"Direction Of The Heart": Simple Minds' new studio album

Glaswegian synth-rock icons, still reliably epic

Simple Minds’ career as one of the most dependably true-to- themselves album artists of the 21st century proceeds apace. Their eighth new record in that time offers plenty to satisfy, built around Jim Kerr’s deep, moody croon and the dynamic peal of Charlie Burchill’s guitar. 

In the single Vision Thing, the driving synths of First You Jump and the mellow, open-top pop groove of Human Traffic, they seem to at once take inspiration from and declare their influence upon stadium-­fillers such as Coldplay and The Killers. 

Kerr ponders post-truth on Who Killed Truth? and rides two of the most infectious synth-pop grooves this band have written since the 80s in Act Of Love and the Skids-like reappraisal of Berlin 1989, The Walls Came Down. Reliable, but also brilliant.