Good point.
That said, I've heard Zeppelin being dropped in conversations throughout my entire life. U2 rarely gets mentioned. But I can't be everywhere at once obviously, so, I can only give you my first hand experience. I've gotten naysayers to admit to liking certain U2 songs when i've pressed the issue, but it's not something I've noticed people willingly throw out there. I used to DJ like 300 parties a year for about a decade. Everything from little kid parties to sweet 16s to weddings to house parties. Rarely did I ever get a U2 request. Did I play a lot of Zeppelin? You bet. A lot of Stones? Of course. Beatles? Definitely.
Then again.....I didn't play much of The Who either. Or Kraftwerk.
Ignore this.
Speaking of clubs and DJing, and personal experience, I was in zimbabwe in may last year. In a swanky club in Bulawayo they were playing hip hop and trance and no one was really upbeat about the whole thing, and after a while sitting there and sipping my jack and coke I got tired of it and went to the DJ's station. I asked them to play some rock and surprisingly they were willing to do so. When asked what would I would like to hear I said, obviously, some U2. They said okay. The next song was 'Beautiful Day' and, believe it or not, a host of people rushed onto the dance floor and started dancing. I know, its not the obvious song for a dance, but the opening notes obviously stirred something in people who just a second ago were not in the mood for much stirring.
The best thing was four or five guys asked who requested it and when they learnt it was me (Zimbabweans are the most awesome and hospitable people btw) treated me to free alcohol. A lot of free alcohol.
So your and BVS' s comment made me think about that. U2's impact on culture may be more than we give it credit for. And when it comes to cultural impact, we are basically talking mainstream, and when we are talking mainstream we are talking hit singles -- songs more than albums or even bands. The casual listener wont remember obscure gems hidden in the album, they know the hits.
I would argue that today, many songs or bands may have that impact, but having seen it myself I would highly doubt that there will be impact much greater, even if it was a beatles or led zep single coming on in a club. I am not saying anyone's better than the other, just that that kind of cultural pervasion(?) is rare and is achieved by the top class of artists. It takes luck undoubtedly and some connect with the world at large to achieve moments like beautiful day, etc. And U2 have done it a lot of times in their long career. I personally feel that as fans we are an apologetic lot, maybe because of bono, maybe because U2 have never really been recognised (rightly in my opinion) as virtuoso musicians. But I think in the future U2 will be remembered as higher placed than many of us would dare to admit
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