Vote For U2's Best Studio Album

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Quick update:

AB and JT are still the far and away leaders.

Only R&H and Passengers are voteless.

I am going to close voting at 11:59pm on 7/31/2011. I'm guessing that I'll have a big enough sample by then to declare a winner.

Should be curious to see which album is declared third best...

29-33

JT
AB

NLOTH
 
Alright, the fans have spoken.

Disclaimers: I recorded a total of 71 voters (32 voters in the <18 to 28 range, and the other 39 voters in the 29 to 45+ range). A few of you submitted an extra album in the 3rd spot and I recorded them if I felt there was no true "3rd" place distinction. So that will explain the higher vote count versus number of voters.
Also, if you did not include your demographic, I did not record your votes. For the record, they would have made no difference to the final results.

No surprises at the 1 and 2 positions...but the rest was not what I expected.

Anyway, the results:


ALBUM - TTL Votes - Percent
Achtung Baby - 66 - 30.6%
Joshua Tree - 52 - 24.1%
Unforgettable Fire - 26 - 12.0%
Pop - 19 - 8.8%
Zooropa - 18 - 8.3%
NLOTH - 16 - 7.4%
ATYCLB - 7 - 3.2%
War - 6 - 2.8%
HTDAAB - 3 - 1.4%
Boy - 2 - 0.9%
October - 1 - 0.5%
Rattle & Hum - 0 - 0.0%
Passengers I - 0 - 0.0%

AB and JT were 1 and 2 across every demographic. But the 3rd pick was different in many of the age groups:

<18: (tied) UF, ZOO, NLOTH
18-23: ZOO
24-28: (tied) UF, POP, NLOTH
29-33: POP
34-38: UF
39-44: UF
45+: NLOTH

I found it curious that NLOTH was the 3rd best among 45+. UF only got 1 vote among that group.

Also, strange to me, is the fact that October only got 1 vote while R&H got NO votes at all....especially when Zooropa and Pop got so many.

And, POP? The 4th best U2 album? I'll disagree with that one all the way home.

There you have it. I will keep the complete results in case anyone wants to see specific data. Thank you to everyone for participating, it was rather fun to see what people like.
 
I guess the fact that Pop finishes 4th or whatever in your poll probably reflects the age of the average person on this forum. Whereas (I would guess) the average casual U2 fan around the globe is maybe 35 to 45 years old, the average Interferencer is probably much younger. A lot of people on here discovered the band around the time of Pop and the Internet becoming pervasive; hence, Pop's high result. There's also the fact that the obsessive U2 fan is more likely to appreciate lesser-known works than the casual fan.

But I agree with you that NLOTH's finishing so high amongst the older brigade is kind of baffling. I'm never encountered anyone except in this forum who thought it was a great album, but my experience may be atypical. Again, it's probably down to the difference between the casual fan and the uber-fan.
 
Zooropa and Pop have been popular lately. And there's a whole thread dedicated to why Rattle & Hum may or may not suck (the movie, but the album sometimes too) :/

I'm fine with Zooropa as 4th....Pop, though...:no: I have no idea how NLOTH got into 6th. And that ATYCLB got before War
 
While I'll agree that Pop was ahead of it's time, it never felt complete to me. I like the album, but it in my personal ranking, it's the lowest of the collection, IMO.

Of course, I realize it's all a matter of personal opinion and the age of the fan, which is why I opted to take the time to record the demographics. I was just expecting something different.

I might do this again with more detail. Having people choose only 3 albums may have skewed the results. There are not many folks that are willing to rank R&H, OCT, or Boy in the top 3...but possibly it would fall into 5, 6, 7, etc.

AB and JT are always going to win the top spots...they always have. I'm more interested in seeing how people really feel about the other kids.

I don't believe that R&H or OCT fall into last place in a more complete survey. But there have been countless threads across multiple forums over the years that try and rank the albums/songs/Bono's glasses, etc.

Do people really enjoy these things?

But I like seeing the numbers. I think I'll run another one and just hope that people are willing to participate.
 
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