What is the stupidest decision U2 has ever made?

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I tuned out the spider man era. So much that when I was in a supermarket and heard Rise Above being played I was trying to figure out why there was a new U2 song I never heard before being played in a super market.
 
There's actually some good music on Spider-Man, and BFFTS is a potential minor classic. I think the aborted Ruben album would have been a good one, though I can see how they thought the needed to go "arty" again after Bomb and dropped the feel-good pop rock they were working on in 2006 (I actually love WITS, but my tolerance for U2 cheese is awfully high, I've always been here for the uplift). I think they sensed the backlash coming and seemed to be aware that they were now "U2" and not U2 (hence the return to Eno/Lanois).

But then that blew up in their faces.

Their career has been so long and so varied that they may be out of moves, other than to try to write good songs. Which is where SOI comes from. And it's a good album. I enjoy it a lot.




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Since Irvine mentioned BFFTS, here's a major mistake: not releasing BFFTS as a full U2 song. Like a one-off single in 2010. I don't mind the Spider-Man soundtrack version, but the U2 live version is epic. I'd love to hear a clean version of that.


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It did create enough of a stench to sully the U2 "brand", however. It had the most visible half of U2 (Bono & Edge) promoting it for what seemed forever. For Joe Public, it was almost impossible not to think of it as a U2-related disaster.


I'm not sure what Joe Public thought of it.


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I wilfully ignored the Spiderman stuff, so will have to take people's words for that. I had actually completely forgotten it even happened.

Said no one.

Your earlier posts have been pretty much the only bad thing about this thread.

Letting Dik Evans leave the band.

Already been said, Nicholas.

Bad, BD, Vertigo, and similar

The first time this has ever been said.

But fuck off with your Oxford comma.

Being away for so long. Will be about 6 years since i saw them live in September.

Bono being injury prone and risking his health again and again.

How is constant touring fine for his health but going for a bike ride is not?

Those stupid Aung San Suu Kyi masks.

Very true, an excellent nomination, BUT it did inspire one of my all-time great posts http://www.u2interference.com/forum...-suu-kyi-will-be-free-207989.html#post6972126

It makes no sense that you can't just go to the record store and get Achtung Baby on vinyl. I'd love to know why they didn't release it in a standard format. Of all U2's decisions this is the strangest.

Yes this is a good nomination as well. One of their two most loved albums and you can't buy a copy on vinyl in an age where it's the fastest growing format.

i'll even say that "MMMBop" is a better song than "Smells Like Teen Spirit."

:up::up::up:

That only a new album = any touring phase.

Yes. This is quite annoying.

Keep up the good work people.

And yes, I am as surprised as you all are that U2girl reads posts other than her own.
 
.. would have to be their decision after Pop to pull back hard on their experimental sounds.

Not saying I hate everything they've done in the last 15 years, but the band doesn't challenge me anymore. At all.

On the experimental side, U2 are like roadkill... a stinking, rotting husk of their former selves. Bono claims they are still experimental, but I don't hear it at all. He is apparently obsessed now with writing "timeless songs that get stuck in your head". I will say this, the songs on SOI *do* get stuck in my head, so he achieved his goal I guess. But honestly, I'm not sure I want them there. Aside from a couple standout tracks, it's almost like having Rick Astley stuck in your head. An unwelcome guest.

My favorite U2 songs never get stuck in my head, that was part of what drew me to the band. The songs seemed mysterious, and had sounds and lyrics that you just knew no other band could have put together. With their newer albums, I feel like I could be listening to Coldplay or some other U2-emulating band. The core elements are there, but the magic is gone. Edge is seemingly disengaged, not pushing the envelope, just filling in empty spots that need some guitar. (There are of course still a few songs that are exceptions to this, or I wouldn't even listen to them anymore).

They need to play to their strengths and give up on the boring, mainstream "best band in the world" crap already, it's been long enough.
 
Since Irvine mentioned BFFTS, here's a major mistake: not releasing BFFTS as a full U2 song. Like a one-off single in 2010. I don't mind the Spider-Man soundtrack version, but the U2 live version is epic. I'd love to hear a clean version of that.


