Why is PopMart dissed?

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Visiongfx

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I don't know if this has been posted anywhere before but I don't get why people are dissing the PopMart tour so much? When i first heard the Pop album i was amazed and fell in love with it instantly. Now I'm not a big long time fan or anything, i was born 3 days after Achtung Baby was released and i never really got into U2 until early this year and now i can't stop listening them. I see how some people growing up with the serious U2 through the 80's and early 90's could feel that PopMart was a laugh at us all, but to me its the biggest and best concert i've ever seen.. on dvd. I wish i reallly went to a U2 concert, and i even missed the Vertigo tour too. Maybe its because im young and grown up in a techno/hip hop world that Pop being more to the techno(ish) side would intrigue me more?

But what about the songs like Last Night on Earth, its one of my favorites on Pop and i see no sign of it being "rushed". Miami sounds as much experimental as Numb was but Miami was soo put down as U2's worst. But i do see the flaws in PopMart, the first show, rushed album, ect. But if this was planned a little better i see it being bigger or equally as big as ZooTV. Does anybody else agree with me or am i just alone on this all.... :huh:

Ok i'm done with the venting... sorry!
 
You can't know it with being rather new here – but, yes, it has been posted here a zillion times. There are people, who
- don't like the album, the album's name, the band's look & behaviout then, the tour concept and the setlists being too static e.g. under-rehearsed especially at the first leg(s) ...
- don't like the album that much, but love the tour being mindblowing
- like the album hailing it the last creative masterpiece, but don't like something of the rest quoted above ...
- praise the album & the tour

... a zillion times, as said before, I just think the album was fine, some of the tour's ideas were great, but overall it remains the problem that the tour concept meant U2 and their music being overshadowed by stage light & performance ideas. Technology & stage concept challenge o.k., but in the end it's the songs, that count . Don't let it ever happen again!
 
Yeah, but it's not their fault they weren't around for the previous discussions.

Someone might be nice enough to find one of the past threads and point the new members to it, since if they're not premium, they can't search on their own.
 
The POP album got rave reviews.. The tour and the tour press conference got some slagging from the press.

I guess it was hard for a lot of people to see the earnest U2 dressed up like the Village People in videos and being transpored to the stage in gigantic lemons??

But where were these people when U2 destroyed that image during the ZooTV era?

It kind of makes me wonder too.

People just didn't get it.

But it's been 10 years so don't wrap your head around it too much.
 
all of U2s output in the nineties were years ahead of 98% of other musically output at the same time. many people just were not ready for stuff like this.
and many, inclusive some of U2, say and think POP wasn't ready at the time of the release. i don't think so at all. its good as it is.
i much more prefer the challenging (90s) U2 as the safe (post 2000) U2. my wishful thinking is to bring on another challenging album for the next release.
 
I think the tour was a big fucking waste of money, but most people here are mad for it. I have no problem with that, I still think Pop's a good album.

Different strokes for different lads, I suppose?
 
jacobus said:
all of U2s output in the nineties were years ahead of 98% of other musically output at the same time. many people just were not ready for stuff like this.
and many, inclusive some of U2, say and think POP wasn't ready at the time of the release. i don't think so at all. its good as it is.
i much more prefer the challenging (90s) U2 as the safe (post 2000) U2. my wishful thinking is to bring on another challenging album for the next release.
Click to expand...

:up:
 
Visiongfx said:
I don't know if this has been posted anywhere before but I don't get why people are dissing the PopMart tour so much? When i first heard the Pop album i was amazed and fell in love with it instantly. Now I'm not a big long time fan or anything, i was born 3 days after Achtung Baby was released and i never really got into U2 until early this year and now i can't stop listening them. I see how some people growing up with the serious U2 through the 80's and early 90's could feel that PopMart was a laugh at us all, but to me its the biggest and best concert i've ever seen.. on dvd. I wish i reallly went to a U2 concert, and i even missed the Vertigo tour too. Maybe its because im young and grown up in a techno/hip hop world that Pop being more to the techno(ish) side would intrigue me more?

But what about the songs like Last Night on Earth, its one of my favorites on Pop and i see no sign of it being "rushed". Miami sounds as much experimental as Numb was but Miami was soo put down as U2's worst. But i do see the flaws in PopMart, the first show, rushed album, ect. But if this was planned a little better i see it being bigger or equally as big as ZooTV. Does anybody else agree with me or am i just alone on this all.... :huh:

Ok i'm done with the venting... sorry!
Click to expand...

It's really kinda simple I think. It doesn't really have much to do with the production of the album or the tour, or the fact the first show went poorly or the over-the-top-ness of it all. U2's always been good at writing radio hooks and for an album titled "Pop" they decided, maybe ironically, not to write those hooks and went instead for, as you mention, intensity. So, the rock and roll lovers among the fan base panned it, and the art lovers in the fan base revered it.

But with the bands development and fame gained with such rock classics as New Years Day, Streets, Mysterious Ways and One it was no surprise it wasn't very well received at the time of it's release in the US when there never was that big radio song.

Plus, tickets were ludicrisly expensive. IIRC, a Pearl Jam or Green Day ticket was like $50. Popmart tickets were upwards of $100. For a college kid anyway, that's a lot of beer money just to hear Staring At The Sun on an acoustic guitar.
 
coolian2 said:
You're wasting your time.

None of us here like Pop, tbh we think U2 90's sucks
Click to expand...

Especially Achtung Baby.

