OFFICIAL - U2.Com - New Album Out In 2009 Pt. 2

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that follows U2.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Status
Not open for further replies.

Sicy

Sizzlin' Sicilian
Staff member
Joined
Jan 15, 2001
Messages
71,088
Location
Bay Area, CA
Please continue discussing in this thread.

Previous thread:
http://forum.interference.com/f196/official-new-album-delayed-until-2009-a-189387.html

---------------------------

U2.com | Official News

'We want 2009 to be our year'

'We’ve hit a rich songwriting vein and we don’t want to stop.' Bono has been talking to U2.Com about how the songs are shaping up for the new record and plans for 2009 to be their year.


‘This is our chance for us to defy gravity once again, ‘ explains Bono, calling in from a break in recording sessions in the south of France. ‘ We have what it takes, we have the songs, new rhythms and a guitar player who is not ready to re-enter earth's atmosphere until he's taken a slice of the moon!
'It's been fun, it's been maddening... there have been injuries and recoveries, no babies born that I know of, but this one is nearly ready for the new year of 2009.'

The band have been writing and recording the follow-up to ‘How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb’ since last year, and the feeling is that they’ve hit a creative groove so there are no plans to stop. Everyone, he says, is excited about where the recording is taking them.

‘When we set out on this record it was Larry who came up with the plan not to have a plan. He put up this idea that wouldn’t it be great just to make music for its own sake, not for the purpose of a live show or on album but just to see what we’re capable of…’

It’s an idea that’s paid off. Following sessions in Morocco, in Dublin and through the summer in France, the band have written ‘fifty or sixty’ tracks. And counting.

‘We’ve hit a rich songwriting vein,’ he explains. ‘It gets a bit dark down here but looks like we've found diamonds not coal. I thought a while back we might have the album wrapped by now, but why come up above ground now if there's more priceless stuff to be found?

For now, they’re keeping a promise they made to themselves when they started writing: ‘We said to each other that if we got to the great place then we wouldn’t stop…’

So the writing and recording continues and while they now know what shape most of the album will take, they're not leaving the studio just yet.

‘We know we have to emerge soon but we also know that people don’t want another U2 album unless it is our best ever album. It has to be our most innovative, our most challenging … or what’s the point ?’

They have no doubts that it will be as important a release for U2 as any. ‘It’s a brand new chapter for us, and everyone we’ve played the tracks to has said that musically it feels like another departure.

‘The last two records were very personal, with a kind of three piece at their heart, the primary colours of rock - bass, guitars and drum. But what we’re about now is of the same order as the transition that took us from The Joshua Tree to Achtung Baby.’

He also mentions that the recording in Morocco was the first time the band have worked in a studio open to the sky: ‘On that track you can hear the sound of a swallows nest close to the building - it’s beautiful.’

Longtime collaborators Danny Lanois and Brian Eno have joined the band at different times, and, more recently, Steve Lillywhite – usually a tell-tale sign that a record is nearly done. ‘Steve has that ear for a top line melody and a good hook.’

But while Bono is itching to get the music out he says it’s going to be early 2009 when we first get to hear the songs.

‘I’m always the one who underestimates how easy it is to simply 'put out the songs now', if it was just up to me they’d be out already! But early next year people will be able to start hearing what we’ve been doing. We want 2009 to be our year, so we’re going to start making an impression very early on …’
 
I like this quote from Billboard:

One source who has heard several of the works-in-progress describes them to Billboard as "amazing and a little out there. I hope they don't change anything."
 
Let me say: If the album comes out in Jan09 or March09 or whatever, that would be awesome; break up the monotony of the Fall release/holiday cash in.
Plus, that time of year (Jan-March) sucks anyways, so it would be super cool to have the album then.

But...I can easily see this sliding back...and back...and then finally them just saying screw it, Nov09 it is. I sincerely hope not, but it's not an impossible thought. We were in the same boat in sept03, hoping for a Nov03 release....and we know what happened.


No on is picking up my point that if they're still writing, it could take months just to get one song recorded, much less a few more songs......hence, Jan09 is out of the question. Hell, I'm going on record saying right now that Jan09 is OUT.
March? Maybe. I hope so.
 
LOL.......yeah, why would Bono exaggerate anything?

He's never been known to do that. Ever.


:lmao:
 
I like this quote from Billboard:

One source who has heard several of the works-in-progress describes them to Billboard as "amazing and a little out there. I hope they don't change anything."

well, the beach clips, although really cool, were not "out there" by any means...

Maybe Bono didn't want to frighten the guests at Edge's birthday party, so he played the "normal" songs.

generally, a delayed release for an album is not good news, but i am hopeful it's for the better.
 
One thing that occured to me is that Bono has such a bizarre and indirect way of talking sometimes that when he says "you'll be able to hear the new songs in early 2009" or whatever, he might be referring to the tour, as opposed to the album. Who knows.

I don't think that's likely, but then again, going by the email he sent to Rolling Stone about the Boy reissue, sometimes he doesn't make a bit of damn sense when he's writing.
 
Why was nolineonthehorizon.com registered so early? Why was Nov. 18 leaked as a possible release date earlier this year? Too many fishy things about this. I can't help but think that something has gone drastically wrong . . . like the label hearing the songs for the first time and telling the band they they stunk, thus causing these unexpected delays. The story on U2.com was all PR, trying to put an overly positive spin on what must have been terrible news.

