Amsterdam was the
original city of diamonds. So that's not why we recorded there.
(22:00):
We recorded there because of all the great places and
of all the great audiences. They just happen to have
this amazing venue there, which is purpose built, is purpose
built for music. Not many venues are, so the logic
there is quite easy to understand. But there's also a
fantastic crowd and the band we have a heck of
(22:23):
a popularity for some reason in Holland, so all of that.
But yeah, it was a moment in time and in
this world where since we have your career things have
come and gone and the changes that we've seen, mostly
based on technology. Society has changed everything. The one thing
(22:47):
I'm glad that has not changed for simple minds as
playing live. We use technical tools, but essentially you turn
up in town, you get up on stage that night,
and you put the band together and you try to
catch some lightning in a bottle. And that's what the
(23:12):
live records attempt to do. The try and capture a moment.
Speaker 4 (23:18):
And they pump people up to go out to see
you all over the world.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Right there you go, yeah, they go, that's a great
live band, which is still something to be right. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (23:29):
Well, in closing, I wanted to ask if you could
take us back to June twenty seventh, two thousand and eight,
the performance there for Nelson Mandela's ninetieth birthday party.
Speaker 4 (23:47):
What was that experience?
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Like, I mean, you know, we've been, as I say,
very fortunate. We've been able to play some amazing gigs
and especially you know when you play Wembley Stadium more
you know, even back in the day to turn up
playing at live a JFK stadium, but to play at
(24:09):
these concerts, the first one which was calling for the
release of Nelson Mandela. I mean the political situation in
South Africa was things were on the move, but certainly
our government was dragging its feet and there was a
few things our government could have done politically that would
(24:32):
have speeded up the protests. So when Jerry Damas came
and asked us to get involved in this concert, it
was kind of basically the year before had been lively
the first big global concert, and Jerry saw how you
could really There had always been the great American there'd
always been great agid prop and protest singers and stuff,
(24:55):
but to put on where they were really calling for
the end of a party was something that something there
comes a time in your life where you think it's
got to be about something more than just selling records
and selling T shirts. We have a microphone and we're
(25:16):
being asked to I mean, you wouldn't want to do
it every year, and you wouldn't want to do it
every album, but we're being asked to add.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Our voices to something that.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
Really was important to us, an important to a lot
of people of a generation. So it was an amazing
thing and obviously to to then subsequently, because there is
a voice in your head as well sometimes you think
we're getting a bit too big for a boots here,
or we're getting out of our lane, or you know,
(25:55):
does it really matter, does the world really listen? And
I'll never forget that. When Mandela was eventually able well
to be freed and on his way to becoming the
President of South Africa, he came to London to thank
the actors involved and he said, he said, when there
(26:17):
was no voice alowed, somehow we always could hear the
voice of the artist, the poets, the filmmakers, the documentary makers,
the writers a journalists, and he said that gave us
the very oxygen we needed to continue.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
So it was an amazing experience.
Speaker 7 (26:42):
Mister Kerr, mister James Kerr, I absolutely love speaking with you.
Speaker 4 (26:47):
I feel like we were just almost you know, like
we were at one of the pubs there in Glasgow,
just hanging out and yeah, having a conversation.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
I appreciate everything you continue to give and that Simple
Minds continues.
Speaker 3 (27:01):
To give us.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
And thank you sir for being on Taking a Walk.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
Hi, thank you. I enjoyed every minute talking to you
all the best.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Taking a
Walk podcast. Share this and other episodes with your friends
and follow us so you never miss an episode. Taking
a Walk is available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
and wherever you get your podcasts.
Taking a Walk.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
If you go on with a bit, yeah, I'm not released.
Speaker 3 (00:04):
It's a Shoesday night, and some in the Boon Docks,
there's no Boon Docks. There's no Shoesday night. It's the
only night in the world when you go on stage,
because it's the only you're in the there, and then
you're in the here, and now the there and then
tomorrow night doesn't exist. Last Night's history. And I think
(00:26):
when you attack it like that, Thatt Awards come back
ten times.
Speaker 1 (00:31):
Welcome to this episode of the Taking a Walk Podcast,
and today we're joined by one of the most iconic
voices in music, Jim Kerr, the charismatic front man of
Simple Minds, known for their hits like Don't You Forget
About Me? And Alive and Kicking. Jim has been a
driving force in the music industry for decades. Jim Kerr
(00:52):
joins Buzz Night Now on the Taking a Walk Podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Jim Kerr, It's.
