Songs of Experience 36 - Now with 20% fewer acronyms

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Just a call out to Cori - Do you still need the mp3s sent to you?? Let me know as soon as you can, and i can get em to you!
 
Listened to the album at midnight for the first time last night and listened to it twice today. Songs that I wasn't sure about at first like "love is bigger" and "lights of home" are growing on me. I would say songs that I find as excellent at the moment are "13," "Little Things," "Red Flag Day" "Blackout" and "Summer of Love." I can't remember a U2 album in the past 20 years (including POP) that has such a great sequence of songs like this album has from tracks 6-13. Even a more 'light' song like The Showman doesn't take away from that stretch as it's just a solid pop song.

I can definitely connect or relate to this album more than any U2 album in a long time too. I think ATYCLB had that type of power and this album is a step above that album since it delivers from beginning to end despite some minor speed bumps like "best thing" and "american soul"

Great to be a U2 fan right now....I honestly didn't think they had it in them after hearing the officially released songs.
 
Just a call out to Cori - Do you still need the mp3s sent to you?? Let me know as soon as you can, and i can get em to you!

Hiya! Sure, I'll happily take them for my iPod. Will blast through Spotify on my TV today as well. Thanks!
 
Book of Your Heart and Lights of Home (strings) absolutely crush the two deluxe tracks from Songs of Innocence. Outstanding tracks.
 
Say what you will about a few questionable lyrics and the re-use of the guitar riff but American Soul really rocks. The transition from Kendrick at the beginning to the hands in the air towards the end has me rocking the whole time. My wife’s first listen and she didn’t get to Summer of Love cause she had to go back and listen lol.
 
Pretty happy with this album so far. Some duds, but what I def like:

Love is All We have Left
Lights of Home
American Soul
Summer of Love
Red Flag Day
The Showman
Landlady
The Blackout
13

Could take or leave:
GOOYOW
The Little Things
Love is Bigger

Trash that should be left off the album:
You're the Best Thing...
 
so i haven't really posted my thoughts yet, since i've been trying to avoid hyperbole and the Shiny New Sticker Syndrome, but here it is:

this may very well be my favorite album this century by U2. ask me again in a few months if it's better than Atomic Bomb or All That You Can't Leave Behind, but it's definitely better than No Line and Songs of Innocence to my ears.

The lowest points in the album for me are pretty easily Get Out Of Your Own Way and American Soul. They do fit in thematically, and they're better album tracks than singles. Once again, it appears U2 messed up the singles.

Love is All We Have Left is pretty wonderful. The autotune verse and then the "two Bonos" singing simultaneously is pretty awesome. I've seen a bunch of posts wishing the songs would go on a bit more (Landlandy in particular), but this is one that I'm glad just ends.

Lights of Home is excellent. Either version is excellent, but I prefer the rock version. Others have already talked about the song's excellence, but one lyrical twist that I really enjoy is throughout the entire first two verses, Bono always comes back to "I can see the lights in front of me," *except* when he sees the statue of a gold guitar (gold calf), then it's bright lights/idol. Minor twist, but it shows that the guitar/calf is not the lights of home/heaven. the Iris callback works wonderfully.

I may be in the minority here, but I really enjoy Best Thing. thematically, it fits nicely after the emotional Lights of Home/near death experience. i guess you could say Bono freeing himself is kicking back and enjoying life a bit, and who better to help him do that than Ali? That said, I find the melodies to be excellent and the lyrics don't bother me as much as most of you here. Edge's bridge is wonderful.

Get out of Your Own Way is alright. I like Edge's part, but wish it had more to breathe. It's a bit sing-songy, but given who it's written to, it makes sense.

American Soul is my least favorite. It's ok. I get what they're trying to do. If you want to say Trump "ruined" or lessened SOE, then this is pretty much the only song you can turn to. Edge's "brother John" verse is cool. I don't really have much else to say here.

Summer of Love is refreshingly excellent. It's got a vibe and a groove that you seldom hear in U2 songs and it just slinks along -- in the best possible way. The strings during the final part of the song are A+.

