Overview
Simple Minds has announced plans for a major North American headline tour – the legendary UK band’s biggest live run across the US and Canada in four decades. They are excited to share that the bands opening in support for the entire tour will be Soft Cell and Modern English.
"Been a while but absence makes the heart grow fonder,” says Jim Kerr. “Simple Minds are ecstatic at the prospect of touring so extensively in the US and Canada this coming Spring.”
The eagerly awaited tour coincides with the 40th anniversary of Simple Minds’ momentous 1985, a milestone year in their legendary career which saw them topping the world’s charts with their Billboard “Hot 100” #1 smash, “Don’t You (Forget About Me),” and RIAA Gold-certified seventh studio album Once Upon A Time, not to mention their unforgettable set in front of 135,000 fans – and a TV audience of millions – on the American leg of 1985’s Live Aid. Today sees the digital premiere of a special new 9-track edition of Once Upon A Time featuring the addition of “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” and updated Ruby Anniversary artwork. Physical versions and other anniversary reissues will follow later in the year. Simple Minds will be performing “Don’t You (Forget About Me)" on Jimmy Kimmel Live! this Wednesday, January 29.
"Hindsight is a glorious thing!” continues Kerr. “40 years on and it now feels right for Simple Minds to have ‘Don't You (Forget About Me)’ included in this classy new nine track edition of Once Upon A Time."
What’s more, 2025 looks to be yet another banner year for Simple Minds, including the recent arrival of the new single, “Your Name In Lights,” released to celebrate the BBC premiere of the acclaimed documentary, Simple Minds: Everything Is Possible, available to stream now exclusively in the UK on BBC iPlayer with North American broadcast dates to be unveiled soon. “Your Name In Lights” is joined by an official music video that had its world premiere on January 17 – marking the anniversary of the band’s first-ever live performance as Simple Minds, held January 17, 1978, at Glasgow, Scotland’s Satellite City.
Produced and directed by acclaimed filmmaker Joss Crowley, (Kate Bush, Freddie Mercury, Peter Gabriel), Simple Minds: Everything Is Possible is the first-ever feature-length documentary to chronicle the most iconic and influential Scottish band in history. Highlights include never-before-seen footage and feature interviews with band members, fellow musicians Bob Geldof, Bobby Gillespie (Primal Scream), Dave Gahan (Depeche Mode), Jerry Dammers (The Specials), Sharleen Spiteri (Texas), James Dean Bradfield (Manic Street Preachers), writer Irvine Welsh, actress Molly Ringwald, and album producers John Leckie, Pete Walsh, Steve Hillage, Trevor Horn, and Jimmy Iovine.
Inimitable musical pioneers for nearly half a century, Simple Minds are among the most successful UK bands of all time, having achieved more than 1B global streams on Spotify alone (with over 8.3M monthly listeners on Spotify alone) and total worldwide sales in excess of 60M, including six #1 albums in the UK and chart-topping releases in countless other territories including Germany, Italy, France, Spain, Australia, and New Zealand.
Coalescing around childhood friends Jim Kerr and Charlie Burchill, Simple Minds emerged in 1978 with an immediately distinctive sound simultaneously rooted in punk, art-rock, and the electronic avant-garde. Over the next four decades, the band has pushed their open-armed approach to fashion a broad array of stylistic varieties – spanning pop, funk, gospel, soul, dance music, and more – into their own world-straddling brand of stadium-sized rock. Their continually evolving body of work is highlighted by such landmark LPs as 1982’s New Gold Dream (81,82,83,84), 1984’s Sparkle In The Rain, 1985’s Once Upon A Time, and 1989’s Street Fighting Years, along with a stunning canon of iconic global hit singles spanning “Love Song,” “Someone Somewhere (In Summertime),” “Glittering Prize,” “Promised You A Miracle,” “Up On The Catwalk,” “Speed Your Love To Me,” “Waterfront,” “Belfast Child,” and of course the timeless teen anthem, 1985’s US #1 classic, “Don’t You (Forget About Me),” the latter of course famously featured in the classic John Hughes film, The Breakfast Club.
Named as the world’s “Best Live Band” by Q Magazine in 1991, Simple Minds have long commanded the stages of sold-out arenas and stadiums around the planet. Their world-class credentials have been burnished in recent years by an array of equally remarkable accomplishments – from acclaimed new albums (including 2018’s Walk Between Worlds and 2022’s Direction of the Heart, both of which had top 5 chart debuts in the UK), best-selling live albums, career retrospectives, and epic world tours to accolades and honors like a 2014 Q Inspiration Award (presented by avowed fan Manic Street Preachers’ James Dean Bradfield) to a prestigious Ivor Novello Award for “Outstanding Song Collection” – all of which serve as timely reminders to a new generation of Simple Minds’ ongoing appeal as well a springboard for their next burst of creativity. Now as ever, Simple Minds remain a band touched by powerful magic, continually willing to experiment while remaining true to their original instincts.
“The truth is we never fully wound down,’ says Charlie Burchill. “There have been lots of different incarnations of Simple Minds, but we’ve always kept our identity. A legacy can be a burden if you allow it to be. For us, it’s been empowering.”
“We’ve been on one hell of a journey,” says Kerr. “I’m grateful for the career we’ve had, but I’m mad enough to think we can still hit new levels. This is what we do – write, record and play live. One of the things I’m most proud of is that people say to me, what Simple Minds are you talking about? The avant-garde, the art-rock, the pop, the ambient, the instrumental group, the political, the folk, the stadium band? To play all those different styles but at the same time be quintessentially Simple Minds is an amazing thing.”
For complete details and ticket availability, please visit www.simpleminds.com/tour. The tour will also offer a variety of different VIP packages and experiences for fans to take their concert experience to the next level. Packages vary but include premium tickets, behind-the-scenes tour, group photo in front of the stage, exclusive VIP merch item & more. VIP package contents vary based on the offer selected. For more information, visit vipnation.com.
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