Red Mosquito

McParadigm wrote:

spike wrote:

dimejinky99 wrote:Bono interview with the irish times

http://www.irishtimes.com/culture/bono- ... -1.1927184

I don't usually care much for artist interviews, but there was some interesting stuff here.

Yep, it was a good read. I don't get how Bono's mother died at 14 and he claims to have almost no memories of her. He's said this in a couple of recent interviews. I'd think there would be a solid decade of memories. It's not like he was a little kid when she passed. She even saw him sing live. I suppose he could have blocked it out or something, but otherwise the lack of memories makes no sense.

Drugs, man.

dimejinky99 wrote:By the way, what bands *do* pitchfork actually like or review favourably?

all the bands I like get absolutely slaughtered there...

They LOVE St. Vincent. And rightly so.

They love Arcade Fire too.

Basically people who dress funny. They like that.

PryTo wrote:

McParadigm wrote:

spike wrote:

dimejinky99 wrote:Bono interview with the irish times

http://www.irishtimes.com/culture/bono- ... -1.1927184

I don't usually care much for artist interviews, but there was some interesting stuff here.

Yep, it was a good read. I don't get how Bono's mother died at 14 and he claims to have almost no memories of her. He's said this in a couple of recent interviews. I'd think there would be a solid decade of memories. It's not like he was a little kid when she passed. She even saw him sing live. I suppose he could have blocked it out or something, but otherwise the lack of memories makes no sense.

yeah, i think he's said it's a trauma thing; he's blocked out the memories.

I'm liking the space on this record. There are nice instrumental breaks and even I Voni does some scat it's not yeah yeahs. And the guitar sounds are great.

I Voni Does Some Scat. A new film by the director of Shit-Eating Cum Whores.

PryTo wrote:

dimejinky99 wrote:I'd argue they shouldnt be 'going back' at all, but the first and main thing people say about U2 is they prefer the old stuff, so they've clearly taken that on board...

Just reading some U2 forums and Dublin forums, one argument really struck home, about Pop, and how it crashed and burned so badly(mainly cos America didnt 'get it') but dance/club culture was so big here and in Europe at the time, they wanted to reference it, but because it failed in their main market, its prevented them from ever being that brave and experimental again...apparently the band were really freaked out by the negative reaction to it....i dont watch U2 that closely, so ill defer to their fans saying this.

So again, theyre in a lose/lose..cant go forward and be brave, cant go back to familiar touchstones..they et burned for doing either..

I’ve never been a huge U2 fan, but I’ve always enjoyed their music. I saw them twice on the Pop tour, once in the US and once in Europe. Both shows were pretty good, but the European audiences were way more into it and the venue was better. (The US gig was held in a football stadium that had a LOT of empty seats.) I saw them again in maybe 2005 or so. They’re a solid live band, but I’ve never been blown away by them in concert. Maybe I just caught them on off nights or something.

I give them a lot of credit for working really hard to make good albums. They never phone it in or put something out that they haven’t put some real effort and thought into. I can’t say the same for their live shows, which tend to stick to a very conservative playlist of megahits and rarely mixes things up. When you play football stadiums, that’s what you have to do, which is one reason they’ve never been in my top-whatever bands. They’re a great studio band and they deliver those songs very professionally in concert, but I’ve never felt any sense of spontaneity or that anything could happen at a U2 show. You see one show on a tour, you’ve pretty much seen them all. I guess they’ll throw in a rarity here and there. It was telling that they had their fans vote on songs for a fan club-only live album from the last tour and almost every winning song was a megahit. That’s who they’re catering to, unfortunately, but that’s the fanbase they’ve cultivated their entire career. When you aspire to be the biggest band on earth, you gotta play the hits every single night.

I was bummed when U2 abandoned their experimental phase and went back to their Joshua Tree sound. I suppose it was inevitable, but Achtung, Zooropa, and Pop and among my favorite U2 records. They were a much more interesting band during that era than they have been since. According to Wikipedia, Pop sold 8 million copies worldwide. (That’s a failure???) No Line on the Horizon sold 5 million worldwide, also nothing to sneeze at in the “music-is-free” era.

Respectfully, I totally disagree. They are a great love band. And consistently great. I've seen them phone it in only one time and apparently they were all hungover. But other than that they've managed to be excellent each time I've seen them

durdencommatyler wrote:

dimejinky99 wrote:By the way, what bands *do* pitchfork actually like or review favourably?

all the bands I like get absolutely slaughtered there...

They LOVE St. Vincent. And rightly so.

Oh god. That makes so much sense.

