Jim Kerr of Simple Minds: 'There’s been ups and downs along the way'

As the band prepare for their largest ever tour, to mark Simple Minds' 45th anniversary, Kerr finds himself marvelling at their durability. "It feels like a feat, but it also feels like we've been blessed," says the 64-year-old.

"In the very first interview we did, the question was (asked) 'What do you want out of this? Do you want to be rich and famous?' I said, 'No, we want to be a great live band' – and it's interesting I said a great live band, not just a live band. I also said, 'We want to take it around the world and we want to get a life out of that'. I mean, that was very ambitious talk from someone that had only played on gig.

"I'll let other people judge our merits as a live band, but it seems there have been plenty around the band who do consider us great live and whenever we tour they come out, and subsequent generations come along. There's been ups and downs along the way, but here we are in these arenas and we turn up and people greet us like long lost friends."

In the past decade, Kerr and his long-time songwriting partner and close friend, Charlie Burchill, have signposted the way for other musicians of a certain vintage to reacquaint themselves with different sections of their fanbase.

It started with a tour of modest-sized venues on which they played their first five, art-rock influenced albums from the late 70s and early 80s, then built up to greatest hits sets catering for those cottoned on to them in their commercial peak.

While stressing that he "never downplay(s) luck" as an important factor in what they've achieved, Kerr acknowledges that they've never been shy of hard graft too. "To do this, you have to be a type, so that was lucky to be born that type," he says, "but we have grafted and we do graft and we were really hard on ourselves. We realise what's at stake for the audience every night you go on stage.

"People in Amsterdam don't care if you were in Liverpool the night before or people in Leeds don't care if you're in Manchester tomorrow night. Tonight's the night, and they come along expecting and hoping and they merit 100 per cent. Now if we talk about a tour of the magnitude that we've just been mentioning there, to want to give 100 per cent every night it's fantastic graft but it's still that level of commitment that we think is the remit necessary."