Speaker 4 (00:59):
An honor to have you on Taking a Walk, sir, Well, how.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Could I resist a title like that Taking a Walk?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
I mean, I still.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
From the earliest days that was my whole thing, and
I'm still a walker. I'm still a hiker. I'm still
a whatever. That's how I get around. So for that
reason alone, although I hear many great things about your show,
but for that reason I role you had me at
(01:32):
the title.
Speaker 4 (01:33):
Oh you're so kind, Thank you. So since it's called
taking a walk.
Speaker 5 (01:38):
Though, I do have to ask you this devilish question
of mine that I do start out the podcast with,
If you could take a walk with somebody living or dead,
who would that be and where would you take a
walk with him?
Speaker 3 (01:56):
Oh? Wow, God, that is a devilish question. You absolutely
ray for all the obvious reasons. Right now, I'd love
to take a walk with my old dad, that's for sure.
He's no longer here, but he was a walker, and
he and I were very fortunate we got the chance.
(02:16):
Especially once my band got successful. I was able to
take him with me on quite a few trips and
we would go off peace.
Speaker 2 (02:29):
You know.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
There would be the gig and the tour and all that, which,
of course was what it was all about. But as
soon as there was a day off, we would go
off around whatever city or whatever desert or whatever national park.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Walking and talking and thinking was our thing.
Speaker 3 (02:51):
So I've been very lucky in my life the amount
of people I've met, everyone from Nelson Mandela to the
Dalai lama Uh.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
And if I had mentioned those names.
Speaker 3 (03:02):
You would have I'm sure you would have said, yeah, well,
I can understand that, but I'm still gonna go with
my old dad.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
That's a good one.
Speaker 6 (03:10):
And I will tell you many folks who I asked
the question, they either bring up their dad or their
mom as someone they would like to take that walk with.
Speaker 4 (03:23):
So you know, and I can't disagree.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Well, the people who taught us to walk, the people
who taught us to take our first steps.
Speaker 4 (03:31):
Yeah, that's so great. Well, congratulations on the City of
Diamonds release Live in the City of Diamonds, which goes
across four decades, which clearly shows how much joy you
have in performing live and continue to have in performing live.
(03:54):
There's also a documentary we'll talk about as well and
the making of that. But I did want to ask
you what was the earliest moment you knew you were
connected with music for a lifetime.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
I had a great opportunity last year where I was
able to.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
BBC asked me to do a program BBC Radio on essentially.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
My favorite ever rock.
Speaker 3 (04:29):
Group who just happened to be American the doors, and
the reason they asked me was that the producers had
heard me elsewhere telling the story of being in the
back of my dad's car he had just got. It
(04:49):
wasn't a new car, it was a second hand car,
but it was her new car, and I was afraid
in a summer night, and.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
He came back with the car.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
We were all excited, and while mom was making the
and he said, come on, give you a right and
we went. The big thing about the car. You will
laugh because I know, being American, the idea of cars not.
Speaker 2 (05:10):
Having a radio.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
But when I grew up, the first few years I
grew up, most cars didn't have a radio. So not
only was it his new car, the new family car,
but it had a radio. And so we drove to
the outskirts of the city, and being very scotty, she said,
I just got to go to this pub and see
(05:33):
your friend. He's always in there, and I'm just gonna
have a ten or fifteen minute.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Chat you and your brother.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
You know, listen to the radio. Big deal. Great.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
And he came out and brought some chips and.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Christs and stuff. And as I tell you, this is
so unlikely. The weather in Scotland can change like that.
And within he said it'd be ten minutes. He was
probably there an hour and within that hour the weather
changed and as we were sitting in the car, the
(06:10):
clouds got kind of doom and gloom late and thunder.
Didn't hear a lot of thunder with thunder. It was kinny,
scary lone Behold. As we're listening to the radio, the
song comes on with the sound of thunder and rain
at the beginning of it, and then there's this haunted
(06:33):
voice and there's a killer on the road. His brain
is squirming like a toad. Take a long holiday. Let
the children play Oh Man Riders on the Storm. Now.
I would have been ten, and that's when I knew
(06:55):
there was another kind of music other than just the
pop hits that we listened to on the radio. And
it's amazing. A couple of days later, driving in the
same car my dad, it came on. I said, I
love this song, and my dad said, that's a great song.
(07:16):
And then he went that young fellow just died and
I said what He said, Yeah, it was in the
newspaper he just died. I said, what's his name?
