Virgin Records | UK | 12″ | 2012 | SMRSD 1

Simple Minds – Theme For Great Cities [Moby remix]/I Travel 2012 UK 12″ [2012]

1. Theme For Great Cities [Moby remix]
2. I Travel 2012 John Leckie Remix

Living in The States, I had to buy this aftermarket following Record Store Day 2012. The good news is it was worth every penny. There are sterling mixes that show these classic songs in a somewhat new light without losing their essences in the process. It’s not hyperbole to suggest that these songs are among my favorites ever by Simple Minds and their new 2012 retoolings are most welcome indeed. Of the two, the Leckie mix of “I Travel” gets the upper hand; primarily because Moby has dared to replace Derek Forbes’ killer bass line with a synth.

Other than that horrifying fact, the remix is sterling. Moby has stripped  away everything but Mike McNeil’s synth lines and built a new streamlined Moroder chassis on the song’s frame. Moby also dared to add a new middle eight to the track for a different feel. Chalk this one up as another successful remix [the fourth] of this classic instrumental. I enjoyed the ’91, ’98, and now the ’12 mixes of this very much but the original is still primary to me. The Forbes bass line is too vital to the song to chuck it without repercussions, but the new vibe is ultimately valid as it honors the song’s origins without straying off course. If the end result is more machinelike and less erratic in 2012, well, what else isn’t?

I could say the same thing of Leckie’s new mix of “I Travel” as he casts the track in a more intense and claustrophobic mix that is clearly more tightly focused and unflagging. He’s excised the famous proto-acid-house sequencer riff from the intro while protracting the synth notes in the introduction to heighten the tension before slamming into the train rhythms full on right up front. When the famous sequencer riff finally gets an isolated spotlight in the middle eight following the intro synth riff again, it releases the considerable tension that has been ratcheting upward throughout the song in a relentless fashion.

Burchill’s heavy tremolo guitar is downplayed in many places for emphasis of McNeil’s keyboards. Leckie had moved Kerr’s vocals into dub space for the last 80 or so seconds and he’s been EQed to be less trebly in the mix as well. Key lyric phrases of the song are dubbed out to the song’s fade. Crucially, Leckie doesn’t touch Forbes’ bass lines. In fact they are heightened in the mix.

The mix gains almost another minute, making it roughly 4:45. I’ve never liked Leckie’s original 12″ remix from 1980, it excised far too many aspects of the original that I thought were the song’s strengths, but I’m glad he’s had another crack at this classic. He’s altered the song by reordering, treating, and re-EQing the track’s individual components, of which he has not replaced a single one. This new mix is neck and neck with the original with me after three plays. Which is my way of saying that Leckie has very successfully remixed one of my favorite songs ever.

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