Cool. I'll ignore both from now on.

dimejinky99 wrote:Respectfully, I totally disagree. They are a great love band. And consistently great. I've seen them phone it in only one time and apparently they were all hungover. But other than that they've managed to be excellent each time I've seen them

Oh, I wouldn't accuse them of phoning it in live at all. They've always been very solid, very professional, and right on the money the three times I've seem them. But none of those shows went to the next level; they weren't transcendent. I didn't get the sense that the shows I saw were special, or that the Chicago show was much different from the Dallas show and so on. But I concede that I might have caught them on off nights. And I was expecting to be blown away, so it's also possible that my expectations were too high.

As far as I know they play almost identical sets every night too, so over a 2 year long tour, I guess it must be hard to conjure up that magic..especially in a stadium i guess..

Will there be videos off this thing, or are there already

Since U2 is a top 10 band of mine I've been meaning to write a long self-indulgent review.

And here it is.

Songs of Innocence:

My attitude going in: I first got into U2 in 1997 or so. Right around the time Pop came out. One of my closest friends in college was a huge huge huge fan, and we made a deal where if I sat down with her and gave a close listen to U2’s new album she’d do the same for Pearl Jam’s next album (I became a bigger U2 fan than she became a pearl jam fan. If only it was backspacer instead of yield). From pop I made my way back. I like scattered songs on the first 3 records, but for me U2’s prime is the Unforgettable Fire -> Achtung Run, where there are just three ridiculously good albums in a row. Achtung is my favorite, and I think I generally prefer the more ironic and jaded side of U2, since it plays against expectations and because there’s always that part of Bono that is fighting against it, which adds an interesting dimension to the music—there’s some conflict at the heart of it that is not normally present in that artistic and ideological position. Zooropa and Pop have some amazing moments, but as albums in their entirety they represent a step back from the heights of Achtung, which is, quite frankly, one of the most impressive artistic achievements by any band, ever.

The decision to go back to the anathematic well on All You Can’t Leave Behind was a disappointment. There are some songs I adore (Kite is a classic, and Beautiful Day is really good) and some others that had a lot of potential (I love the feel of New York and wish Bono was singing some different lyrics). But the rest of the album felt like a retread. Almost every song (especially the single laden first half) was like a poor man’s version of a previous mega hit. They followed the same template with Atomic Bomb, which was the superior record. There’s a lot to love on that album, and while it still aped the Joshua Tree sound, it was far more effective. Crumbs on Your Table and City of Blinding Lights are still very good, and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t enjoy Vertigo (the Achtung call back). And overall it’s still a solid listen from start to finish.

That particular well was running dry by the time we got to No Line. The songs like Magnificent that are so desperate to recall past glories just fall flat, and there are just too many overbaked or flat out dull songs on that record. But there are some promising moments in the back half (Breathe maybe, and especially Cedars of Lebanon and White as Snow) that make it clear U2 can still give us something worthwhile if they can just unchain themselves from the Joshua Tree.

The issue is Bono, since U2’s music has almost always been excellent, even at its most predictable. The strength of Bono’s voice was its clarity and conviction. When Bono talks to God you get the impression that God is actually listening - that Bono is his conscience. U2's best Joshua Tree era tracks were hymns as much as they were rock songs. But that’s gone now. He can’t reproduce it, and the attempts at doing so consistently fall flat. He can’t be an angel, or a martyr, or a prophet. However, what Bono can still do pretty well is play the part of the fallen—someone no longer on the inside who is here to remind us of what we’ve lost, and warn us not to make the same mistakes. It’s a logical development from the artistic direction of Achtung-Zooropa-Pop, and something that better fits his diminished capacities as a vocalist. And when they embrace that, they can still do good things. That record is mixed on Songs of Innocence, but present enough that I still want to see U2 keep making music until they get it right.

The Miracle (of Joey Ramone): I really have to fight to get past this title, but once I do this is one of the better songs on this album. I like the dirty echo on the drums, and the processed scratchy crunch on the guitars. There’s a nice vocal melody (but Bono can write those in his sleep), and a chorus that strikes just the right balance between ground and sky. I think the background vocals are really poorly done throughout this album, but they’re pretty good here. I like the self awareness in the lyrics about exaggerating his pain. It’s a personal song, but I’m glad he left out the particulars and sang about the feeling, because I know exactly what he’s talking about and hate the fucking Ramones. Overall a strong opening track that takes a few listens to figure out the pieces, but it comes together nicely once you do.

Every Breaking Wave: Too much With or Without You in the music, but the bittersweet sense of loss in the verse is something Bono still does quite well. The chorus is pretty good since every time it’s about to swell it gets pulled back down, and so it avoids the pure anthem trap that’s going to sink a few other songs on this album. Nice flow to the bridge, some of the better lyrics on the album. There’s space for a song or two like this. The problem is that this kicks off a run where there’s too many, and none are this good.

