I REALLY question the band's decesion on something.

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shart1780

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OK I respect these guys and their understanding of the music indrustry but lately I've been seriously questioning their intelligence on a certain issue.

Mercy should be on HTDAAB. Period. I'm tired of this "but the album would be too long!!!" baloney. More great songs never hurts an album. Period. There's no rules stating an album can be no longer than an hour.

Xanax and Wine is better than Fast Cars. If it had a little more production it could have been one of the best songs on the album. What were these guys smoking? Taking a mind-blowing song and turning it into a b-side? It's crazy. Fast Cars is good but nowhere near as good as Xanax and Wine could have been.

Smile is a completely beautiful song. The melody is just tearjerking to me. Everything in this song is awesome. The lyrics, the vocals, the music. It makes me angry that they left this out. It would have been one of my favorite songs on the album.

Love You Like Mad is also a completely awesome. It deserved to be on the album. It's catchy, it's sexy, it's just plain cool. Better than a few songs on HTDAAB IMO.

Flower Child should have been on ATYCLB in the place of Wild Honey. We can all agree on this. I like this song A LOT.

Levitate is beautiful and should have been on ATYCLB as well.


Over the last couple of days this has really been getting to me. I know I should be glad to even HAVE these early demos but I just feel like U2 can be somewhat foolish at times. Why do they think their albums need to be 11 songs only? It's silly. As long as the album is full of good songs it will be a good album. You can not have too many good songs.

I also question them for taking completely spectacular songs and turning them into something much worse (Xanax and Wine, Flower Child). Why do they do this?

The bottom line is U2 has the potential to release better albums and they don't. If Levitate and Flower Child were on ATYCLB it would have been a better album. If Xanax and Wine, Smile, Mercy and Love You Like Mad were on HTDAAB it would be a better album as well. They have almost finnished songs collecting dust in their studios that are BETTER than what's being sold.

I kind of feel like I'm getting the shaft in a way.
 
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How long (minutes, not songs) is the new album anyway?

When I think of it, many of my favorite cd's are about an hour long.
 
MrBrau1 said:
I think these outtakes are great, but none are album worthy. They all have major faults.

I don't see what you're saying about Flower Child. It's difficult to fit on ATYCLB because it's more of the Grace song than Wild Honey and it would cause some problems there but I see what you're saying in that yes they do have problems but that's because they weren't given the attention that the songs that made it on the album got.

Take Native Son. If you spent more time on that song and not more time in the "let's ass rape this song into being a different song entirely" then it wouldn't have those major faults.

Love You Like Mad is just not that great lyrically but it's head and shoulders above All Because Of You in that department.

I feel shafted because while I do have the songs they all sound somewhat incomplete. Vertigo getting the polish and shine while Native Son gets a demo release is a sham.

Levitate is a beautiful song but also suffers from what Flower Child does. It's tough to put on the album. Elevation / Levitate? come on folks and Elevation was needed for pacing.

But yes I agree it's a damn shame that these songs didn't get more work. Even X&W needs a wee bit more work but it's still miles ahead of Fast Cars and would have been the best song on the album.
 
Why does everyone think Wild Honey and Flower Child are so similar? Is it the mention of nature in the title? Is it the acoustic guitars? Cause each tune has a very different spirit.
 
Native son should have been polished in place of vertigo, and I really like Smile if they wouldve spent some more time on that song. With regards to 11 tracks on the album, I dont understand why they dont release more tracks, they truly are great songs?
 
MrBrau1 said:
Why does everyone think Wild Honey and Flower Child are so similar? Is it the mention of nature in the title? Is it the acoustic guitars? Cause each tune has a very different spirit.


I agree when I first heard Flower Child I thought "well this is like a good version of what the song Grace was supposed to be about. Yeah the girl Grace she's the flower child." Musically not so similar obviously but it's like Grace is Bono telling us about something and Flower Child is the band showing and letting us feel the same concept.

