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Has no one ever talked about "Neapolis"?
I'll talk about it, but first, a necessary preface.
As someone who was a teenager in the Eighties, and therefore, like many adolescents, was highly receptive to every stimulus, I confess, Jim Kerr represented an Idol for me. Perhaps the only true idol I truly perceived as such, no one like him seemed to speak and pour words into music to my heart... and that was true both with the harsh, introverted, and extremely complex harmonies of the pre-1982 works, as well as with their new wave paradigms "New Gold Dream" and "Sparkle in The Rain", and with the emphasis—which then as now sounded sincere to me—of "Once Upon a Time."
Then, something stalled.
Maybe I was becoming an adult, discovering other talents, other music...
But now, 22 years later, "Live in The City Of Lights" still sounds like a betrayal to me: Jim screaming instead of singing? A "live" album with so many overdubs? "Promised You a Miracle" and "Book of Brilliant Things" with accents flipped compared to the originals I loved?
"Street Fighting Years" 20 years later? Simple Minds trying to be progressive? Hmm... and then the most terrible thing: Charlie Burchill, the magical carver of atmospheres, excellent at his craft precisely because he blended and interacted with other instruments... here, for me, it's a disaster, a soloist who stands particularly awkward and always comes in at the wrong moment.
Yet I loved them, even these albums...
"Real Life" and "Good News From The Next World" came too late for me, the magic was gone, and I had fallen in love with other sounds and currents.
"Neon Lights" is chilling and without passion, this said with serene equidistance.
"Cry" and "Black & White" leave me rather indifferent, more the second than the first.
And in between we find "Neapolis," this album from 1998... so mistreated that when I searched online for comments—positive or negative, but sufficiently articulated to show that the album had been given even minimal attention—... I found nothing, apart from generic "en passant" ("the lowest point of their career," "anonymous album," and so forth).
Instead, said by a former fan of Simple Minds (or rather Jim Kerr), this album, as far as I'm concerned, stands out powerfully, it is a peak of inventiveness compared to what came immediately before and after it. If only because here, and not before or after, it seems to me that there is a pursuit of sonic construction... If only because here there is a lot of "Sons & Fascination" vibe—with all due proportions!—due to the airy keyboards and the brisk pace, agile, swift, of tracks like "Tears Of A Guy" or "Lightning" ... If only because Derek Forbes still participates in the sound of this album, THAT Derek, that bass which contributed to the uniqueness of the Simple Minds' sound as much as Michael Mc Neil's keyboards. Is this co-presence, the bassist, and the newfound vitality a coincidence?... and then, yes, if only because they end the album with an instrumental like they've not done in 20 years, which just from its title "Androgyny" sounds intriguing... And don't tell me you didn't love the Simple Minds' instrumental tracks!
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
02 Glitterball (04:55)
Full of doubt, took the easy way out
Always said they couldn't find their place
Among some real dark stuff, they got to thinking enough
Remember Halcyon Days
We'll spend our time with a bottle of wine
And a love that knows no human state
Never got to wake up early
Never got to feel so poorly
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
Lifts me up - Then leaves me to fall
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
One step, Two step, Three step, Four
Drag me to the middle, then you pulled me to the floor
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
And I've been captured by imagination
I feel the faint vibration in the air
Been taken hostage by the one creation
Anticipate the night that's in your hair
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
Lifts me up - Then leaves me to fall
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
Lifts me up - Then leaves me to fall
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
One step, Two step, Three step, Four
Drag me to the middle, then you pulled me to the floor
Glitterball - Radiate round the hall
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
One final day
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
Don't make me wait
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
Don't make me wait
As the great unloved go dancing all the way
Written by : Kerr/Burchill Reproduced Without Permission
06 Lightning (05:35)
I want to know where you live
I want to know who you are
I want to see what you see
I want to go where you are
Want to touch what you touch
Want to be where you are
I want to know what city this is
Seems like I'm moving so far
Riot town right noise
A lightning streak
Fate rides up and moves us on
Mother don't weep
I want to see what you see
I want to touch - let me play
I want to try every poison in sight
I want to lie where you lay
Let me see let me see
I want to know what you know
I want to learn what's imprisoning me
Iwant to know let it go
Riot time right noise
Violent times speak
Bottled up - like a fake damnation
Lightning speed
Crackdown backdoors
Meltdown shoes
Bare back riders - a rank outsider
An automatic cruise
I want to touch what you touch
I long to be where you are
I'll always know - you'll let me know all this gets too far
Let me touch. Let me touch
Let me feel what you feel
I want to know how certain this is
I want to know this is real
Riot town, right noise
Lightning streak
Fate rides up and moves us on
Mother don't weep
Crackdown back door
Violent times speak
Fate rides up and moves us on
Lightning streak
Written by : Kerr/Burchill Reproduced Without Permission
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