lazarus
Blue Crack Supplier
The track order is almost secondary because by that point people have bought the album. Unless you're talking about people who sample the beginning of each song on a music store listening station. As for the Discotheque video, they could have survived that--look how bizarre The Fly was compared to what came before it. The album DID debut at #1 with very impressive up-front numbers. Longevity was the problem.
The most impact you have on an album's sales is probably the singles you release. I've argued before that SATS is not powerful enough of a ballad to have been released as the second single (even One was released third, after Mysterious Ways). The goal should have been to get the attention of people who had dismissed it as a techno record, something Discotheque probably failed to do (as rocking as it is). Especially in the U.S. What better way to do this than release a rock song? Last Night on Earth, as mentioned above, is one of the more accessible songs on the record, and still has enough modern touches that it doesn't mislead one about the album's true stylings.
The other problem would have been LNOE's video, which was a little too in-jokey for most people's tastes. Yeah, it's cool that they got William S. Burroughs to appear, but it's a small payoff for a video that's just too concept heavy. It's like a Beastie Boys video with too-subtle humor.
If they had shot a video with the band "on the street" witnessing the decadence or lost souls found there, it could have been a really cool promo (think Bono's solo vid for the Marvin Gaye cover Save the Children).
Staring at the Sun may have been a successful third single, once you had people's attention. It could have come out in mid to late summer. And then instead of releasing Please, which is WAY too complex of a song for a single, I would have put out Gone, maybe with a video featuring live footage.
Then it's the holidays, and maybe IGWSHA has success this time around like it was meant to.
laz
The most impact you have on an album's sales is probably the singles you release. I've argued before that SATS is not powerful enough of a ballad to have been released as the second single (even One was released third, after Mysterious Ways). The goal should have been to get the attention of people who had dismissed it as a techno record, something Discotheque probably failed to do (as rocking as it is). Especially in the U.S. What better way to do this than release a rock song? Last Night on Earth, as mentioned above, is one of the more accessible songs on the record, and still has enough modern touches that it doesn't mislead one about the album's true stylings.
The other problem would have been LNOE's video, which was a little too in-jokey for most people's tastes. Yeah, it's cool that they got William S. Burroughs to appear, but it's a small payoff for a video that's just too concept heavy. It's like a Beastie Boys video with too-subtle humor.
If they had shot a video with the band "on the street" witnessing the decadence or lost souls found there, it could have been a really cool promo (think Bono's solo vid for the Marvin Gaye cover Save the Children).
Staring at the Sun may have been a successful third single, once you had people's attention. It could have come out in mid to late summer. And then instead of releasing Please, which is WAY too complex of a song for a single, I would have put out Gone, maybe with a video featuring live footage.
Then it's the holidays, and maybe IGWSHA has success this time around like it was meant to.
laz
So let's see, they're allowed to bring it up and anyone who disagrees with them is bad. But if I start a negative thread and get jumped on, what do I hear? 'what did you expect'? well that's what I'm saying here! Hard to believe after all this time only ONE person understands what I mean. 
. You're right about the songs having a lot to take in-I remember when I first heard this album, some of the songs grabbed me right away, and others, I certainly didn't hate them, but it took a couple of listens for me to get used to them, just 'cause the music was a little different and everything. But once I got used to them...
), I think that Pop is a very good album, but not up to typical U2 standards. Most of the songs are great (except Miami and Playboy Mansion do not do much for me) but it is the tracklisting that bothers me. The three heavy dance songs are in a row, the three more typical rock songs are in a row and most of the more downbeat songs are in a row. This makes the album much more exhausting than it should be. However, mixing the songs up and changing the tracklisting only makes things worse as it will be jarring going from a dance song to a rock song and back again. Basically I feel like U2 wanted to make an all-out dance/techno/electronic album and chickened out and threw in some typical U2 anthems. In the end, most of the songs are great but the album is deeply flawed. As a result, I don't think it is anywhere near OK Computer which flows beautifully from start to finish.
.
