Speculation thread: predict U2's next era

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If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
ozeeko, i'm going out on a limb in thinking you are suggesting they just release the damn album already. for music's sake.

obviously all artists release music for music's sake. some have other motives, such as groupie benefits, but U2 is beyond that i would think.
 
U2 have to accept the fact that they're not always going to be the "biggest band in the world". At this point, they are WAY beyond elder statesmen status, they are an ANCIENT band at this point. They are OLD. What else is there to prove? NOTHING!!! I think it would be the most FREEING thing if they just GAVE IT UP and just decided on making MUSIC FOR MUSIC'S SAKE!!!

What can go wrong?! Seriously! What can backfire at this point?
I think they want to stay successful because they love doing big tours like 360. And that is what could go wrong, for them, not for us because we would go to shows anyway.
 
ozeeko, i'm going out on a limb in thinking you are suggesting they just release the damn album already. for music's sake.

obviously all artists release music for music's sake. some have other motives, such as groupie benefits, but U2 is beyond that i would think.

I think they are finally at a stage in their careers where they can make the music they really want to make, and Bono can write the lyrics he really wants to write. I don't care if their next album takes one month or one year to get released, if its something from the heart that's all that matters.

I'm sure U2 are above groupies, but I think they're still stuck in post-911 'Savior band' mode, and I think that's what has prevented them from "really" moving on and "really" doing what they want to do musically.
 
I think they want to stay successful because they love doing big tours like 360. And that is what could go wrong, for them, not for us because we would go to shows anyway.

They would sell out anyway, like the Stones do. If you polled the Stones' audience and asked each person in attendance to name 3 songs off a new album, I'm sure you'd maybe get like 10% who could. But it doesn't matter. They sell out, because a Rolling Stones show is sure to be a great time.

U2 have a reputation for being an amazing live band, and like the Stones, it doesn't matter what they release, they will sell out anyway. So they might as well write what they want, because more than half the audience just wants to hear Pride and With Or Without You, anyway.
 
I think they want to stay successful because they love doing big tours like 360. And that is what could go wrong, for them, not for us because we would go to shows anyway.

They don't want to be a dinosaur act where no one would care about their latest work. This is what Bono is getting at with "relevance". (I don't think they will ever again get the relevance a la post 9/11 Elevation tour in America)

Writing a single is where they are now, so writing a single is what they will do. Writing a single is what they want. Whether it will work or not or whether or not they're doing it right is debatable, perhaps, but not the motive.
But now that most of "pop U2" and "retro U2" singles have failed, they turn to club records and Danger Mouse. So a change is coming. Notice new producers. Notice several new songs being played live.
 
I think they are finally at a stage in their careers where they can make the music they really want to make, and Bono can write the lyrics he really wants to write. I don't care if their next album takes one month or one year to get released, if its something from the heart that's all that matters.

I'm sure U2 are above groupies, but I think they're still stuck in post-911 'Savior band' mode, and I think that's what has prevented them from "really" moving on and "really" doing what they want to do musically.

two things...

#1, u2 have actually been the earnest, savior band for the majority of their careers. if we're splitting up years, it's 20 years of earnest savior band mode, 10 years of fuck the mainstream mode. so i'm thinking perhaps the 10 years of fuck the mainstream mode was the blip on the exception, not the rule.

#2, what if this is the music they want to write? we seem to think of the music that WE want them to write and consider it to be what THEY want to write, which isn't really fair.

u2 has made it fairly clear throughout their career that they want to be relevant and sell a lot of records and make big tours... mr. macphisto was a characterization of bono's biggest fear, turning into the vegas lounge act just trying to cling on. they want to matter. if they can't matter in the mainstream, i don't think they'll just all of a sudden shrug their shoulders and go write acoustic celtic records. i think they'll go away.
 
F*** OFF and get a life!

D'you want other U2 songs that sound like "Vertigo" (except the more sofisticated production)? Listen to Boy or to some War songs!

you sorta ignored the whole "u2 completely ripped off an iconic drum beat from the 80's on their most 'innovative' 'fuck the mainstream' album" thing, didn't ya?
 
i believe, as the story goes, neil mccormick listened to vertigo and brought up how they had already used "hello hello" once before in stories for boys... which i believe is why they snippeted it at the end of vertigo during the tour.

I think I heard that as well. The part I was referring too though was Edge's chimes at 2.08 on Vertigo sounding extremely similar to much of his work throughout Stories for Boys, I seem to remember Edge and Bono mentioning this a fair bit whilst promoting HTDAAB.
 
You mean the four measures of arpeggios? Well arpeggios is a big part of Edge's sound, I really don't think that counts as a rehash... it's like 12 seconds.