There is this one dude named Axver who loves it though...he's pretty cool, but his musical taste is suspect. :tsk:
 
corianderstem said:
Yeah, but it's not their fault they weren't around for the previous discussions.

Someone might be nice enough to find one of the past threads and point the new members to it, since if they're not premium, they can't search on their own.
Click to expand...


Exactly :up:
 
Its hard to believe Pop was released in early March and the tour started in late April. I think thats bad for any band, especially U2 who had a huge world tour. MTV & VH1 were hyping up the Popmart tour. I was at the Vegas show and when they kicked into Mofo the crowd was :| The album had a strong buzz when it was released. It was #1 and people were into it. But the negative 1st leg reviews really hurt U2 and the Pop album. The press were on them.

If Pop came out in the fall of '96 w/ Discotheque, SATS, & Gone(maybe LNOE) as the first 3 singles. U2 would have had rehearsal time & the Pop album would have had some longevity.

There was a review of a 2nd leg Popmart show that praised the Popmart and how that one paticular show was the best U2 show ever. In my opinion the 1st leg was just one big rehearsal. The 2nd leg was the true beginning of the Popmart. U2 wanted the Popmart to top ZooTV (technology, visual,effects) and emotional. And by the time the tour ended, they succeded. :)
 
zoopop said:
In my opinion the 1st leg was just one big rehearsal. The 2nd leg was the true beginning of the Popmart. U2 wanted the Popmart to top ZooTV (technology, visual,effects) and emotional. And by the time the tour ended, they succeded. :)
Click to expand...

In my opinion the tour never took off, the way it should. On the 2nd leg, you are talking about, every night you had the same setlist, the same routine. The spectacular shows were those, where other circumstances brought the thrill. Take Mannheim (Germany), where heavy weather destroyed everything, Edge wanted to get through the ampifiers, leading to unique song versions of UTEOTW, NYD & others. take Sarajewo, where u2 played for the first time in Europe's sadly long forgotten cemetery at that time in front of army soldiers, far travelling fans and the people of Sarajewo on the road back to "normal life". The 3rd leg with less than 20 shows in the US, nit sold out, was a disaster. And the 4th leg showed hints of what might had been. Intense moments, beautiful audiences and near to perfect setlists ...
 
Don't be sorry - you have to learn to take the sarcasm and nonsense posts of some people. You've generated some honest discussion. :)

I think coolian2 was being sarcastic, which you wouldn't have known, being new here. You have to ignore judiciously until you get the hang of some posters around here.
 
corianderstem said:
I think coolian2 was being sarcastic, which you wouldn't have known, being new here. You have to ignore judiciously until you get the hang of some posters around here.
Click to expand...

I don't even know sometimes :shrug:



Although that time i was being sarcastic on account of everyone loving Pop
 
it's not really dissed that badly though

after Zooropa and POP the general interest in U2 wasn't on an alltime high (whether that is U2's fault or the fault of the avarage music listener is a question I won't go into right here)
then when your first couple of shows are not that good either you get some backlash

quite understandable
 
My own theory as to why PopMart (and 'Pop', to a greater extent) were "dissed" after they came out is two things: (1) it was the season of hype in the mid- to late-90s in major label rock, and (2) the band were suddenly very unfashionable at a time when there was a plethora of other young guitar bands to choose from.

And yes, the disco balls, moustaches, and dorky videos hurt them too, but mainly with the American, middle-of-the-road casual fans only.

On point (1) above: I think Pop was the first U2 album to be released after the weight of huge expectation in the corporate tour era that was a bit disappointing. Achtung Baby could easily have suffered the fate of Pop, but it was SO good that no one could diss it. The Achtung/Zoo period is still the key longevity pivot in the band's history. The Zooropa record was just to accompany a tour and wasn't marketed or considered a 'major' album as such, nor did it have the weight of expectation on it after years of anticipation. Pop had all of that and more, and obviously the band blew it by having that big (and totally ignored) TV special to coincide with the album, rushing out the record, and performing weak shows to start the tour.

On point (2), 1996-1997 was a period when a host of guitar bands from the British Isles were making inroads into the guitar-type of fan in North America. Oasis, Blur, Radiohead, Verve, et al were a lot younger and appeared a lot more sincere and 'guitar-fan-friendly' at the time than did U2 dressed as the Village People. I think Pop was also U2's first real dalliance with the children of the 90s, and there's going to be an adjustment needed in order to appeal to a greying market of fans. PopMart wasn't really what that market wanted.
 
The only two issues I have with this era, and honestly it's not so much that I have issues with them but I can see where it went south;

1. the image, yes, the image killed them. U2 are good at making fun of themselves, but only when it's subtlely, the Disco video was embarassing.

2. As much as some don't want to face it, they were jumping on a bandwagon, and it was a bandwagon that just didn't last...

I love POP. I do. But I can totally see why people hate it. I think the funniest thing about those that love Pop and hate the 00's is they talk about how U2 is trying to embrace a younger crowd and how uncool their image is, when POP was probably the pinnacle of both of those.
 
It's dissed because they did poorly early in the tour and they didn't finish the album preceding it. Anyone who saw a Popmart show from the second leg on most likely likes the tour.
 
I don't understand either why people are dissing it, the Popmart tour is my fav, too. Possibly that's because it was recorded during my favorite period of the band, but still...the production and the musicianship was top notch.
 
I only have one thing to say: there were 150.000 people in Reggio Emilia in September 1997 so see PopMart. There was no dissing in Italy...
 
Maybe the mockery of american consumer society was another reason for dissing popmart in US.
 
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