Speaker 2 (07:26):
He said, Jim, same as you, same as me.
Speaker 3 (07:29):
My dad' said Jim as well, And listening to that,
there's such a haunted, the echoes, the whole thing, beautiful poetry.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Something bad's about to happen.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
I think in terms of your question, that's when I
first developed a deeper curiosity about music.
Speaker 4 (07:57):
Oh what a beautiful story. And I always wanted to
go back to Scotland from a trip about a year
ago because we had this cool driver who had a
soundtrack actually that he put on to kind of accompany
us on the drive, and that's the only thing that
was missing. I mean, we had our share of great music,
(08:21):
everything from Simple Minds to Genesis to The Strawbs, but
we didn't have any doors.
Speaker 3 (08:29):
So well, there you going. Well I would have liked
that because I'm a Genesis fan, and I and the
Strobs was also a band that everyone respected.
Speaker 4 (08:38):
So what inspired you then to form Johnny and the
Self Abusers in.
Speaker 2 (08:45):
Nineteen seventy seven.
Speaker 3 (08:47):
That was this just I don't know what happened, but
out of nowhere came this thing that was cold punk rock.
So obviously there was a huge music element to it,
but it was more a philosophy and the philosophy to
(09:10):
mostly young British working class kids was like a bolt
of lightning, because not that we resented our stature in
life or anything the working class communities and it was
a great pride in that, but there was a feeling
(09:31):
that a viewer from working class that you couldn't be
an artist, or you know, you have to come from
Paris or Vienna, or you have to go to the
great arts schools in London or whatever. It was just
a step beyond not very many working class certainly no
people we knew, but out of nowhere, somehow this punk
(09:52):
thing came along with the theology, very simple theology that said,
you know what, any one can give it a go,
and anyone kind of gave it a go, and.
Speaker 2 (10:06):
We were one of those who gave it a go.
Speaker 3 (10:08):
It wasn't like you were going to be judged because
you couldn't play like Eric Clapton. A year before you'd
be judged because you couldn't play like Eric Clapton, or
or you couldn't play keyboards like Requitment, or or you
didn't go to music college. It was something much more visceral,
like that, have you got something to see and can
(10:32):
you see it, and whether you said it through music
or kids were starting their own fashion label, some of
which have become world beating, and still people were making
little documentaries, publishing their own fanzines published.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
There was this great energy and we were swept up
in that.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
We being Charlie Burschell, my songwriting partner who lived in
the same street as me in Glasgow. We met when
we were eight years old and in our case we
took our whole passion for music and this punk wave
that came swept us up in It carried us along.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
To the extent of rather than just sitting saying one
day we're going to get a band, we got a band.
We knew.
Speaker 3 (11:24):
We knew we didn't have the chops, we knew that
we hadn't done the ten years of wood shedding. But
we got up, we plugged in, We did our thing,
and something happens that usually never happens when people start
(11:44):
a band. The audience went mental. They went crazy.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
I when I say the audience, I'm talking about fifty people.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
But you know it was a little pub. They went't
crazy like and we know because we used to go
and see the band's playing on bars and the audience
never went crazy. They went crazy, which made us think
we had a vibe. And before we came off, I
(12:13):
found myself already haggling with the bar owner to try
and get her free up from ten pounds a week
to twelve pound a week because I could see, I
could see our value instantly, beers were being bought. It's amazing.
Speaker 5 (12:36):
How do you maintained such a great creative energy, you know,
all these years?
Speaker 3 (12:45):
I think, well, it's great that you mentioned energy, because
it all comes down to that. I think you know
your spiritual energy, your physical energy, your creative energy, you
name it. But I think it comes through a combination
of things. We don't even have to try to remember
(13:07):
how lucky, how fortunate we are. And when you feel
like that, you're already you know, you're just you retain
the only energy that you hadn't It doesn't diminish as
well as realizing how lucky we are, because who wouldn't
(13:31):
want to be you know, who wouldn't want to have
a life doing something that you love? Never made the
success and the extra rewards that alone. So the great
fortune in because the amount of you know, the amount
of people that start bands and want to be musicians
(13:51):
and want to you know, we're in the zero point
zero point zero point one percent, so we're incredibly fortunate.
But along with that, and to an equal amount, there's
a fantastic sense of purpose, especially.
