Remembering When One of the Biggest Movie Hits of the 80s Got Turned Down by Everyone, Including the Band That Finally Recorded It in 1985

Simple Minds’ “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” would likely be a consensus high-ranker in any number of hypothetical musical lists. That includes Most Successful Movie Songs and Most Era-Defining Hits of the 80s.

Just think that several artists turned down the chance to record the song. That includes Simple Minds, the band who eventually capitulated and did it.

Keeping it Simple

John Hughes, the filmmaker whose films helped to define the ethos of the American teen in the 80s, preferred British music. In particular, he liked the New Romantic bands and other UK post-punk outfits that made the UK such a thrilling music scene in the 80s.

One of the bands that Hughes loved was the Scottish group Simple Minds. (You can see a poster of the band on a wall in Hughes’ Sixteen Candles.) As he was creating his 1985 film The Breakfast Club, he thought the group would be a perfect addition to the soundtrack.

Songwriters Keith Forsey and Steve Schiff wrote “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” specifically for the film. Forsey received the go-ahead from Hughes to offer Simple Minds the chance to record the song. But they ran up against some friction in that endeavor.

That’s a No

Simple Minds, having succeeded in the early 80s within the UK, desired a shot at the American market. But as lead singer Jim Kerr explained to The Guardian, they didn’t like the idea of doing so with a song they didn’t write:

“Then our record company came to us with an idea. The director John Hughes was making a movie called The Breakfast Club, and they thought it would be a great vehicle for their bands. All this sounded great until they said: ‘And we’ve got a song for you.’”

Kerr and company also were somewhat put off by the fact that Forsey presented them a demo cassette backstage at one of their shows. It smacked of a hanger-on desperately trying to get a top band to record his stuff, rather than a legitimate pitch from the makers of a major motion picture. The band refused.

Ask Them Again

Desperate, Forsey began pitching the song to others. Bryan Ferry, Billy Idol, and The Fixx were among the acts who turned it down. Luckily, Hughes and Forsey didn’t quit on Simple Minds. They made another pitch, this one embellished when the band found out about Forsey’s impressive musical career to that point. And by this time, Chrissie Hynde, Kerr’s wife at the time, had insisted to him that it was a high-quality song.

This time around, they relented. The band hustled into a studio and recorded “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” in a matter of hours. Guitarist Charlie Burchill pumped up the track for American radio with a series of crunching chords. And Kerr added the distinctive “la, la, la” refrain that closes out the song.

“Don’t You (Forget About Me)”, helped by the massive success of The Breakfast Club, took off upon its release. It gave Simple Minds their first Top 40 hit in the US, which just so happened to be a No. 1. It’s a good thing that the initial “no” wasn’t their final answer.

(Photo by Gie Knaeps/Getty Images)

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