Legendary Simple Minds bass player to perform at Skipton bar

Simple Minds bass guitar legend Derek Forbes will perform with his band The Dark at the Sound Bar in Skipton at 7.30pm on Thursday, November 7.

It is one of the gigs on his 2024 tour promoting his autobiography A Very Simple Mind: On Tour, published by McNidder & Grace.

A Very Simple Mind: On Tour is the autobiography of legendary Simple Minds bass player Derek Forbes (Image: UGC)

More recently a new film/documentary by Paramount Simple Minds: Everything Is Possible was described by The Guardian as the story of five working-class lads from Glasgow who started a band in 1977, and by the mid-80s were stadium rockers up there with U2. The most iconic and influential Scottish band in history.

Derek, one of the original band members, is known for those iconic spine-rattling bass riffs which people recognise in most Simple Minds' songs, and he wrote and co-wrote many of the band's earliest classics.

Derek is also well known on the international stage as songwriter and bassist for Big Country and Propaganda and has recorded with Iggy Pop, David Bowie, Dave Gilmour of Pink Floyd and Kirsty MacColl.

He won an Ivor Novello Award for ‘Outstanding Song Collection’ in 2016 for his song writing for Simple Minds, voted best bass player in the World 1982 and best bass player from Scotland in 2010. He still lives in Glasgow.

The book explores his story of the early days of Simple Minds, where a band of working-class lads from 1970’s Glasgow took on the world.

Derek shares stories from the band’s travels on the road - they were friends, they laughed together, they laughed at each other, they had fights and arguments, they learned to work with luminaries of the music industry, but most of all, they had fun.

The book also explores his departure from Simple Minds in 1985 shortly after recording hit song Don’t You (Forget About Me), which shot to number one in the charts in America and Canada.

In the days that followed Derek described how he felt ‘a screaming silence’ and completely alone.

Derek later rejoined Simple Minds in 1995 and toured again with the band.

Derek’s book tour took him across the UK at the end of last year when his book was published in November 2023 and he is keen to continue sharing his stories at events in 2024.