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The song is an absolute MASTERPIECE. I wonder if random U2 fans do know about it, probably not...
 
Agreed more or less, BlenderJoe. :up: But I do think that SOI is their best one since Pop. Before that one, NLOTH was the best one since Pop. That's what I think anyway.
 
If you take the best bits from NLOTH and SOI and forget HTDAAB ever happened (except for Mercy, which was slipped to the more ornery fans like a roofie), you have the makings of a good half hour playlist.
 
Artistic Decision, I'll go with butchering Mercy.

It's the prototype of their whole second guessing themselves and not trusting their own music on the last 15 years, having albums ready but not ready enough, bringing new producers and modifying their songs over and over again and then when they finally come out (if they come out) still going with wrong singles or even more modified versions.

Even worse, in the case of Mercy, that song was truly a great piece, arguably their best in the last 20 years and it was not only a matter of not including it in an album or not even not releasing it at all, but to modify it in an attempt to include it a more poppish chorus ruinining the magic it had.

Career Decision, I'll go with Boots as lead single.

That whole second guessing themselves and not trusting their own music on the last 15 years I mentioned before? well, it didn't have really bad consequences up to that point.
Not releasing Mercy didn't really affected them, Bomb was a measurable great success, just like Leave Behind was. Even Pop was not a total lost even if it wasn't as successful as they expected it to be.

But Boots -which is not a bad song per se, actually- really tarnished their image. It was the wrong song at the wrong time with the wrong eyeliner.
360 was a success, but I guess we can agree that it was closer to a greatest hits tour than to a No Line tour. Even the name of the tour didn't mentioned the album or any song at all. The tour had barely nothing to do with their new release but the image of the band as uncapable of creating good meaningful music anymore stuck.

Rattle and Hum's sin was being too serious and too arrogant, and that was "easily" fixed by adding humour and irony in themselves. But being regarded as a joke or as a punchline as bad musicians, is a lot harder to come back.
 
Since Irvine mentioned BFFTS, here's a major mistake: not releasing BFFTS as a full U2 song. Like a one-off single in 2010. I don't mind the Spider-Man soundtrack version, but the U2 live version is epic. I'd love to hear a clean version of that.


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Agreed on SO many levels!

Love the live version I have, but in the end there's a chick chanting "hey, hey, hey" which annoys me to death. :lol: I should probably cut it some time, but I'm too lazy.
 
I'm not sure what Joe Public thought of it.


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Actors getting quite seriously injured, the massive production costs, scathing reviews, the public and messy falling out with Julie Taymor and a premature closure...yea it didn't make good reading. At all.
 
Agreed on SO many levels!

Love the live version I have, but in the end there's a chick chanting "hey, hey, hey" which annoys me to death.

It may have been Leo's mom trying to get Bono's attention.

You gotta try everything when security has orders to keep you out of restricted areas.
 
Actors getting quite seriously injured, the massive production costs, scathing reviews, the public and messy falling out with Julie Taymor and a premature closure...yea it didn't make good reading. At all.

On Broadway, it grossed as much as the "beloved" South Park guys' play, "Book of Mormon". So it wasn't this "bomb" that everyone thinks. And that gross was nicely over $200M on Broadway (and that was about a year before it closed). I don't know total costs involved though, so maybe it just broke even or was a bit in the red, but hardly a bomb.

I have not read that it was a premature closure. I read that it was meant to tour (not shocking given that's in U2's nature). So I question that claim.

However, the disaster with Taymor (and I put a lot of blame on her, even though others disagree) was bad along with the injuries. I don't understand how so many were injured with that play given the rarity of injuries in the various Cirque du Soleil productions (although there was a recent death in one of them).

Overall, U2 should have just agreed to write a few songs and get out. Producing this show was a mistake, unless they were VERY silent producers, not writers or critics or anything else.

As for music decisions, for every song I would pick, there would be tons of people who adore the song (and vice versa). So I do think this Spider-man musical was probably their biggest mistake. Not doing it, per se, just having too big a role in it (and maybe choosing Taymor to be the director).
 
Actors getting quite seriously injured, the massive production costs, scathing reviews, the public and messy falling out with Julie Taymor and a premature closure...yea it didn't make good reading. At all.