California: The Santa Barabra chanting at the start, despite the fact that it’s clearly meant to be an homage to the Beach Boys, is just terrible, and so there’s already a fair amount of ill will I have for this song before it really even begins. There’s nothing in this song that hasn’t been said before, and better. There’s an appealing smoothness in the verses, but this is a weak chorus, and this song doesn’t feel like a memory as much as it does a mid-life crisis, an attempt to recreate something gone, rather than explore how the experience helped shape him. Bono doesn’t do classic rock solos very well, and the one at about 3:10 disappoints.

Song for Someone: As long as this song remains fragile it’s good (ignore the melodramatic lyrics and focus on the feel of it). Bono sounds like he’s trying to soothe someone frightened and scared, like he’s approaching a skittish deer in some forest glade somewhere, and the pre-chorus has some very nice lyrics and a real warmth in the delivery. But then the verses end...

AND THIS IS AN ANTHEMATIC…AN ANTHEMATIC CHORUS
THIS IS AN ANTHEMATIC…AN ANTHEMATIC CHORUS

And it has no business being here and destroys what was a pretty lovely understated song.

Iris: Another round of odd chanting and moaning at the start of the song that doesn’t bring much to the table other than a vague feeling of being out of place. Standard Edge guitar playing, but it’s always nice to get that at least once. The problem is that they do basically nothing interesting with it and so it ends up feeling flat. This takes the chorus of Song for Someone and builds a whole song around it, but the whole thing is a reminder of how great this song might have been 20 years ago when they would have made it interesting. Bono doesn’t sound bad here, but he doesn’t sound authentic. The strength of Bono as a singer with these Joshua Tree style songs was that it sounded like Bono couldn’t help but speak in anathematic declarations—like he’d order a hamburger the same way he’d talk to God, and turn the drive through a church in the process. This is too calculated, and the fact that the song has nothing worthwhile to say beyond the unartful presentation of tired clichés doesn’t help.

Volcano: The music brings War era U2 to mind, and I like it. But part of the charm of those records were how sloppy they felt, like the whole thing could fall apart at any moment. This is once again too calculated and it spoils the effect. The chorus is also terrible, the delivery, the lyrics, the melody, the whole thing. And while I usually hate this phrase, the whole ‘you are rock and roll’ moment at the end is an actual cringe worthy moment. He may be trying to recall some personal moment from his past that influenced who he is, but once again he’s trying to recreate the experience rather than describe what he learned from it, and he can’t pull if off.

The whole California -> Volcano run is really weak, though Song for Someone could have been good if they dialed it back (imagine if So Cruel was interrupted by the chorus of Whose Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses). Fortunately the album picks up a bit from here.

Raised by Wolves: the music at the start is intriguing, in a vaguely unnerving way, and while the background gasping is odd, it does kind of fit in with the unsettling feel the song is going for. I think Bono is a bit too upfront in this song, and this is not one of his better melodies though it improves by the second half. He sounds great on the ‘I don’t believe anymore’ pre chorus, but the RAISED BY WOLVES! chorus sounds like it should have been part of a different song. It’s a weak set of lyrics and is once again anathematic for the sake of being anathematic, and not really of a piece with the rest of the song. It would have been a much more interesting song had he left us with the more provocative ‘I don’t believe anymore’ and then went back to his story. The music once again calls to mind a War era song like New Years Day but as with Volcano the effect is undercut by the flag waving feeling too forced this time

Cedarwood Road: Edge (and the others) do this grittier stuff surprisingly well, given how far afield it is from their usual style. There is a dirty ramshackle edge to this song, with some real menace and a definite improvement from Breathe on the previous album. The chorus feels natural for the first time in many songs and there’s a nice clean transition out of and back into the verses. And unlike so many of the past songs, here Bono is dissecting his memories, and reliving rather than recreating them, and so his voice is a much better fit. I really like the bridge, especially the ‘if the door is open it isn’t theft/you can’t return from where you’ve never left’ part. The background vocals also are working with Bono and feel appropriate to the song, rather than some bizarre distraction from the larger point. This is a strong song.

Sleep Like a Baby Tonight: This song feels unexpected, with the musical choices, with Bono’s delivery, with the way it manages to be simultaneously tragic and accusatory without ever fully surrendering to inevitability. It’s maybe the freshest sounding song on the record. I like that Bono doesn’t back away from the falsetto part, even when he can’t quite sustain it. It fits in well with a song that is disappointed with its own refusal to confront its failings. I’m not crazy about Edge’s solo, but at least it isn’t predictable. This is one of the best songs on the album, and a pretty clear indication that U2 can be really interesting when they don’t try too hard to be U2, or, better, when they remember that once upon a time U2 did some of their best work by remembering that being U2 meant not being U2.

