Completely random love for No Line on the Horizon

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elaine2112

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Jan 29, 2005
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Hi guys. I just wanted to pop in with some thoughts of the week. I've been listening to No Line for a couple of mornings in a row. The excitement of the new tour has got the bug up my butt and I'm revisiting some of my favorite things.

YES, No Line is one of my TOP 3 fav U2 albums, which I have thusly confirmed with much listening over this week as:

Achtung, Baby
Unforgettable Fire
No Line on the Horizon.

I feel the need to shout it over the internet because of what seems to be a huge consensus of dislike. Even from the most recent Rolling Stone interview.. pretty sure Bono was slagging something or other in there for poor execution or timing or whatever. And also major votes in the Create your own worst album thread.

Personally, I obviously like the more poetic/spacey/experimental side of U2. I think their rooftop performance of Breathe was wild, courageous and right on. Magnificent and Go Crazy are some of my fav tracks, ever. I love Boots, and also the Boots remix. I happily admit that it's the teenage Aerosmith fan part of me that likes the ridiculous innuendo. Hey, can't be serious the whole damn album. Bottom line is I actually like every track to some degree, and so this def has a place among my fav albums of all time.

Is anyone with me... :reject:
 
NLOTH is fighting for the Top 3 position with HTDAAB

1- AB
2- POP


NLOTH is amazing, I even like the middle 3 (Stand Up Comedy should be played sometime, as White As Snow), I just hate Cedars Of Lebanon (and I mean HATE)

MOS, UC, GOYB, Breathe, Magnificent. An amazing record, with a theme, with structure, it flows. I just love it.
 
ImNotSleeping said:
Not top 3, but I do very much like it. Going to find the Breathe rooftop performance. I'm thinking you mean the BBC session?
Click to expand...

You know, I totally f'd that up. I was thinking of how they opened up their week at Letterman with Breathe. I thought that was very courageous.

I conflated that in my head with the Invisible on the rooftop earlier this year. :doh:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIDGE7NJEkM
 
elaine2112 said:
You know, I totally f'd that up. I was thinking of how they opened up their week at Letterman with Breathe. I thought that was very courageous.

I conflated that in my head with the Invisible on the rooftop earlier this year. :doh:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZIDGE7NJEkM
Click to expand...

I thought you meant the BBC rooftop session and then realized they didn't play that one there. They did play Breathe for Jo Whiley in the BBC lounge, though. Odd thing here - there are NLOTH songs that have been pulled from youtube. Two or three UC links are now not working and I found a Breathe one just now. :ohmy:
 
A very impressive album. I think Breathe and MOS are up there with some of their best songs. It's just human nature to bash the previous album while praising the new one rather than just give credit to the new album (if you like it) without having to criticise previous work to do so.

Sent from down the rabbit hole
 
I'm gonna give it a listen tonight, with some non biased, non judging ears.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
 
I like and it has a few bright spots... and of course one of the best songs ever in MOS.
 
I love 7 songs on this album, which is more than I can say for the two that preceded it, but man, what a missed opportunity for true greatness.

Should have stuck with the "Eno Knows Best" philosophy and not brought in Lillywhite.
 
Love the Letterman performance of Breathe. As a youtube commenter on it said, "I need a cigarette after that."
 
It's not a classic or anything, but the hate the album has gotten since SOI came out is ludicrous but hardly unprecedented. Oh, Interference. Never change.
 
Last edited:
I love NLOTH. It's my fifth favorite U2 album. I don't dislike a single song on it. And I like it much more than SOI. The way that Interference has turned on it is bizarre. It seems like, a year ago, it was at least reasonably well-respected, if thought to be very imperfect. Since SOI came out, however, it seems to be put in the same category as Bomb, which makes no sense to me.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
 
digitize said:
I love NLOTH. It's my fifth favorite U2 album. I don't dislike a single song on it. And I like it much more than SOI. The way that Interference has turned on it is bizarre. It seems like, a year ago, it was at least reasonably well-respected, if thought to be very imperfect. Since SOI came out, however, it seems to be put in the same category as Bomb, which makes no sense to me.
Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
Click to expand...

Larry's mind control experiment. :wink:
 
digitize said:
Since SOI came out, however, it seems to be put in the same category as Bomb, which makes no sense to me.
Click to expand...

They would be comparable if NLOTH was wildly overproduced, had nothing but over the top sugar highs and no direction whatsoever.
 
