Simple Minds
Reel to Real Cacophony

"Reel To Real... Fact To Fact..."
 
Dedicated to those who believe that Simple Minds gave their best only as (magnificent) pioneers of crystal-clear electro-pop in the New Gold Dream / Sparkle In The Rain era. Or as epic promoters of ethereal stadium rock and protest songs during the Once Upon A Time / Street Fighting Years period.
 
In the ten years that separate "Changeling" from "Belfast Child" there is one of the most fascinating chasms in the history of modern pop music. That is, the live construction of a band, a big brother of evolution or for others the documentary of a de-evolution. Surely few bands have shifted from a musical environment comparable to Devo to another akin to U2. Delicious mysteries of one of the most atypical bands of recent decades. Like a mystery is the incredible willpower and experimentation that can lead a band to release, just over six months after their debut work, Life In A Day, an appreciable LP yet catalogable in modest art-rock seen in a Glasgow pub, imitating Bowie, Roxy Music and similar, to this Reel To Real Cacophony. The "blue album" of Simple Minds, in that 1979 brimming with cataclysms. A 1979 in which it is difficult to conceive an album without being intimidated by a thousand innovations, the greatest bands alternating as the charioteers of the year. Better, to name two, Wire, Clash or P.I.L.? Joy Division or Pop Group? No one needed Simple Minds, no one needed a dark work from a dark band. And yet this is exactly what will come, a cacophonic circus of sensations, post-adolescent poems, monumental soundscapes and little electronic jokes. Jim Kerr and company still do not know which direction to take, and so it will be for all the first four years of the group's activity, during which an incredible five albums were released, each a different step from the next, each a different face and shade (and almost always interesting). And it's from Reel To Real that comes the necessity to put their chromosomes on record, the choice to wave all possible genetic mutations of the band, awaiting to then choose their personal path with greater ease. So, it must be clarified, here Simple Minds have not yet found their own trademark sound, they are still searching for it. And to do so, they bring us an album of photos, sounds heard from other bands and absorbed in their own way, of desires, showing us what they want to be when they grow up. Reel To Real is the DNA of Simple Minds.

No piece benefits from the immaculate production that "Promise You A Miracle" or "Alive & Kicking" will have, in fact everything seems like a cutout, a sketch, an idea jotted down in a notebook. What's surprising is how excellent, even ingenious, these intuitions are. Punk is overturned, art-progressive inherited from Eno & company, the hypnotic keyboards of the Los Angeles sixties, but a form of three-minute pop gem is also given to pieces borrowed heavily from John Lydon or from the grooves of Unknown Pleasures. New-wave in child-size format, that's what Reel To Real is. It's unfair to come to it -as happened to me- after listening to 154 or Seventeen Seconds, it would have been fun to stumble upon this toy for a real neophyte. Because here you can find a real sound manufacturing, an accidental Kid A, that is unafraid of making mistakes because it has nothing to lose, no fans to respect, obey, indulge. For this reason, the blue album is the most enjoyable dark-pop I have ever heard, a carefree version of In The Flat Field with shouts, enthusiasm, games with recorders, synthesizers used in such a naive way that they are irresistible. We are immersed in a positive but ominous atmosphere, where we fall in love with doubts, electrified by the power of team music, where there is not yet a leader, a main, predominant instrument. Someone might say for lack of clarity or sound definition. I would rather say for great solidarity among the members, made a fluid, cohesive, and attractive whole as only the latest Japan and few other lights of the period would be able to succeed in the same field. And after these concise forty minutes, even divided coherently into two parts, where instrumental pieces (among which the restless "Veldt", led by a versatile bass, and the delightful "Theme For A Film", the perfect encounter between Second Edition and il Tempo delle Mele) blend effortlessly with triumphant imaginary singles ("Premonition", "Calling Your Name" the most striking examples) and a continuous succession of surprises and flaws, you might find yourself wanting more.

But the beauty lies precisely in this, Reel To Real is just a calling card, nothing more, almost a demo presentation. But at a very high level. Other albums are better or at least more representative of Simple Minds, but the "blue album", which for someone else could be the culmination of a career, remains my favorite.