Simple Minds
Graffiti Soul

I read excellent reviews about "Graffiti Soul".

I notice not excellent sales of "Graffiti Soul".

Age-old issue: quality does not always pay off, and believe me (or listen to the album): here, there is all the quality of a group that has been playing (and really playing) for 30 years, navigating through highs, lows, very lows, from new wave to rock, inventing along the way a style and a brand.

Those who have followed, like me, that path might think that the Simple-Minds-Sound here reaches near-perfection and supports, even surpasses, the magnificent "Black & White". Throughout the tracks, I find solid bass-drum foundations upon which Burchill indulges in more or less all the techniques with which one can play a guitar, a Jim Kerr who suggests melodies and attacks the choruses, all amidst sinth undertones and perfect arrangements.

This is the logical thread from which unravel "Moscow Underground", rhythmic and introspective, "Rockets" with the engaging guitar riff in the chorus, "Star Will Lead The Way" in which Burchill draws peaks and highs over Kerr's intense and incisive vocals. Next is "Light Travels" with its muted verse that develops and grows through key changes and opens to the final refrain. "Kiss & Fly" and the title track stand out for the chases between bass and drums, sometimes unlinked and then intertwined again in the pressing guitar interjections; "Blood Type 0" and "Shadows & Light" are unusual compositional solutions, unusual at least for Simple Minds, yet pleasant and wonderfully arranged. Among them, the rock energy and atmosphere of "This is it".

You can think anything but not that Simple Minds are tired of making music. In "Graffiti Soul" there are ideas, technique, measure, genius, a desire to play against all odds.