This is the difficult part about having these types of conversations between people who play and people who don't, sometimes a person will hone in on a picking pattern, strumming pattern, chord progression or even just a single chord and start saying rehash or ripoff because it reminds them of something else. It's often a very thin line. There's only so much one can do, patterns they can play, or sounds to play with...
 
two things...

#1, u2 have actually been the earnest, savior band for the majority of their careers. if we're splitting up years, it's 20 years of earnest savior band mode, 10 years of fuck the mainstream mode. so i'm thinking perhaps the 10 years of fuck the mainstream mode was the blip on the exception, not the rule.

#2, what if this is the music they want to write? we seem to think of the music that WE want them to write and consider it to be what THEY want to write, which isn't really fair.

u2 has made it fairly clear throughout their career that they want to be relevant and sell a lot of records and make big tours... mr. macphisto was a characterization of bono's biggest fear, turning into the vegas lounge act just trying to cling on. they want to matter. if they can't matter in the mainstream, i don't think they'll just all of a sudden shrug their shoulders and go write acoustic celtic records. i think they'll go away.

#1 They were NEVER as coddling during the 80's as they were during the 2000's. In fact, much of their early 80's music was quite dark. Earnest I'll give you, but besides Where The Streets (and thats stretching it), where else in their 80's catalog do they don a Savior Band mentality? Sure, Bono was making his political points, but they were mostly angry. You could say 80's was Old Testament Bono, and this decade is New Testament Bono. But one thing is pretty clear to me, U2 weren't writing "Savior" songs, songs that were designed for comforting us, for letting us know everything will be alright, that let us know how beautiful we all are. They might have written about the Savior on October, but it was all about THEIR spiritual crisis, not about OURS. That's the difference. I don't think U2 were even about to go down that road, it was mostly their ATYCLB album being reinterpreted after 9/11 that made them change. All of a sudden, it was like Bono finally made that metamorphosis into Jesus Bono, the Bono every U2 hater had wrongly pegged him as, but this time he was actually turning into what they always had wrong about him. At least that's my take on it.

#2 I don't think that everything they are writing is EXACTLY the kind of stuff they want to write. Like I said before, I feel like they've strapped themselves with an unnecessary obligation to be the Savior Band. On NLOTH, I don't think they had a clear direction, but at least it was something different. However, that unclear direction became lost forever once they decided to add the "savior songs" - I'll let you decided which ones i mean. It's almost like they needed people to be reminded of their responsibility to the current human condition, to let the masses know, "hey, we're there for you." Very nice of them, but I think they played that hand one too many times during the BOMB era. The coddling has become tiresome.

As you said, if the mainstream didn't like them, they would screw off most likely. I find that to be quite sad. There are many out there who have never heard the song Slug, and you know what? The song lives on, it doesn't matter. A hundred years from now, it won't matter. The music is what survives, not a crummy position in the charts. If U2 are driven solely by what they can sell, then there is no way in hell they are making the music they want to make.
 
#1 They were NEVER as coddling during the 80's as they were during the 2000's. In fact, much of their early 80's music was quite dark. Earnest I'll give you, but besides Where The Streets (and thats stretching it), where else in their 80's catalog do they don a Savior Band mentality? Sure, Bono was making his political points, but they were mostly angry. You could say 80's was Old Testament Bono, and this decade is New Testament Bono. But one thing is pretty clear to me, U2 weren't writing "Savior" songs, songs that were designed for comforting us, for letting us know everything will be alright, that let us know how beautiful we all are. They might have written about the Savior on October, but it was all about THEIR spiritual crisis, not about OURS. That's the difference. I don't think U2 were even about to go down that road, it was mostly their ATYCLB album being reinterpreted after 9/11 that made them change. All of a sudden, it was like Bono finally made that metamorphosis into Jesus Bono, the Bono every U2 hater had wrongly pegged him as, but this time he was actually turning into what they always had wrong about him. At least that's my take on it.

you've put it rather crudely, but I'd agree this is true for parts of ATYCLB and HTDAAB

but I don't think Bono/U2 have undergone quite the transformation you're suggesting. their most recent output is hardly coddling
 
you've put it rather crudely, but I'd agree this is true for parts of ATYCLB and HTDAAB

but I don't think Bono/U2 have undergone quite the transformation you're suggesting. their most recent output is hardly coddling

With the exception of CT and SUC, you are right. Keep in mind these songs were worked over and added later during the delay period of NLOTH, so read into that what you will.
 
