Simple Minds plus OMD, LG Arena, Birmingham

SIMPLE Minds have never really gone away but their fanbase has dwindled as it has aged and, as their new music has become more marginalised, there have been few new recruits.

That's why their latest tour sees the band united with Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, an electro-pop duo whose only connection with Simple Minds is that they too enjoyed a commercial peak in the 1980s.

It matters not, because OMD's music has seeped into the darkest recesses of your pop brain and it's surprising how many of their tunes are familiar.

It's an hour-long journey through the hits from Electricity and Messages to Seven Seas. In between, Andy McCluskey still bounces around the stage like an enthusiastic student, promising and delivering some very eccentric dancing.

By the time they leave the stage to warm applause you remember that Souvenir was a gorgeous pop song that would have been a hit in any era and that Enola Gay is both barmy and endearing, much like OMD themselves.

Simple Mind's Jim Kerr reminds us that the band are celebrating 30 years of playing live. And this tour is showcasing their whole career.

So we get tracks from their avant garde formative years, early hits such as Waterfront and Promised You A Miracle and tunes from the later period after the fans had started to drift away.

But it's the songs from their mid-1980s peak that get the hands in the air and recall the glory days. Tracks from their best album Once Upon a Time, like All the Things She Said, Sanctify Yourself and Alive and Kicking are greeted like the old friends they are.

"I want to thank all those people who come back and see us year after year," says Kerr. "This is for you."

It reminds you that Simple Minds in their day could fill Wembley Stadium, let alone the LG Arena, and challenged U2 in the social conscience and musical stakes.

Once Upon a Time, indeed.

Nigel Powlson