Still very early days and we all have the warm glow of a new album, with fresh songs we've never heard before. Time will tell if these songs have real staying power, however my feeling is that this album will have real staying power. Comparing it to previous albums below (SOE could be their best since AB.....)
When SOI was released, I was really positive about it and I still think it's a good album. However over time, the album has diminished and some of the songs I thought were really good have lost their lustre.
With NLOTH, I actually remember being a bit underwhelmed when it was first released, but the album grew on me over time. It has some absolute belters on it (Magnificent, Breathe, White as Snow, Ceders, No Line, MoS etc) but that album has a real low - Crazy Tonight, Unknown Caller and Boots - that really taint the album. This is probably the only U2 album out there where I actively DISlike songs, and it's those 3.
Bomb - I remember hearing COBL when it was released and thinking "this is a U2 classic!". Combined with Miracle Drug and SYCMIOYO (both if which I think are great songs) plus other good songs, it still stands up as a good, solid U2 album for me. It's not groundbreaking by any means, but I personally don't think it has any "bad" songs on it. It may have some bland songs, but there is still a decent melody in there.
ATYCLB - great album, that first 5/6 songs are great. Beautiful Day to In a Little While is a great opening sequence (although I prefer the live acoustic versions of Stuck In a Moment). The second half has more filler - Peace on Earth, WILATW, Grace. New York and TGBMF are excellent.
Pop - So uneven. I love how they were trying to be adventurous and it works some of the time. The songs just sound unfinished (we all know why). It is an underrated album, but would still be a mid ranking album in their catalogue for me.
Zooropa - Great album, some absolute gems on here. However as an album overall it's not quite there and that's partly due to it's experimental nature and the fact it was so quickly put together.
Achtung Baby - absolute monster of an album. Up there with The Joshua Tree in the top 2 U2 albums. Every song is great, the weakest being So Cruel and TTTYAATW but even they are good songs.
So...back to SOE. How does it hold up against all these albums? Again, it's very early days and I will have to live with this album for a few months before it starts to get ranked. However I have to say, this album seems to be their most consistently good since AB. The weaker songs seem better than the weaker songs on previous albums, and the best songs genuinely seem as good or better than many of their albums since AB.
Let's see if these songs truly hold up over the weeks and months ahead, but the early feeling is a great one.