Another album soon?? Songs of Ascent

[Irishteen]

These are about the only possibilities, however, I would be very suprised if it wasn;t option 1.

2 - Eno has too many irons in too many fires to be able to tour with the band. I don't see him as a touring musician as much as Danny; at least not with U2.

3 - Eno wouldn't be producing b-sides.

4 - See above.

5 - Possibly, but the band wouldn't be required to oversee that. That's something Eno would do on his own, after recieving some direction, and then they would get together for a day or so and make sure it all works.

In the end, the only reason Eno would be there would be to work on new material. The others would seem a waste of his time and energy.

I think it is most likely the album but Eno might be producing b-sides if they are using a song he wrote with the band, seeing as it's still one sixth Eno's he might want some say in finishing it off...however I'd much rather a new album

u2's days of ruling the radio are pretty much done. when you have people like lady gaga and miley cyrus dominating the charts........the writing is pretty much on the wall.

Radio has always sucked, seriously it didn't just start going bad in the last few years it has always been that way. Sure we all think back on the 80s as a decade of great pop now, now that the majority of the bad music has been forgotten about it. It'll be the same in 20 years, the 2000s won't be remembered for crap like Sean Kingston or Flo-rida but the better pop music

 

[dan_smee]

^ so true Irishteen.

Maybe they are finishing Winter now, for whatever purpose it may serve in future?

I mean, they say its not done, and there has to be a reason it was left off. It sounds almost done, just need to fix up some transitions that feel too aprupt, like the song is changing from verse to chorus, because songs have verses and choruses, not because it is an organic progression in the song.

Honestly, all the talk of two albums, how many songs they've got, blah blah, McGuine$$ is the only one who has played down that recntly. It can't be a huge amount of work to knock it into decent shape. Perhaps they are finishing off the songs they have, and figure they will write a handful on the road and can commit them to record in the gaps.

 

[ahittle]

This will make an interesting career path. Let's say NLOTH doesn't catch fire and is generally received as weird or experimental by Joe Average Radio Listener. Songs of Ascent is supposed to be moodier, more subtle than NLOTH. This could set them up for another "comeback" or "return to form" record after this whole campaign is over. It could be like the third coming of U2 in 2015!

 

[BEAL]

They are probably finishing up songs leftover from the NLOTH sessions that Eno was directly involved with.

I would imagine with 2 months before tour, they would want to at least get a start on some new songs for the next album (if they do release another album within 12-14 months).

While they are in Europe, they will probably have better access to studio time, kind of like Zooropa. Once they reach the US, they won't be doing too much studio work until the winter break.

Crossing fingers this is for the next album, but I seriously doubt we'll hear anything official from the band or people close to the band.

They want NLOTH to sell. If the public knows U2 is going to come out with something new, they're probably less likely to buy this album, considering the reception has been average.....and I blame that on a real shit promotion job.

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

this album will sell well into the millions, but there is no hype over this album, largely because of the lack of a hit single to identify it by. boots flopped, magnificent looks to have peaked already and is starting to decline... i still say they need to release breathe and promote the bejebus out of it and the album will take off, but i don't even know if they want to do that.

of course none of this matters, as many of you are saying. of course many of you are the same who mock the rolling stones for not being relevant, which is always fun.

i don't think all that you can't leave behind even ever hit #1 in america, but it certainly was relevant at a time when, yes, radio sucked. beautiful day is still relevant.

a lot of you disliked bomb and vertigo, but yes... you still hear vertigo on the radio, on tv and in sports arenas and bars and etc. it's still relevant.

no line may be a better album, musically, than both of those previous efforts... but at least in america, culturally speaking it is still irrelevant.

i'm sure there are die hard stones fans who loved a bigger bang, too.

 

[buzzkill27]

I hear plenty of U2 on Sirius/XM satellite radio

 

[roy]

this album will sell well into the millions, but there is no hype over this album, largely because of the lack of a hit single to identify it by. boots flopped, magnificent looks to have peaked already and is starting to decline... i still say they need to release breathe and promote the bejebus out of it and the album will take off, but i don't even know if they want to do that.

of course none of this matters, as many of you are saying. of course many of you are the same who mock the rolling stones for not being relevant, which is always fun.

i don't think all that you can't leave behind even ever hit #1 in america, but it certainly was relevant at a time when, yes, radio sucked. beautiful day is still relevant.

a lot of you disliked bomb and vertigo, but yes... you still hear vertigo on the radio, on tv and in sports arenas and bars and etc. it's still relevant.

no line may be a better album, musically, than both of those previous efforts... but at least in america, culturally speaking it is still irrelevant.

i'm sure there are die hard stones fans who loved a bigger bang, too.

Isn't NLOTH the biggest selling album in 2009?

Was Bigger Bang so popular?

 

[U2girl]

If Magnificent can't do it (I don't know about US but it definitely gets more airplay than Boots on the radio here), Breathe certainy won't. At this point, get out Crazy Tonight asap and hope for the best IMO.

U2 won't get sales the likes of ATYCLB and Bomb anymore; partly because I doubt they'd get another monster single like BD and Vertigo, partly because they're getting older and CDs just don't sell as much as they used to.

