SOE 22 - 2018 it is... (it isn't)

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Bono on Pop, 1997- This is the best record we've ever made! We like making wild, crazy music like this! This is the record we've waited 20 years to make!

Bono on Pop, 2002- Pop was unfinished... we needed more time to finish the record!

Bono on Pop, 2017- What an unfortunate little blemish that is on our legacy! Let us never speak of it again.

I still love Pop as much as I did the first day I bought it, aged 15, sitting up in my bedroom listening to it over and over as I read the liner notes, as well as my issue of POPAGANDA. I can't believe they have not acknowledged it's 20th anniversary even a little bit. Not even an honorable mention. They seriously want to pretend it never happened. It will always be a special record to me, I don't care what those aging Irish bastards say! :wink:
 
Bono on Pop, 1997- This is the best record we've ever made! We like making wild, crazy music like this! This is the record we've waited 20 years to make!

Bono on Pop, 2002- Pop was unfinished... we needed more time to finish the record!

Bono on Pop, 2017- What an unfortunate little blemish that is on our legacy! Let us never speak of it again.

I still love Pop as much as I did the first day I bought it, aged 15, sitting up in my bedroom listening to it over and over as I read the liner notes, as well as my issue of POPAGANDA. I can't believe they have not acknowledged it's 20th anniversary even a little bit. Not even an honorable mention. They seriously want to pretend it never happened. It will always be a special record to me, I don't care what those aging Irish bastards say! :wink:

I'm on board ;]
 
I think some of you forget that U2 are the artists, and not U2 fans. They don't listen to U2 music the same way you do, so they're not going to talk or think about it the way you do.

I think some of you are taking their self criticism the wrong way and far too personal.
 
and HTDAAB got remembered for one song rather than the album.

Ehh, the other songs were remembered enough that 3 of them in addition to Vertigo won specific Grammys. Yes, Bono said the whole of the album wasn't better than the sum of the parts of whatever but at least they stood by the songs themselves. And COBL is remembered warmly by fans and the band as it was being played regularly on I&E and 360.
 
Ehh, the other songs were remembered enough that 3 of them in addition to Vertigo won specific Grammys. Yes, Bono said the whole of the album wasn't better than the sum of the parts of whatever but at least they stood by the songs themselves. And COBL is remembered warmly by fans and the band as it was being played regularly on I&E and 360.



I agree. From an awards perspective; Vertigo, Sometimes and COBL were all big winners.

With that said, in my opinion the best way to judge a songs success is if it makes it into the next tour and subsequent for that matter and not as a "one off" and then how it is received by the fans live.

Vertigo- has been a regular on 3 post tours: 360, iE and JT and every tour it is received very well by the fans.

COBL- has been a regular on 360 and iE and received very well by the fans (I always found this as a so, so song but man it gets people going live to the point that I get swept up too!)

Now me personally...I would add Miracle Drug and Love and Peace to the list of awesome U2 songs from that album. I am a huge fan of that album!
 
I still love Pop as much as I did the first day I bought it, aged 15, sitting up in my bedroom listening to it over and over as I read the liner notes, as well as my issue of POPAGANDA. I can't believe they have not acknowledged it's 20th anniversary even a little bit. Not even an honorable mention. They seriously want to pretend it never happened. It will always be a special record to me, I don't care what those aging Irish bastards say! :wink:

Pop and Popmart are what got me into U2, so I am extremely fond of that era. I'm also bummed that they've seemingly dismissed it. It's a really special album, so maybe if they're still at it in 5 years, they'll come around and acknowledge it on its 25th birthday.

They could really take a cue from the sonic foundations they laid on Pop (and Zooropa... and by extension AB) to reinvigorate their sound these days. Hopefully, SoE will have a few nice nods to their 90s output, be well received, and rekindle some lovey dovey stuff towards Pop.
 