They're completely different feelings and completely different thematics to them. Just listened to both of them again and I've got to say I don't see where the connection is except for acoustic guitars and flower = bees = honey! and Wild in my heart = Wild Honey!

Wild Honey is a bit more of a longing type song while Flower Child is just a happy love song with a free spirit and about ten times more hippy.
 
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You know the problem here is that when you have something, and then something else becomes available you stop and think..."hmmm, maybe I like that better." I've heard Xanax and Wine and I've listened to Fast Cars. I must say for my taste Fast Cars is the better song. I think for me it's the left turn of this song compared to the rest of the "Atomic Bomb" songs that does it for me.

As for Native Son and Vertigo...Native Son sounds like a demo I heard that KISS did before they were KISS. Yes that statement is sacrilege I realize, but that is exactly what it sounds like to me. I'm glad they developed that riff and made it Vertigo, a far better song....IMO.
 
First off, some of those songs were mislabeled. If you check the PDF, Edge says Levitate is from Pop and Flower Child is from HTDAAB.

After listening to the unreleased tracks a lot, my opinion is that the only wrong choice they made is with Yahweh. I find the unreleased version to be much stronger. I love the album version too, but I think the unreleased version is even better.

Xanax and Wine is a close call. It's a good, solid rock track. Ultimately though, I find Fast Cars to be more interesting. Fast Cars has a unique quality that really "makes" the song. Xanax and Wine was a more complex song, but I think the more simplified nature of Fast Cars with the flamenco-style guitar really made it come alive.

Had Flower Child actually been from the ATYCLB session, I agree that it NEEDED to be on the album. It along would have made ATYCLB a much better album, in my opinion. However, since it's actually from the HTDAAB session, my opinion is a little different. It's great, but I'm not sure it's quite on par with the other HTDAAB tracks. With that said, I hope they keep working on it for the next album. It drags in a few places, but it has huge potential.

I like Smile, and it has some incredible moments, but I don't think it's quite strong enough overall to have made it on the album. This is another one that I hope they keep working on and consider for the next album.

Love You Like Mad really should have been on ATYCLB. It also needs some work, but they should have put in the time during that recording session. My guess would be that they dropped it because it didn't fit with the ATYCLB style. It's definitely more suiting for HTDAAB.

I feel the same way about Levitate as I do Smile. While listening, there are moments when I can't imagine how it didn't make Pop, but other moments where I realize it needed some work.

As for Native Son and the alternate versions of ABOY and SYCMIOYO, I'd say they made the right choice. Native Son is a good song, and I like the lyrics, but Vertigo is much more powerful. In fact, I find the same true about the other two as well. I can see why they weren't quite happy with these tracks.

So, all in all, I think they primarily made the right choice. I don't think any of these songs are dead yet though (aside from the ones that were already re-worked and released, obviously). They all have great potential, and I hope at some point, they revisit them.

One thing I love about all of the unreleased tracks is that they're not over-produced at all. U2 are always seeking perfection with each song, which is great, but sometimes I feel that leads them to over-production. Ah well, bootlegs will solve that problem in a few months ;)
 
I love Mercy and agree that I would have liked to see it make the album. I would even have liked to see Are you Gonna Wait Forever make it as well. However, if you think about it from a business point of view, it makes sense. Leak them early and get people like us talking about them - wanting them - loving them. Put them out on singles as b-sides or iTunes and you are selling more product to people who would have already bought the album and might not have otherwise purchased the singles. It makes the singles a more marketable product with great b-sides to back them up. They also become great sells on iTunes because they aren't on the purchased album.

I hate to think of things like this, as I value artistic integrity over business. But hey... that's life. And it might be a matter of maximizing profit. Let's face it... they are pulling out all the stops with this release in terms of marketing strategy, etc.
 
while I haven't heard Native Son, from reading the lyrics it seems that it wouldn't really lyrically fit on HTDAAB as seamlessly as Vertigo does
 
korczykp said:
while I haven't heard Native Son, from reading the lyrics it seems that it wouldn't really lyrically fit on HTDAAB as seamlessly as Vertigo does

But then put X&W on the album and viola they begin to fit.