Just my 2 cents.
 
I like this quote from Billboard:

One source who has heard several of the works-in-progress describes them to Billboard as "amazing and a little out there. I hope they don't change anything."

I love how this supposedly finished album suddenly became a work-in-progress in, like, a day.
 
There has to be some other reason than just "were making so much good music that all of the sudden we feel the need to make 90 instead of 60 songs for an album". :doh: You guys can always keep jamming out.... if you really have 50 to 60 songs you cant choose enough out of that?! I smell bullshit.
 
furthermore, this seems eerily similar to what occurred in Sep of 1996 when Pop was on the verge of being released. It was pushed back to March 1997 and we all know what circumstances came to light after the fact once Pop was released. The record was widely perceived to be a dud, it was rushed, and was only released due to intense pressure from the label. Hope we're not seeing that same game played out here.
 
furthermore, this seems eerily similar to what occurred in Sep of 1996 when Pop was on the verge of being released. It was pushed back to March 1997 and we all know what circumstances came to light after the fact once Pop was released. The record was widely perceived to be a dud, it was rushed, and was only released due to intense pressure from the label. Hope we're not seeing that same game played out here.

I think we would've seen than scenario had they released the 2006 Rick Rubin sessions as an album.

As it is, it's been four fucking years. Just release the album already.
 
We all have Bono to thank for this delay...

... extra time is needed so that Bono can get his fat-arse into shape for the photo shoots and the tour. period.
 
like the label hearing the songs for the first time and telling the band they they stunk, thus causing these unexpected delays.


Seriously doubt it. U2 aren't exactly the band that label's push around like that... Now I'm saying that in a U2 are beyond that manner, I'm saying that in the aspect that when a label has U2 they cater so not to lose the artist, it would have to be completely out of left field for any label to step in. The songs we've heard so far are not the types of songs labels step in for...
 
I don't doubt that it'll be good.

I think they're either waiting for one or two songs to come to them that fit better into the mix, making it a more complete album, or they're toying with a double album . . .

dunh, dunh, dunh!

I do think Bono's statement is laced with PR though, but that doesn't make it complete B.S.
 
Am I the only one who is completely OK with them releasing the album only next year? I don't know, maybe it's because I mostly listen to "retired"/dead singers and separated bands, so I don't expect anything anyway... :lol: As long as I know the album will be out eventually...
But I understand why some of you are upset...
 
I do think Bono's statement is laced with PR though, but that doesn't make it complete B.S.

He's absolutely patronizing us, but hey, if he wants the album to be released in Q1 2008, who am I to complain? New Franz Ferdinand, Killers, and U2 in the same couple of months. :drool:
 
furthermore, this seems eerily similar to what occurred in Sep of 1996 when Pop was on the verge of being released. It was pushed back to March 1997 and we all know what circumstances came to light after the fact once Pop was released. The record was widely perceived to be a dud, it was rushed, and was only released due to intense pressure from the label. Hope we're not seeing that same game played out here.

god i HOPE that is what is happening. I would literally kill a walrus with a trombone to get another POP album

i say bring on the pushed back date. i want a Summery U2 album. No more christmastime releases!

I want a song about dumbbells and diving boards.
 
Seriously doubt it. U2 aren't exactly the band that label's push around like that... Now I'm saying that in a U2 are beyond that manner, I'm saying that in the aspect that when a label has U2 they cater so not to lose the artist, it would have to be completely out of left field for any label to step in. The songs we've heard so far are not the types of songs labels step in for...


I agree....label is in no position to boss U2 around.
And the 4 beach clips were promising material, not a bunch of junk.


No, this delay is definitely U2's decision.....why exactly is what is in speculation.
 
Well, I'm kind of bummed that the album release has been delayed, but I suppose all good things are worth waiting for. If the boys feel that the album isn't good-to-go just yet, than I'm sure I can give them the benefit of the doubt.

I guess the boys wanna end the 00's with a bang.
 
We all have Bono to thank for this delay...

... extra time is needed so that Bono can get his fat-arse into shape for the photo shoots and the tour. period.

I hope you're being sarcastic, because this statement is just dumb and childish.

Actually I believe Bono is the one who wanted this album out before Christmas.

There are other forces in the band that keep slowing things down. Obviously there is a disagreement, Edge said so.

Bono has a way with euphemisms, it's hard most of the time to figure out what he really tries to say, that's just the way he's expressing himself and i agree that it sometimes becomes too much. But wouldn't it be boring and dull if he just came out and said: Hey guys, we fucked up, we cannot agree because Larry (or whoever) is being a asshole about the new songs?
 
Seriously doubt it. U2 aren't exactly the band that label's push around like that... Now I'm saying that in a U2 are beyond that manner, I'm saying that in the aspect that when a label has U2 they cater so not to lose the artist, it would have to be completely out of left field for any label to step in. The songs we've heard so far are not the types of songs labels step in for...


The worst U2 album stinks of huge profit for the label. They do have complete freedom to do whatever they want. Their core fan base is one of the biggest. They set a high standard. Even if they lost label support they could go independent and their profit per album would skyrocket.

They are not satisfied yet. Whether it's an artistic or a marketability determination is irrelevant. These are both factors they have weighed for years when creating their product.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top Bottom