This is Where You Can Reach Me Now: The solider soldier stuff is a bit excessive, but undeniably catchy, and greatly enhanced by Edge’s playing. And in fairness, the whole song is over the top, but it definitely feels less affected than the Raised By Wolves chorus. Another song calling to mind the sloppy enthusiasm of War era U2, and easily the most successful of the bunch. It’s surprisingly youthful sounding song. You have to remind yourself that this is band of people in their 50s, which means they pulled it off. Pretty good stuff.

The Troubles: The background/accompanying vocals are fantastic. Haunting, accusing, and beautiful. They mesh well with Bono, like they’re his conscience, and Edge’s playing bridges the two perfectly (and gives us a really nice coda to boot). It’s an unusually naked song for modern era Bono, and this may very well be my favorite song of its type in their catalog, at least going all the way back to the 80s. Usually when he exposes himself like this the music gives him some cover, but every time he tries to hide Lykee Li calls him out. He’s been trying to write this song for a while, and finally succeeded. I don’t know if this is my favorite song on the album, but it’s the best.


So overall I enjoyed this album way more than I thought I did. There’a promising beginning before it falls into a mediocre abyss but, against all odds (this album was definitely feeling like homework by the time Volcano was over) it starts to pull itself out with Raised by Wolves and ends with as strong a run of 4 songs as they’ve had in a long time.

I think The Troubles, Sleep Like a Baby, Ceaderwood road, and the Miracle are very good songs. This is Where You Can Reach Me Now, and parts of Raised By Wolves, and Song for Someone have a lot going for them. They’re not going to make it onto a playlist any time soon, but they’re worth a listen. But a good third of this album has little to commend to it. Here’s hoping they take their cues from the right songs, because if this did nothing else it made it clear that they still, potentially, have something left to give

Hell of a review, Stip. I haven’t spent much time with the new album. I’ll throw it on the iPod and let it shuffle into rotation, but with 15,000 songs on there, it’ll be a while before I digest it. Truth is U2 hasn’t interested me enough in the last 15 years or so to dig into the new record. What I’ve heard so far hasn’t been enough to make me want to give it a concentrated listen. But with an 18-month old boy to entertain (and entertain me), I don’t do much concentrated listening these days, so that’s part it.

I agree that Achtung Baby is the band’s high water mark and one of the greatest rock albums by any band ever. I don’t remember the first time I heard too many albums, but I remember my first Achtung spin. I was a teenage record-store clerk in Los Angeles, and I’ll never forget putting on the CD the day it arrived, listening as I got ready to open the store, my jaw dropping with each new track. (The Fly was the lead single, and it made no sense to me until I heard it in context of the album. The Fly went from head-scratching to brilliant in a single listen.) Achtung remains my favorite album of the 1990s, a decade that produced a ridiculous amount of great music.

It’s easy to forget how good Joshua Tree is, mainly because so many of the songs have become ubiquitous. I don’t listen to it much, but some of the lesser-known songs are still thrilling.



It also contains what I’d call the band’s best B-side (and they have a jillion of ‘em).



I think War is among the best albums in the band’s catalog. In some ways, it’s like Joshua Tree, where the big hits almost make you forget how strong it is as an album. I’m hot and cold on the first two records, but War marked a massive leap forward. Like Joshua Tree, some of the non-hits are as good today as ever.



And I’m genuinely baffled by any U2 fan who doesn’t consider Rattle and Hum among the group’s finest hours. It’s probably second to Achtung Baby in my book. You have to ignore the non-performance parts of the film and excise the (unnecessary) live cuts from the album, but with that out of the way you’re looking at Desire, Van Dieman’s Land, Angel of Harlem, God Part 2, Love Rescue Me, When Love Comes to Town, and All I Want is You. That’s five-star material to these ears.



I hated All That You Can’t Leave Behind when it was released, but came around to it eventually. Wild Honey and Stuck in a Moment are top shelf in my book.

When my wife and I first started dating I would sing the sweetest thing to her in a cookie monster voice. I had to stop doing it in the car because there were a few times she laughed so hard she nearly drove off the road.

you were doing so well Stip...was about to compliment your review...then the cookie monster story...why...whyyyyyy!!???

haha

thanks for the review. As usual, i agree with everything you said.

i insist you make a video of you singing that song in that voice for your daughter, and post it here. Make it happen.