I like how a lot of criticism on here is met with "What are you complaining about the band at least did something."
 
I'm torn between X&W/Fast Cars and the two versions of Yahweh.

I like all four songs.

I think that some elements of the Chris Thomas version of ABOY and Native Son more interesting and rocking than the final versions of said songs, but overall the final versions are far superior.

The early version of Sometimes is really boring, and the rest make great b-sides, but none of them (except maybe Flower Child) would make great album tracks, IMHO.

Cheers
 
Having heard Fast cars (in the vein of Big girls are best: a fun song, but really a B-side, not album material) and Mercy (b-side too, with more work needed IMO), they were right not to put them on the album.
 
I LOVE Flowerchild, love you like mad, smile, xanax and wine, native son, and levitate. Put them all on one CD and you've got a brilliantly sloppy EP.

But never replace wild honey with flowerchild. The album's big enough to have both. Get rid of peace on earth and grace and you've got a great album.
 
biff said:
How is that? You have all the songs anyway. They've made them all available, so how are you being shafted?

think in so many fans that don´t have internet and have never listened Mercy nor Fast Cars :sad:

Mercy is far, I mean, FAR BETTER than A Man And A Woman or One Step Closer :yes:

:wave:
 
shart1780 said:
OK I respect these guys and their understanding of the music indrustry but lately I've been seriously questioning their intelligence on a certain issue.

Mercy should be on HTDAAB. Period. I'm tired of this "but the album would be too long!!!" baloney. More great songs never hurts an album. Period. There's no rules stating an album can be no longer than an hour.

Xanax and Wine is better than Fast Cars. If it had a little more production it could have been one of the best songs on the album. What were these guys smoking? Taking a mind-blowing song and turning it into a b-side? It's crazy. Fast Cars is good but nowhere near as good as Xanax and Wine could have been.

Smile is a completely beautiful song. The melody is just tearjerking to me. Everything in this song is awesome. The lyrics, the vocals, the music. It makes me angry that they left this out. It would have been one of my favorite songs on the album.

Love You Like Mad is also a completely awesome. It deserved to be on the album. It's catchy, it's sexy, it's just plain cool. Better than a few songs on HTDAAB IMO.

Flower Child should have been on ATYCLB in the place of Wild Honey. We can all agree on this. I like this song A LOT.

Levitate is beautiful and should have been on ATYCLB as well.


Over the last couple of days this has really been getting to me. I know I should be glad to even HAVE these early demos but I just feel like U2 can be somewhat foolish at times. Why do they think their albums need to be 11 songs only? It's silly. As long as the album is full of good songs it will be a good album. You can not have too many good songs.

I also question them for taking completely spectacular songs and turning them into something much worse (Xanax and Wine, Flower Child). Why do they do this?

The bottom line is U2 has the potential to release better albums and they don't. If Levitate and Flower Child were on ATYCLB it would have been a better album. If Xanax and Wine, Smile, Mercy and Love You Like Mad were on HTDAAB it would be a better album as well. They have almost finnished songs collecting dust in their studios that are BETTER than what's being sold.

where are all these songs??


I kind of feel like I'm getting the shaft in a way.
 
I would feel shafted if these sub par songs made it on an album.

Mercy is a great song and all, but it's flat, sounds too much like Echo and The Bunnymen and all and doesn't even fit with the theme of HTDAAB.
 
david said:
I would feel shafted if these sub par songs made it on an album.

Mercy is a great song and all, but it's flat, sounds too much like Echo and The Bunnymen and all and doesn't even fit with the theme of HTDAAB.

I kind of agree and Mercy is my favorite of all the unreleased tracks.
You can tell that there might be a really powerful song somewhere in there but that they didn't find it--yet.
I'm reminded of Luminous Times. A few really powerful moments still in search of a great song.
 
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