Love Is All We Have Left - Appreciation Thread

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trevgreg

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On the first listens, this is the one that's standing out for me the most. It's a gorgeous tune. Vocal effects and all. I'm sort of stunned since it's more understated that most of the songs in some respects, but Bono really sounds great here!
 
Best song of the album for me also. I know this is wishful thinking, but I would love a remix from Four Tet on this tune.
 
YES! a stunning song. Exactly the opposite of Love is Bigger. This track might not be my favourite on the album, but it is the most powerful. SO much more of this, please! Followed by Lights of Home and for me this is the strongest 1-2 punch to open an album in a long stretch.
Boom!
 
Always reminds me of "2001 - A Space Oddysey" ...
(specially the middle part with the vocoder and stars lyrics)
 
Would love to see the next album have some more of this feel. Love that its subtle and sounds so effortless despite interesting sounds and vocal effects going on. Brings me back to "Stateless" :)
 
They could have opened with a classic U2 sound, like Blackout, but the soft opening is mind blowing, amazing tune, amazing album. It's sort of like foreplay to whats to come.
 
Reminds me of a Moby song. That's not a bad thing. I felt like it would have been on Innocents.
Totally agree. I guess the autotune and strings help. Love this song, such a stunningly different start to the album.
 
What is the noise you hear each time before Bono says the line "Love is all we have left"? I can't figure out if it's a voice with an effect or an instrument.
 
Unless I’m overlooking something, a U2 album has never opened with a slow atmospheric song before. It’s always something epic or fast. This is something totally different, and I like it. :up: It reminds me of the first track on Keane’s Under the Iron Sea. The autotune is a little surprising, but I think it suits the song.
 
It's kind of like Bono's near death experience and realizes that all we have left is love, but he's going to keep going which segues into Lights of Home as the reason why to keep going.
 
Unless I’m overlooking something, a U2 album has never opened with a slow atmospheric song before. It’s always something epic or fast. This is something totally different, and I like it. :up: It reminds me of the first track on Keane’s Under the Iron Sea. The autotune is a little surprising, but I think it suits the song.

It's not auto-tune. It's a vocoder. A pitch shifter. It takes a voice and harmonizes the voice. Brian Eno uses one on A Different Kind of Blue off Passengers. Far predates auto-tune which corrects pitch.

But yeah, cool to hear Bono finally use one.
 
Does anyone else think that this song is about refugees?

(Don't close your eyes)
Love and love is all we have left
A baby cries on a doorstep
Love is all we have left
(Don't close your eyes)
Love and love is all we have left
You argue 'cause you can't accept
Love is all we have left
 
"Walk On" says "Love is all that you can't leave behind," this song says Love is "the only thing that can be kept," and "all we have left." Around the time ATYCLB came out, Bono said something to the effect that when you die, love is the only thing you can take with you, hence the heart in a suitcase symbol. On SOE, if Bono said he's writing as if he's dead, then this song is like a fulfillment of the idea of All That You Can't Leave Behind. "The only baggage you can take" (when we die), to "All we have left" (we're dead).

:ohmy:
 
Listening to it today in thr car, it spunded like it was Don't close your eyes the first few times but then changed.

Please forgive typos. I am drunk and in a karaoke room with 20 people and don't have my readibg glasses.
 
Unless I’m overlooking something, a U2 album has never opened with a slow atmospheric song before. It’s always something epic or fast. This is something totally different, and I like it. :up: It reminds me of the first track on Keane’s Under the Iron Sea. The autotune is a little surprising, but I think it suits the song.

Yeah - it's a big surprise for them to note open with the biggest punch that they can. Zooropa is the closest to an exception - it has a long atmospheric build up. They've often mentioned thinking about starting with more of a slow build before- but they always back off:

Achtung Baby they thought about Alex Descends into Hell as an opener
NLOTH they thought about Fez as an opener
SOI they thought about This is Where you Can Reach Me Now - which is still a pretty energetic song - but at least has a slower build than Miracle.

So this time they finally went for it.
 
Full credit to Andy Barlow who brought the magic out of this one, along with The Little Things.

Of all the producers who worked with U2 over these two albums, Barlow by far comes out with the most credit.

Exceptional work, that really brought out the mystique and beauty in U2's songs again.
 
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