#1 They were NEVER as coddling during the 80's as they were during the 2000's. In fact, much of their early 80's music was quite dark. Earnest I'll give you, but besides Where The Streets (and thats stretching it), where else in their 80's catalog do they don a Savior Band mentality? Sure, Bono was making his political points, but they were mostly angry. You could say 80's was Old Testament Bono, and this decade is New Testament Bono. But one thing is pretty clear to me, U2 weren't writing "Savior" songs, songs that were designed for comforting us, for letting us know everything will be alright, that let us know how beautiful we all are. They might have written about the Savior on October, but it was all about THEIR spiritual crisis, not about OURS. That's the difference. I don't think U2 were even about to go down that road, it was mostly their ATYCLB album being reinterpreted after 9/11 that made them change. All of a sudden, it was like Bono finally made that metamorphosis into Jesus Bono, the Bono every U2 hater had wrongly pegged him as, but this time he was actually turning into what they always had wrong about him. At least that's my take on it.

#2 I don't think that everything they are writing is EXACTLY the kind of stuff they want to write. Like I said before, I feel like they've strapped themselves with an unnecessary obligation to be the Savior Band. On NLOTH, I don't think they had a clear direction, but at least it was something different. However, that unclear direction became lost forever once they decided to add the "savior songs" - I'll let you decided which ones i mean. It's almost like they needed people to be reminded of their responsibility to the current human condition, to let the masses know, "hey, we're there for you." Very nice of them, but I think they played that hand one too many times during the BOMB era. The coddling has become tiresome.

As you said, if the mainstream didn't like them, they would screw off most likely. I find that to be quite sad. There are many out there who have never heard the song Slug, and you know what? The song lives on, it doesn't matter. A hundred years from now, it won't matter. The music is what survives, not a crummy position in the charts. If U2 are driven solely by what they can sell, then there is no way in hell they are making the music they want to make.

okay... in the 80's they were the band with the political conscience, who wore their heart on their sleeve. they returned to form in the 2000's. maybe it's not as angry as, say, sunday bloody sunday... but sunday bloody sunday was a song about a subject that they were very close to, personally, growing up in ireland. the socio-political climate in ireland has changed drastically since then. even up through pop you could still see the most anger and bitterness directed at the troubles, specifically with songs like Please. that situation is much better now.

so perhaps their songs aren't as angry and personally dark as some of them may have been at one point, but, ya know... things are pretty good for them.

i'd be more willing to listen to your arguments if they were somewhere along the line of "bono doesn't write angry political songs anymore because he doesn't want to upset anybody because of his activism". but this whole "coddling" thing you're running with makes no sense to me.
 
okay... in the 80's they were the band with the political conscience, who wore their heart on their sleeve. they returned to form in the 2000's. maybe it's not as angry as, say, sunday bloody sunday... but sunday bloody sunday was a song about a subject that they were very close to, personally, growing up in ireland. the socio-political climate in ireland has changed drastically since then. even up through pop you could still see the most anger and bitterness directed at the troubles, specifically with songs like Please. that situation is much better now.

so perhaps their songs aren't as angry and personally dark as some of them may have been at one point, but, ya know... things are pretty good for them.

i'd be more willing to listen to your arguments if they were somewhere along the line of "bono doesn't write angry political songs anymore because he doesn't want to upset anybody because of his activism". but this whole "coddling" thing you're running with makes no sense to me.

The "coddling" is the motivational speaker style lyrics Bono started to use post 9/11. He did it throughout BOMB, on WITS, and although he tried his hardest to exit himself on NLOTH, he couldn't quite commit and as a result dropped a couple more on us. I can't really explain it further. Just listen to BOMB and the other songs. It's all in there.

And if you like that sort of thing, then great. A lot of people do. I think that's why U2 have a hard time straying from it.
 
i can't change the world, but i can change the world in me?

i sorta agree that his lyrics haven't been the best over the past 10 years but i disagree with you 100% on the reasoning. i simply think he's been more distracted than ever with all he does outside of the band and his writing has slipped a bit because of it. i also think his own personal life has changed drasticly, and that can't help but change your writing. you're not going to write like an angry, angst filled teenager and 20 something when you're pushing 50.

but to say that he's purposely writing this way to give people that warm, gooey u2 feeling and make them feel better about themselves? i don't buy that.
 
I don't doubt there's been some sort a big change between Pop - ATYCLB (and similarly Rattle and Hum-Achtung Baby). Wake up dead man - BD is quite a transition. (also see All I want is you - The fly)

I just don't think it's about the $$, or about Saviour BandTM or distractions. People change. I don't expect him to write about the same things past 40 compared to the things he wrote about in his 20's or 30's - and just like he will be onto something else now that the big 5-0 is here.
 
Well they're selling out stadiums so I guess they probably want to sell lots of singles as well. That's their "drug of choice".

