Simple Minds -Sparkle In The Rain: 5 disc deluxe edition (March 2015)

All three sectors flaws and all are still excellent packages, even with the lackluster 5.1 mixes, then again each were a lot cheaper than this boxset.

 

I saw on Amazon where a reviewer had posted a message from Steven Wilson where he said he had already gone out on tour by the time a test disc was made so he never heard it and never would have given his blessing. He said the problem will get fixed but it might take some time as he may have to work on it when he gets some free time while on tour. I don't have time to do the leg work on this at the moment but may be able to track it down later. Maybe he has a website where he posts stuff like this?

 

Yes indeed, Wall Of Love seems to have been constructed with that in mind.



Street Fighting Years is a brilliant album, the last truly great Simple Minds album IMO. Soul Crying Out is one of the most beautiful melodies anyone has written.

 

That exact same message was posted right here a few pages back as well.

 

So it is, well cut off my arms and call me a clothespin.

 

So many components mixed in courtesy of the production talents of the Horn and Lipson dynamic duo. It would make for a great re-issue with remixes that illustrate all those tracks. It is a very busy and exciting record.

 

Street Fighting Years would be listenable if they had done an album like in the 60s without songs used for singles being replicated on album. Cut Mandela Day, Belfast Child and the Biko cover and perhaps you are left with an ok album.

 

Okay? I think it's brilliant. It's epic, raw and honest. Certainly not radio-friendly.

 

You're right: the album 'proper' does finish with 'Let It All Come Down' and in fact I rarely listen beyond that track. But I also agree with Dino77 that what you get in the album up to that point is quite a bit better than okay.

 

I love Street Fighting Years. It's probably my second favorite SM album after NGD. The Horn/Lipson production is great, and unlike Sparkle where you have a Lou Reed cover, on SFY you actually get a performance by Mr. Reed himself!

 

My only issue with SFY has always been the weak lyrics and subject matter of Mandela Day. Politics aside, he could have sung something as cheesy about Churchill or Reagan and I'd feel the same way. Something like this doesn't belong on an album. The music is great, too bad it was wasted. As for the rest, I listened to the album whilst soaking in my draught limited tub last night and those same adjectives sprung to mind, epic, raw and brilliant seem to fit and I think it was unbelievable luck that they snagged Trevor Horn and Stephen Lipson. Even though Mel dropped out (I still don't completely understand that dynamic), the finished product is on a plain with Disintegration with respect to its impact on the musical landscape. I was lucky enough to have spent some time in Europe in 89 and witnessed that scene which was so surreal given that in the US it hardly registered.

 

Mandela Day and Biko could have stayed on the Ballad of The Streets EP. The other 'political' songs on the album are more subtle. As for the Mel, it's fun to guess which songs he plays on...

 

...and although I like it, Belfast Child as well. I just tend to think of SFY minus the previously-released EP, which really should've been left off. Easy enough to do when listening, I suppose, since they're the last 3 tracks and it's a 40-minute album without them.

 

Ha I remember that year, Distintegration and SFY. Belfast Child and Lullaby came out about the same time, I was blown away!! Loved SFY (hello Wembley!) but it took me a few more years for me to 'get' Disintegration. Now, I tend to play it a lot more than SFY...

 

SFY is an excellent album, in sonics, lyrics and musicianship.
What makes it even better? - Stewart Copeland is on it! Even if its just one song.

 

Is he providing just hi-hat à la "Red Rain?"

 

I've no problem with Belfast Child and while Biko feels a little out of place, I do like the sonics of it. Mandela Day has always struck me as a kind of creepy song that school kids might sing under the threat that if they didn't they may never see their parents again. It's just so simplistic that compared to the majestic themes elsewhere in the album it does a bit of a disservice.

 

Biko I could easily live without. Mandela Day I like for its simplicity.

 

The Ballad of The Streets ep wasn't released in the US and as by that time the band were chasing US success its only natural that all three tracks ended up on the album.

Personally I think all three tracks are average to weak, Belfast Child (new lyrics over an old Irish folk tune), a cover (SM have never been good at covers IMO) and Mandela Day, whilst the sentiments are laudable it was, by their own admission, written in a rush for the Mandela concert at Wembley and is pretty weak.

I always thought that Belfast Child was a rip off of Ultravox's We All fall Down anyway.

 

Re Mandela Day, as some would know there's a rough/demo version floating around, apparently taped off a radio show prior to the Mandela event. Different enough to be a early take, and imo superior to the album cut.
Remember Kerr described the ambition of SFY as 'reinventing the pop genre' (or something).
The title track is a stone cold classic and fits the bill.

 

Maybe they should have done an American edition of the album, leaving out the overtly Euro-political songs (including Mandela Day and Biko - Apartheid was a bigger newsitem in Europe I guess).

 

you guess wrong, but politics cannot be discussed on the forum.

Artists Against Apartheid was started in the US however.....

 

OK that was only a guess . Though 'Sun City' was a bigger success in Europe, Canada and Australia as many US radio stations refused to play it.

Suffice to say that Belfast Child probably didn't appeal to US radio programmers.

 

Belfast Child was never released as a single in the US, This Is Your Land was the US single, that's why Belfast Child was never played.

 

"Here comes the son
The American son
In here the son shines so bright
Eyes blind
What do you know about this world anyway?"