Speaker 2 (14:08):
When you're tooling, because well, what do you do.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
You know, you turn up on a tone and you
go out that night and it's always at the end
of the night. Although actually I quite like watching the
audience coming in as well. They come in and they
have a certain kind of energy because they've been excited
and the gigs there and maybe they haven't seen you
for a long time, maybe never seen you at all.
They had they're going to a show, they're going to
(14:35):
forget their problems of the day. But if you can
go on and you can deliver beyond the odds to
the extent that you know, they came in with a
spring in their feet, but by the end of the
night they actually physically jumping up and down, regardless of
their age, holding each other, hogging each other. Something is
(15:00):
transformation has happened in that. Let's face it, a lot
of these venues are pretty cold gang places when there's
no people in them. Something beautiful has happened and at
the end of the night, you get the chance to
take twenty seconds and see what you've done. It's a
(15:20):
fantastic sense of purpose.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
And so.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
I don't know how other people look at it or
think about it, but those things alone have helped us
maintain the approach and the energy that I'm glad that
you may notice.
Speaker 4 (15:40):
Isn't it amazing? Now how a constant among so many
things is when one leads with gratitude as well.
Speaker 3 (15:53):
I mean, you know, people ask for advice quite often interviews.
People will say what piece of advice would you? I mean,
I tell you what we found gratitude And it's not easy.
Nothing's easy, but we've found out this when you attack
(16:17):
things with one hundred percent but also with gratitude, with
love and our study, the doors did actually open easier
than we thought. Now, whether that's you know, this karmic
thing of just energy that you give off attracts a
(16:40):
certain kind of energy as well. People say that. I
tend to believe it because it's it's the story. I mean,
if you go on tour without see you go on
to go on tour and you think.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
It's all about you, it's not about you.
Speaker 3 (16:56):
It's the last thing you you were all about you
stay at home playing your garage, you know, to say, well,
I don't want to play those songs and stay in
your garage and do that. You're going out to be
of service. And I think when you have that attitude,
people might not articulated, but they sensed. They buy into it,
(17:20):
and they're going to work the next day and they
become your biggest sales people because they say to their friends, man,
who were at this thing last night.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
It's the story of her career.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
They blew us away, or it was great, or I
can't wait to see it again. On the other hand,
if you go on, I mean a lot of people
to be tired and tour or.
Speaker 2 (17:46):
You know, things got to I didn't have a good.
Speaker 3 (17:49):
Sound, or get over yourself. I'll just get over yourself.
Someone has invested so much to come and see you,
and I'm not even goes without saying they've invested financially,
but they've invested emotionally their time. They're looking forward to
they're coming with friends from school who they saw you
(18:10):
back twenty thirty years ago. And if you go on
with a bit yeah, I'm not really it's a shoesday
night and some in the Boon Dogs. There's no Boon Docks,
there's no shoesday night.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
It's the only night in the world when you go on.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Stage, because it's the only you're in the there, and
then you're in the here and now there, and then
tomorrow night doesn't exist. Last night's history. And I think
when you attack.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
It like that, that awards come back ten times.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
We'll be right back with more of the Taken a
Walk podcast. Welcome back to the Taking a Walk podcast.
Speaker 7 (18:54):
So let's take it to First of all, you know
live in the City of Diamonds and use that as
a backdrop to this major series of tour dates that
Simple Minds is going to have. I think it's a
brilliant way to sort of pump everybody up for what
they're about to see.
Speaker 5 (19:14):
And get them all super excited. And you're playing a
lot of big, big venues and places you probably have
been and maybe some places that you have not been.
So talk about first of all, how much fun it
was going back over City of Diamonds, and then how
(19:35):
you're looking forward to this tour.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Well, I mean the very act of putting out a
live album and putting together a beautiful package and whatever
it is. You know. So the various formats, whether it's
a double or a quadruple, and all that. Live albums,
whether very nature or old school, you know, that's what
you grew up my generation. And if you favorite band
(20:01):
put out a live album, I mean it was intrinsically
a fans thing, a specific fans thing. Live tracks usually
didn't get played on radio or anything, so it was
usually capturing a moment a band wanted to capture a
moment in tame. Maybe in that moment in time there
(20:22):
would be songs the fans knew, but maybe there'll be
three or four with the live arrangement, knock spots off
the record arrangement, or the band happened to be playing
really great at that moment. Because when you think, you
know the way, it's a bit back to front. You
write songs, you've never played them.
Speaker 8 (20:41):
When you go and record them and then you go
and play them live, well, it's not till you go
and play them live you think you know what, there's
something about this live version.