But for the most part Joe Public doesn't really give a shit about Broadway plays in general.


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On Broadway, it grossed as much as the "beloved" South Park guys' play, "Book of Mormon".



there's no need for the quotes -- it is universally beloved, and considered one of the great musicals of the past 10 years, if not the entire 21st century.
 
Also, I think Book of Mormon has done $300+ million whereas Turn off the Dark stalled around $220 mil.
 
Artistic Decision, I'll go with butchering Mercy.

It's the prototype of their whole second guessing themselves and not trusting their own music on the last 15 years, having albums ready but not ready enough, bringing new producers and modifying their songs over and over again and then when they finally come out (if they come out) still going with wrong singles or even more modified versions.

Even worse, in the case of Mercy, that song was truly a great piece, arguably their best in the last 20 years and it was not only a matter of not including it in an album or not even not releasing it at all, but to modify it in an attempt to include it a more poppish chorus ruinining the magic it had.

Career Decision, I'll go with Boots as lead single.

That whole second guessing themselves and not trusting their own music on the last 15 years I mentioned before? well, it didn't have really bad consequences up to that point.
Not releasing Mercy didn't really affected them, Bomb was a measurable great success, just like Leave Behind was. Even Pop was not a total lost even if it wasn't as successful as they expected it to be.

But Boots -which is not a bad song per se, actually- really tarnished their image. It was the wrong song at the wrong time with the wrong eyeliner.
360 was a success, but I guess we can agree that it was closer to a greatest hits tour than to a No Line tour. Even the name of the tour didn't mentioned the album or any song at all. The tour had barely nothing to do with their new release but the image of the band as uncapable of creating good meaningful music anymore stuck.

Rattle and Hum's sin was being too serious and too arrogant, and that was "easily" fixed by adding humour and irony in themselves. But being regarded as a joke or as a punchline as bad musicians, is a lot harder to come back.

I afford to disagree.

Mercy had a potential in its demo version, but it was a bit messy and too long. It was only the live version that made the song consistent and brilliant,

Boots is a great song, with very different arabic vibe. Much more ambitious single than all the Stucks, Walk Ons or Vertigos. I adore the band for that direction that is captured on the album The problem of NLOTH was they were not brave enough to finish the record the way they started it in Morocco and they ended up polishing the songs in more radio friendly - classic - ATYCLB - way.
 
On Broadway, it grossed as much as the "beloved" South Park guys' play, "Book of Mormon". So it wasn't this "bomb" that everyone thinks. And that gross was nicely over $200M on Broadway (and that was about a year before it closed). I don't know total costs involved though, so maybe it just broke even or was a bit in the red, but hardly a bomb.

I have not read that it was a premature closure. I read that it was meant to tour (not shocking given that's in U2's nature). So I question that claim.

However, the disaster with Taymor (and I put a lot of blame on her, even though others disagree) was bad along with the injuries. I don't understand how so many were injured with that play given the rarity of injuries in the various Cirque du Soleil productions (although there was a recent death in one of them).

Overall, U2 should have just agreed to write a few songs and get out. Producing this show was a mistake, unless they were VERY silent producers, not writers or critics or anything else.

As for music decisions, for every song I would pick, there would be tons of people who adore the song (and vice versa). So I do think this Spider-man musical was probably their biggest mistake. Not doing it, per se, just having too big a role in it (and maybe choosing Taymor to be the director).

Aren't you supposed to be the numbers guy?

Gross is an utterly useless number.

It was in a theater three times the size of Book of Mormon.

Spiderman had to sell out every night for about 10 years just to break even, due to its incredible production costs, not to mention the $75 million in pre-production investments.

Spiderman's net loss for its investors was in the range of $60 million dollars. It was a complete, unmitigated financial disaster any way you draw it up.

For comparison, Book of Mormon cost 10 million to make, and was profitable by its 9th month, and continues to sell out every show, on Broadway and on tour, to this day.
 
Actors getting quite seriously injured, the massive production costs, scathing reviews, the public and messy falling out with Julie Taymor and a premature closure...yea it didn't make good reading. At all.


That funny cause I thought it was quite popular with 'Joe Public' in terms of ticket sales. No?



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