Red Flag Day is contender for one of my favorites on the album. Great energy, great music, solid vocal, catchy chorus. I can see why people may compare it to songs on War. Musically it's more similar to Two Hearts than anything else on War.

The Showman grew on me a lot over the past week. My initial reaction was eh. But it's pretty pleasant, fun, and has a catchy melody. Hopefully they'll have some fun with this live.

Little Things is one of the best things U2 have done. I'm very happy with the finished product. It's fleshed out from how they played it on JT, but it's not over the top. It better captures the urgency of the song. I like that they cut the first chorus down -- it allows for a better buildup later.

Landlady is very nice. The last moments of the song (Every wave that broke me...) are A+. It's a well-written song with a very nice melody and the music is allowed to breathe. The interlude between the chorus on that last part of the song is minor in the grand scheme of things, but I love it.

I've already spoken about the Blackout previously, but it's really good. Looking forward to hearing it live.

Love is Bigger Than Anything in Its Way has not hit me yet. It's fine. It's just sort of there for me right now. The bridge is wonderful with the chorus of voices, but the verse and chorus have not resonated here yet. Maybe it will some day.

13 is one of my favorites. Song for Someone's chorus works great here. It's restrained, it's heartfelt and it bookends this entire era perfectly. The whole Songs of Innocence / i+e tour theme basically revolved around Iris, her death and how it's been the driving force of Bono's life. To end this era (and maybe more?) with this song seems fitting.

I am pleasantly surprised and thrilled with this album. It's all I could ask for at this stage, really, and as of now, 12/1/17, it exceeded my expectations.

for the record too, my girlfriend is 26 years old. prior to dating me (~2 years ago), she didn't know anything about U2 except that she hated them for spamming her phone. she said she didn't know any U2 songs etc. She's come around and does enjoy them (she knew songs, just didn't realize U2 did them), and she loves Joshua Tree and various bits of other albums, but adores this album.

I give this album three clicks and two clacks.
 
Ok, so i know all of you have been waiting on the edge of your seat to hear more from me. :wink:

So I just wanted to give a little update on this special release day...

After a full week of pretty intense listening, a couple things have come up.
One, it doesn't seem to be growing old, and also, my initial feelings seem to be holding up, not increasing or decreasing much.

The biggest change was, that after a week of almost always skipping over The Best Thing/Get Out and Am Soul, it kind of hit me out the blue today. I let them play and oddly, the Best Thing/Get Out combo became sort of new highlight for me.
These are damn good songs. Not up in my top tier, but really good. And if this album would have just all dropped like SOI, I think that these two would be getting a FAR different reception than they are now.

American Soul is still not one that I dont want to go back to. I listen once in a while, but its just not my thing, even though, i can recognize a lot of good about it.

Lights of Home has actually become one that I just love to listen through. One that I kind of get lost in. It feels natural and flows well. still gets knocked down slightly with the choral section on the end. So instead of a 9, more like an 8.5.

The big 6 for me

Love is All
Summer of Love
Red Flag
Little Things
Landlady - (made me cry on the way to work this morning)
13 (made me cry on the way home from work yesterday)

Just stay tremendous for me. Loving them.

Blackout is the blackout. A really good song that is an inch or two from being great.

The Showman. Oh the Showman. Why are you on this album Showman??!! What a nice bonus song you would have made. changing it to fall in between Summer of love and Red Flag helps a lot. Showman into Little Things was bizarre.

Also, Put Blackout between Red Flag and Landlady. So much better.


All in all, still such a strong album for me. I revise my initial "possible best since AB" to Best since POP. And SOI is second best since POP. So they have a great pair of albums here.
 
My initial thoughts:

This is so much more textured and elegant than I ever thought it would be – atmospheric in one word I suppose. I wasn't really expecting this but I suppose that’s the culmination of successive albums in the last 20 years that have sounded quite bare and all over the place production wise.

On first listens a few highlights

Summer of Love is beautiful. On first listen this was the song that stood out most. That twiddly little guitar melody by The Edge is perfect. It’s a lovely little song that is a lovely tribute to that small part of beauty of Aleppo in amongst the death and destruction of that part of the world.