Speaker 3 (20:53):
It could be the looseness of it, or it could
be the tightness of it. There's something in that spirited
thing and through the year simple Mains. I mean, our
first ever live album was to quite a nice little thing.
We got gone here. First album was recorded in Paris
(21:15):
in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
Six eighty sexuy five.
Speaker 3 (21:21):
It was called Live in the City of Light. And
then we recorded a certain point an album of loss
in Los Angeles Live in the City of Angels Amsterdam.
It's quite actually, it's quite caused a.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Bit of a ferrari because.
Speaker 3 (21:39):
Right now as we speak, people from Antwerp and Belgium
will jump up and down and say we're the city
of diamonds. But historically, historically, historically, historically Amsterdam was the
original city of diamonds. So that's not why we recorded there.
(22:00):
We recorded there because of all the great places and
of all the great audiences. They just happen to have
this amazing venue there, which is purpose built, is purpose
built for music. Not many venues are, so the logic
there is quite easy to understand. But there's also a
fantastic crowd and the band we have a heck of
(22:23):
a popularity for some reason in Holland, so all of that.
But yeah, it was a moment in time and in
this world where since we have your career things have
come and gone and the changes that we've seen, mostly
based on technology. Society has changed everything. The one thing
(22:47):
I'm glad that has not changed for simple minds as
playing live. We use technical tools, but essentially you turn
up in town, you get up on stage that night,
and you put the band together and you try to
catch some lightning in a bottle. And that's what the
(23:12):
live records attempt to do. The try and capture a moment.
Speaker 4 (23:18):
And they pump people up to go out to see
you all over the world.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
Right there you go, yeah, they go, that's a great
live band, which is still something to be right. Yeah.
Speaker 5 (23:29):
Well, in closing, I wanted to ask if you could
take us back to June twenty seventh, two thousand and eight,
the performance there for Nelson Mandela's ninetieth birthday party.
Speaker 4 (23:47):
What was that experience?
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Like, I mean, you know, we've been, as I say,
very fortunate. We've been able to play some amazing gigs
and especially you know when you play Wembley Stadium more
you know, even back in the day to turn up
playing at live a JFK stadium, but to play at
(24:09):
these concerts, the first one which was calling for the
release of Nelson Mandela. I mean the political situation in
South Africa was things were on the move, but certainly
our government was dragging its feet and there was a
few things our government could have done politically that would
(24:32):
have speeded up the protests. So when Jerry Damas came
and asked us to get involved in this concert, it
was kind of basically the year before had been lively
the first big global concert, and Jerry saw how you
could really There had always been the great American there'd
always been great agid prop and protest singers and stuff,
(24:55):
but to put on where they were really calling for
the end of a party was something that something there
comes a time in your life where you think it's
got to be about something more than just selling records
and selling T shirts. We have a microphone and we're
(25:16):
being asked to I mean, you wouldn't want to do
it every year, and you wouldn't want to do it
every album, but we're being asked to add.
Speaker 2 (25:29):
Our voices to something that.
Speaker 3 (25:34):
Really was important to us, an important to a lot
of people of a generation. So it was an amazing
thing and obviously to to then subsequently, because there is
a voice in your head as well sometimes you think
we're getting a bit too big for a boots here,
or we're getting out of our lane, or you know,
(25:55):
does it really matter, does the world really listen? And
I'll never forget that. When Mandela was eventually able well
to be freed and on his way to becoming the
President of South Africa, he came to London to thank
the actors involved and he said, he said, when there
(26:17):
was no voice alowed, somehow we always could hear the
voice of the artist, the poets, the filmmakers, the documentary makers,
the writers a journalists, and he said that gave us
the very oxygen we needed to continue.
Speaker 2 (26:37):
So it was an amazing experience.
Speaker 7 (26:42):
Mister Kerr, mister James Kerr, I absolutely love speaking with you.
Speaker 4 (26:47):
I feel like we were just almost you know, like
we were at one of the pubs there in Glasgow,
just hanging out and yeah, having a conversation.
Speaker 5 (26:57):
I appreciate everything you continue to give and that Simple
Minds continues.
Speaker 3 (27:01):
To give us.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
And thank you sir for being on Taking a Walk.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
Hi, thank you. I enjoyed every minute talking to you
all the best.
Speaker 1 (27:11):
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Taking a
Walk podcast. Share this and other episodes with your friends
and follow us so you never miss an episode. Taking
a Walk is available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
and wherever you get your podcasts.
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