boystupidboy said:
So whats the verdict then?? Looks like u2 could quite easily cope without the 2 'tempo kings' in the background
"It is fair to say that Bono writes most of U2's lyrics, but he does not write them all. Edge has come up with more of U2's signature riffs than any of the other three, but the other three have all written plenty.
I've watched U2 compose and record. What surprised me was how they
switched roles depending on who was feeling inspired. Listening to a playback,
Larry came up with an idea for a new melody and sang it to Bono, who tried it on the track. When Bono left for the night, Edge took over writing lyrics. When Larry left the room, Edge sat down behind the drums and put down a beat for a demo.
Adam picked up Edge's guitar and suggested some chords. The four members of U2 have been a band since they were schoolboys; they taught each other to write and play. It is almost impossible for an outsider to tell where one leaves off and the next begins. The songs truly come from all four of them."--Bill Flanagan
"It is really striking how much of the U2 sound frequently credited to Edge alone depends on Adam and Larry. Adam often plays with the swollen, vibrating bottom sound of a Jamaican dub bassist, covering the most sonic space with the smallest number of notes. Larry, who taught himself to drum and consequently got some things technically wrong, plays with a martial rigidity but uses his kit in a way a properly trained drummer would not. He has tom-toms on either side of him, and has a habit of coming off the snare onto them that is contrary to how most percussionists use those drums. We're not talking about huge technical innovations here; we're talking about personal idiosyncraises that have over fifteen years solidified into a big part of what makes U2 always sound like U2, no matter what style of music they are playing.
It is also why bands that imitate U2 never get it right, and why all guitarists who try to play like Edge end up sounding so lame; their rhythm section never sounds like Adam and Larry. The great joke is that Adam's and Larry's playing so perfectly reflects their personalities. Larry is right on top of the beat, a bit ahead--as you'd expect from a man who's so ordered and punctual in his life. Adam plays a little behind the beat, waiting till the last moment to slip in, which fits with Adam's casual, don't-sweat-it personality. The great bassists and composer Charles Mingus said that musicians should not think of the beat as a dot that has to be landed on precisely, but as a circle in which one has to land somewhere. Adam and Larry, who have learned their instruments together since they were schoolboys, are working illustrations of Mingus' point. They've played together so long that they seem to spread the beat out between them. And they create a blanket on which Edge's chord layers rest."
--Bill Flanagan
If you only hear Bono and Edge in a U2 song, you're not fully listening to a U2 song.
Sunday Bloody Sunday without the drums wouldn't have the same effect.
With or Without you without the bass sounds really really flat, I know because I've heard a remix of WOWY, with a barely audible different bass line, and a complete different drum pattern.
Song felt gutted.
Go ahead, make a poll, see how many U2 fans prefer the acoustic arrangement of just Bono and Edge performing "Stay" or the full band version.
Does "Sunday Bloody Sunday", on Popmart, have the same impact without the military band like drums, or the sliding bass lines Adam puts in during the chorus.
At times in U2 songs, Adam bass lines almost sound like the words Bono's singing.
Maybe with other bands you have a point, but U2 somewhere along the way, made it so all 4 are needed to make the "U2 sound," so you couldn't replace the rhythm section.
Some drummers clutter up a song, imagine a bass player who wanted to play circles around Edge?
) Each member brings ideas and each member can put a veto on an idea if it's too "out there". It's not like the rhythm section simply is under control of the Great All-Powerfull All-Knowning Commander General Mr. The Edge.
are you being serious?