Landlady has a chorus that Paul McCartney would kill for. It soars in a manner not too dissimilar to Macca's Wanderlust and other great beautiful tunes by him. I just love how Bono lifts this song all by himself - lovely, heartfelt melody.

Red Flag Day is stupendous and it seems like the first song in ages where all 4 members are firing on all cylinders. I didn't think they had it in them to create an energising and great pop/rock song again but this proved me wrong.

It must be a very good album to make me think deeply about his thoughts on this. The first song surprised me quite a bit. We’ve become attuned to expecting a gut busting howl by Bono and the rest of the band when we hit play on a new U2 album but this was the complete opposite. His voice sounds aged and fragile but it isn’t weak. It’s the first time where he has sounded wise in his increasing years and the lyrical content shows this. There’s definitely a sense of mortality/death throughout as corianderstem put so well in her review and death of innocence that crops up in Little Things and 13. I think seeing his children grow up, has really had an impact. I get the idea that he transferred his innocence to them and now they’ve lost or are losing that, he’s truly seen the last of that preciousness that was up until recently an ever-present facet of his life. 13 is a phenomenal closer. The album kind of finishes where it started – in the dark and alone. There’s a point about 1.50 around the bit where he sings ‘and all you’ve got is grieving’ and then wanders off ‘la da da da’ with the gentle piano that I found heart aching. It’s got flashes of that Irish/Scottish lament about it – deep melancholy, lonely and spiritual at the same time. This might just be the album’s crowning moment for me. I really think this is the best Bono has sounded in voice and lyrics in a long long time.
 
thoughts on the Special Apple film in the itunes store? I love some of the musical snippets, especially the one @ 7:13 where is that from?
 
My initial thoughts:

This is so much more textured and elegant than I ever thought it would be – atmospheric in one word I suppose. I wasn't really expecting this but I suppose that’s the culmination of successive albums in the last 20 years that have sounded quite bare and all over the place production wise.

On first listens a few highlights

Summer of Love is beautiful. On first listen this was the song that stood out most. That twiddly little guitar melody by The Edge is perfect. It’s a lovely little song that is a lovely tribute to that small part of beauty of Aleppo in amongst the death and destruction of that part of the world.

Landlady has a chorus that Paul McCartney would kill for. It soars in a manner not too dissimilar to Macca's Wanderlust and other great beautiful tunes by him. I just love how Bono lifts this song all by himself - lovely, heartfelt melody.

Red Flag Day is stupendous and it seems like the first song in ages where all 4 members are firing on all cylinders. I didn't think they had it in them to create an energising and great pop/rock song again but this proved me wrong.

It must be a very good album to make me think deeply about his thoughts on this. The first song surprised me quite a bit. We’ve become attuned to expecting a gut busting howl by Bono and the rest of the band when we hit play on a new U2 album but this was the complete opposite. His voice sounds aged and fragile but it isn’t weak. It’s the first time where he has sounded wise in his increasing years and the lyrical content shows this. There’s definitely a sense of mortality/death throughout as corianderstem put so well in her review and death of innocence that crops up in Little Things and 13. I think seeing his children grow up, has really had an impact. I get the idea that he transferred his innocence to them and now they’ve lost or are losing that, he’s truly seen the last of that preciousness that was up until recently an ever-present facet of his life. 13 is a phenomenal closer. The album kind of finishes where it started – in the dark and alone. There’s a point about 1.50 around the bit where he sings ‘and all you’ve got is grieving’ and then wanders off ‘la da da da’ with the gentle piano that I found heart aching. It’s got flashes of that Irish/Scottish lament about it – deep melancholy, lonely and spiritual at the same time. This might just be the album’s crowning moment for me. I really think this is the best Bono has sounded in voice and lyrics in a long long time.

Well said :applaud:
 
sorry guys, i still don't have the proper album with liner notes.

Can someone please take a look and see who the male background vocalist is on 13??
Comes in at the 3:40 mark.

thanks
 
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