I get where you're coming from, but I sense a difference in how U2 post-Pop have treated their immediately previous work compared to how they did in their first couple of decades. Of course October always got some flak, and Edge wants another go at everything. I know that feeling, I've published a bunch of stuff and don't like to read over it because all I can see is how to improve it. But now it feels like the old album has to be talked of as something necessarily lesser than the new one - not just that the band have stepped up, that they can now realise their vision better or have honed their craft further, but that there was something "wrong" with what they did last.

It's one thing to see how you might make something better, it's another to suggest there was some deeper, even intrinsic, failing. And, to be honest, I think one big reason U2 have identified these failings is because of their quest for sales as a measure of relevance. Pop, NLOTH, and SOI didn't set global charts on fire
(here comes somebody with a list of how many countries they went #1; you know what I mean, it didn't meet U2's lofty expectations, benchmarked by, most recently, ATYCLB)
and HTDAAB got remembered for one song rather than the album. But THIS ONE WILL! IT REALLY WILL! Because it rights the wrongs of the last album and cracks that mystical formula for relevance! Except until it's the old album and they have to sell another record. Only ATYCLB seems exempt from criticism and proposed revision by the band, and that's because of how damn Relevant™ it was.

A few things I’d add to the ‘sales of previous album’ argument…

I wouldn’t doubt that they might use something like that to ‘sell’ the new album as opposed to the previous one. But for reasons I mentioned, I’m a bit hard-pressed to imagine that they don’t have their own qualms with ATYCLB either. Could there be less mentions of that in interviews? Sure, but I’m pretty certain that they have similar feelings regarding those albums too in one form or another. There might not be that many mentions in the press, but I’m sure they’re there too.

The problem with a band this big is that they do so many interviews and every little comment is going to be held onto a pedestal as the truth or overanalyzed. And for every comment they give supposedly ripping into the previous album, there’s probably a few others they’d give that praise it as well (which is also the nature of the beast when you write your own songs). Bono’s said just as much for praising NLOTH in the promo for SOI. And as others have mentioned, even albums that were successful had a few somewhat negative remarks said about them too. Bono’s one about the “sum of the parts” with HTDAAB happened when they were actually well into promoting that album. And I didn’t see the whole video interview last week, but I heard Bono said something about not being entirely happy with the lyric to Streets? If that’s the case, well, that goes to show you that those feelings can exist for those songs too.
 
U2 is pretty leak proof, aside from what is played out of random beach side windows. Anyone think we may hear anything before the official date?
 
Production but not the material...which is funny since it sounds by far the best (out of their output in the last 20 years).

eta : given their - read: Edge's - wishes, they'd remix/rerecord every album anyway...

Production or the songs themselves, they were still criticizing the album that they were touring that they released less than a year prior. Maybe they felt more freedom since they didn't feel pressure to "promote" it, but it's still notable.
 
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The band added a 4th show in Sao Paolo??

2018 it is.

At least we'll hopefully get some set list surprises. Or they'll just use their A and B sets twice.
 
Well they shot the last tour in Paris so that's not happening again. And I don't think it's happening in Amsterdam either. And I feel like we would have heard more rumbling from sources if there was a full-on concert shoot about to happen.

Also, the band doesn't need a multi-night stand to shoot something, either. The 360 Rose Bowl show was a single night, they just rehearsed with cameras in Vegas the night before.

My money is still on New Orleans or Phoenix.
 
Well they shot the last tour in Paris so that's not happening again. And I don't think it's happening in Amsterdam either. And I feel like we would have heard more rumbling from sources if there was a full-on concert shoot about to happen.

Also, the band doesn't need a multi-night stand to shoot something, either. The 360 Rose Bowl show was a single night, they just rehearsed with cameras in Vegas the night before.

My money is still on New Orleans or Phoenix.



So you think Amsterdam is a promo shoot for the next single?

I'm inclined to think that. It makes little sense for the concert video from this tour to be based in Europe. Phoenix is the most obvious.
 
My money is still on New Orleans or Phoenix.



Still plenty of seats left in the upper tiers on the sides. Lower tiers are more or less sold out it's just the two upper sides. Can't see them doing a DVD shoot in a stadium that isn't sold out
 
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