Street Fighting Years by Simple Minds

Street Fighting Years, Simple Minds' eighth studio album, came out in May 1989 on Virgin (A&M in the States), and it's the Glasgow band going for widescreen grandeur with Trevor Horn and Stephen Lipson at the controls. Jim Kerr sings like he's addressing a stadium from a hilltop, Charlie Burchill's guitar rings out across the valley, and Mick MacNeil's keyboards, Mel Gaynor's drums and the bass of newcomer Malcolm Foster pile on the scale.

The lead single, "Belfast Child", went to number one in the UK, Ireland and the Netherlands and was up for Song of the Year at the 1990 Brits, and the album itself reached the top of the UK chart, carrying on the run of Sparkle in the Rain and Once Upon a Time. "Take a Step Back" shows the record could still hit hard when it wanted to.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.