I personally like how they altered Mercy for the Brussels show and it feels complete at this point, whereas the original was just meandering and the lyrics were partly stand-ins to flesh out a melody.

It seems like their drug of choice is relevance among irrelevance.

Recognition in a musical climate that is largely lacking. I think most people feel that by and large what is popular and getting airplay is not that great these days. Certainly any musician wouyld have to admit music (generally speaking) is not progressing right now. It's not getting better. Definitely from a technical standpoint it's getting dumbed down and degraded.

I would say to try to fit into this climate could be construed as selling out. To let these things and the fact that they are selling out stadiums intrude upon the sanctity of their art/music could be construed as selling out.

I do not know their intentions or their direction because I have not heard the tunes. I have high hopes for the Danger Mouse sessions.

Based on the last decade of output: I perceive that while there are moments of greatness that I love, there are more frequent moments that sound to me contrived, constructed and conceived by factors that shouldn't be part of the creatiuve equation. I believe music creation should be about passion and the marketing department should not play a role in that aspect of their business.

They've acheived the pinnacle of success. They have a huge audience. They could do something unique and relevant and musically compelling. Something brave. It seems like a wasted opportunity to pursue their musical ends to get airplay next to WILL I AM. It's not even a decent ambition IMO. People in all walks of life dream of achieving the status they have in their station of life so they can do exactly what they want unencumbered.

I'm not hearing it. I could be wrong, but I am certainly not alone in my perception. I still love their music.

No Line came close. I just want them to blow me away as they have in the past. "Tell me something true - I belive in you"

Sorry for babbling. :)
 
It seems like their drug of choice is relevance among irrelevance.

Recognition in a musical climate that is largely lacking. I think most people feel that by and large what is popular and getting airplay is not that great these days. Certainly any musician wouyld have to admit music (generally speaking) is not progressing right now. It's not getting better. Definitely from a technical standpoint it's getting dumbed down and degraded.

I would say to try to fit into this climate could be construed as selling out. To let these things and the fact that they are selling out stadiums intrude upon the sanctity of their art/music could be construed as selling out.

I do not know their intentions or their direction because I have not heard the tunes. I have high hopes for the Danger Mouse sessions.

Based on the last decade of output: I perceive that while there are moments of greatness that I love, there are more frequent moments that sound to me contrived, constructed and conceived by factors that shouldn't be part of the creatiuve equation. I believe music creation should be about passion and the marketing department should not play a role in that aspect of their business.

They've acheived the pinnacle of success. They have a huge audience. They could do something unique and relevant and musically compelling. Something brave. It seems like a wasted opportunity to pursue their musical ends to get airplay next to WILL I AM. It's not even a decent ambition IMO. People in all walks of life dream of achieving the status they have in their station of life so they can do exactly what they want unencumbered.

I'm not hearing it. I could be wrong, but I am certainly not alone in my perception. I still love their music.

No Line came close. I just want them to blow me away as they have in the past. "Tell me something true - I belive in you"

Sorry for babbling. :)

You have to understand that U2 has always been about critical acclaim and sales. The last album got the former and a little of the latter but that doesn't satisfy the band. None of the singles resonated (partly because they chose the wrong order and got into a fight over royalties with radio which hurt Magnificent).

They have never been satisfied. They want to be the Beatles. They always hunt for the best album they can make. Some of Bono's criticism of progressive music should be welcome because as enjoyable as long guitar solos are what U2 does with shorter hit singles is often as good if not better. I too hope that Danger Mouse can help them learn that brevity is the soul of wit. I'm not sure what the "club album" will be like in terms of ambition but we need more info on that. If they make the club album into a real U2 record then I expect it won't be a simple OONTS record. If it is then likely it will be a side project or dumped altogether.
 
It would have been a hit with an iTunes ad. You need to do the right kind of 'selling out' to make non-Nickelback/Daughtry 'rock' hit nowadays.
 
The "coddling" is the motivational speaker style lyrics Bono started to use post 9/11.
there's nothing motivational going on
his kids are growing up and his role as a parent sometimes becomes visible in his lyrics

Bono hasn't changed much, but his life has

of course this won't suite your purpose so i'll brace myself for more of your motivational speeches nonsense
 
hmmm, touched a nerve there

the motivational speech "nonsense" is just how it comes across to....me. you don't have to agree, it's just my opinion. it's the reaction i get.

and not for nothing, but any type of music written for one's own kids should be kept behind closed doors.
 
nah, you didn't touch a nerve
i just find your nonsense generally annoying

and how you made the jump from "his role as a parent sometimes becomes visible in his lyrics" to "any type of music written for one's own kids" woud baffle me more if you ever appeared like sensible person before
 
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