Let me say that I don't even remotely hate any U2 album. However..........NLOTH is in their bottom 3 albums for me.
Something is just missing. Fez-Magnificent-NLOTH would've made an incredible 1-2-3. But even with that, the album couldn't sustain itself. MOS is hard to place in the album because it's so over the top trying to be another version of Bad, but it lacks the sort of humbleness and emotional attachment that Bad has. It's still a pretty good song, but it is way overrated.
And of course, the bad ones kill the album. SUC is unspeakably horrific, UC is nonsense, and Breathe tries way to hard.
It had the potential to be something special, but fell way short of what it could've been. It is very strange and quite alarming the lack of B-Sides from this era. They must've felt that the material wasn't even good enough to release as bonus tracks. That's pretty sad because we typically get a nice amount of B-Sides.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
 
digitize said:
I love NLOTH. It's my fifth favorite U2 album. I don't dislike a single song on it. And I like it much more than SOI. The way that Interference has turned on it is bizarre. It seems like, a year ago, it was at least reasonably well-respected, if thought to be very imperfect. Since SOI came out, however, it seems to be put in the same category as Bomb, which makes no sense to me.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
Click to expand...


I'm sure some of that is true but I really soured on NLOTH about a year or two ago when I revisited it and realized that I massively overrated it when it came out. With that said, NLOTH and Fez would probably still break my top 25 or so U2 songs. It's too bad that the album has such glaring weaknesses.
 
Could have been excellent experimental album, even better than Zooropa, but they changed their direction in the middle of the process and went for more safer version of the production (Magnificient, Crazy tonight, Breathe), which is shame. Three songs are quite weak - Cedars, Snow and Comedy. But still I give them credit for coming up with something new (unlike ATYCLB) in finished form (unlike Pop). But definitely not one of their 3top albums. Not even in 5.
 
You can see the experimental side of the album with NLOTH and FEZ. If they would've stayed with that sort of sci-fi sound that those 2 had, it could've been amazing.
Btw, am I the only person who gets a sci-fi vibe from those songs?.....maybe I'm crazy.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference
 
Im sorry there's no bug up my butt. I really wish there was though. Three songs on this album, one of which was the lead single, were a total WTF for me and its never quite recovered afterwards. Truth be told i loved it at first because it was *new u2*. As the dust quickly settled on NLOTH i felt like a member of a cult who escaped and quickly realized just how brainwashed i really was. For that reason im starting to think my "love" for SOI is unwarranted and perhaps overblown.

Back to those dreaded 3 songs, we all know what they are, i can see why they felt they had to do something because the album without those three songs is way too dark and depressing. However, with them it is like a brand new car with a faulty transmission, or various damning nightmares you wont discover until well after you have signed the papers.

I guess there are plenty of good songs on NLOTH though; Moment of Surrender, the title track (if only they had gone with the second version), Unknown Caller, Fez, and i suppose Magnificent if it could have achieved liftoff.

Despite my ambivalence towards this album i still managed to go and see the 360 Tour 4 times from 09-11. These were four fantastic shows, especially the july 2011 shows. Well worth driving 800+ miles one way on two different occasions and spending lots of money. This current tour next year i have no plans or desire at the present to see them. Not sure what that has to do with anything, but there it is.

I haven't listened to NLOTH in years, probably since 2011. I keep thinking i should revisit it sometime but i haven't been able to bring myself to do so.
 
Mrs. Garrison said:
This current tour next year i have no plans or desire at the present to see them. Not sure what that has to do with anything, but there it is.
Click to expand...


I feel the same way but I think it's more about the band's age and the fact that we're still not 100% positive that Bono survived the bike crash.
 
mikal said:
I feel the same way but I think it's more about the band's age and the fact that we're still not 100% positive that Bono survived the bike crash.
Click to expand...

Ha. No clearly for me it has something to do with them playing 22 shows in 6 cities, or whatever it is, none of which are even remotely close to me. Yes i have traveled to see them a time or two before, but that may not be an option this year with increased responsibilities at home and at work. And i doubt they can top Nashville 360 anyway, and apparently they have no interest in doing so either, so there you go.
 
Mrs. Garrison said:
Ha. No clearly for me it has something to do with them playing 22 shows in 6 cities, or whatever it is, none of which are even remotely close to me. Yes i have traveled to see them a time or two before, but that may not be an option this year with increased responsibilities at home and at work. And i doubt they can top Nashville 360 anyway, and apparently they have no interest in doing so either, so there you go.
Click to expand...


Ah. That makes sense. Luckily Chicago is only a 3 hour drive for me. Hope they come back in 2016 a little closer for you.
 
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