 

[Muldfeld]

Radio has always sucked, seriously it didn't just start going bad in the last few years it has always been that way. Sure we all think back on the 80s as a decade of great pop now, now that the majority of the bad music has been forgotten about it. It'll be the same in 20 years, the 2000s won't be remembered for crap like Sean Kingston or Flo-rida but the better pop music

I think radio has had bad stuff, but I honestly think it HAS worsened. The tween purchasing power revolution changed things. I don't know that Miley Cyrus would have been as big a deal in the '80s.

U2 couldn't get "With Or Without You" played nowadays if it were a new song, I don't think. I could be wrong. I've been listening to some of The Beatles and Bono is completely wrong to think U2 is approximating the Beatles in creating easy singles. From what little I've seen much of The Beatles is too weird for current radio, if it were new. "I Am The Walrus" is way to strange for current charts.

 

[Irvine511]

it seems to be official. "boots" is the new "discotheque."

it only confirms the fact that the first single must whore the album. there's no way around that.

 

[Vlad n U 2]

This will make an interesting career path. Let's say NLOTH doesn't catch fire and is generally received as weird or experimental by Joe Average Radio Listener. Songs of Ascent is supposed to be moodier, more subtle than NLOTH. This could set them up for another "comeback" or "return to form" record after this whole campaign is over. It could be like the third coming of U2 in 2015!

I would actually expect the next album to be more experimental than NLOTH.

 

[Gonna Run 2 U]

No offense to anyone but I am getting tired of reading "experimental". Im going to refer to it now as "the E word".

 

[digitize]

it seems to be official. "boots" is the new "discotheque."

Never a bad thing. Disco and Boots are both awesome songs.

No offense to anyone but I am getting tired of reading "experimental". Im going to refer to it now as "the E word".

The problem is, so many people confuse "experimental" with "electronic weirdness", the word loses meaning. I personally wouldn't say that NLOTH is overly experimental in any sense, literally, sonically, but thematically... that's a different story. And that's what matters to me the most.

 

[Aygo]

Never a bad thing. Disco and Boots are both awesome songs.

The problem is, so many people confuse "experimental" with "electronic weirdness", the word loses meaning. I personally wouldn't say that NLOTH is overly experimental in any sense, literally, sonically, but thematically... that's a different story. And that's what matters to me the most.

Both are clichés born in the XXth century, after high culture got closer to the masses. Since then, with the HUGE help of the capitalist monster-machine, the masses have been developping the idea that "quality in arts" equals "avantgarde" and "experimental" (an idea specially approached since the 1980's in certain social environments in certain countries). Plus, in the popular music, it's been developped (wrongly too) the concept that "experimental" equals "more electronic or technically more advanced", due to the tireness of the industry and the lack of something REALLY new or groundbreaking. I think that some authors have already wrote about this.

 

[digitize]

Both are clichés born in the XXth century, after high culture got closer to the masses. Since then, with the HUGE help of the capitalist monster-machine, the masses have been developping the idea that "quality in arts" equals "avantgarde" and "experimental" (an idea specially approached since the 1980's in certain social environments in certain countries). Plus, in the popular music, it's been developped (wrongly too) the concept that "experimental" equals "more electronic or technically more advanced", due to the tireness of the industry and the lack of something REALLY new or groundbreaking. I think that some authors have already wrote about this.

Yeah, that's basically what I was thinking... it's annoying when Radiohead (who I like, but don't see as the be-all end-all of music, like many people), who have been following a very similar format for many years now, are seen as the absolutely epitome of "experimentalism". But what do you do? I just listen to U2 and thank God every day that such a band exists.

 

[ZOOTVTOURist]

it seems to be official. "boots" is the new "discotheque."

it only confirms the fact that the first single must whore the album. there's no way around that.

No, it is not. Unfortunately, because "Boots" (which I like, by the way) is a by far weaker 1st single than "disco" – regarding the music, the lyrics and the video.

 

[dan_smee]

Yeah, that's basically what I was thinking... it's annoying when Radiohead (who I like, but don't see as the be-all end-all of music, like many people), who have been following a very similar format for many years now, are seen as the absolutely epitome of "experimentalism". But what do you do? I just listen to U2 and thank God every day that such a band exists.

dont mention the R word John!!!

I think the distinction here is that people see their hopes and dreams for the direction of the band, and if it doesn't fall into that tiny box they want, then its populist and unimaginative.

I would like people to use the word imaginative instead of experiemental, because it encapsulates peoples feelings much more succinctly. Experimentalism should just cover breaking new ground, branching away from comfort, not "Original Soundtracks 2". If they made a Folk album it would be experimental, but people wouldn't see it that way.

Imaginative is the word, and NLOTH definately was imaginative, as you say because it is thematically different to anything else they've done. Bono gets the hip-hop cadence going in Breathe, and the 3rd person writing is great. The introduced electronic instruments, but played them themselves, rather than dialling it into the computer.

 

[Aygo]

^ bingo!!!

 

[Aygo]

Yeah, that's basically what I was thinking... it's annoying when Radiohead (who I like, but don't see as the be-all end-all of music, like many people), who have been following a very similar format for many years now, are seen as the absolutely epitome of "experimentalism". But what do you do? I just listen to U2 and thank God every day that such a band exists.

But you know what's curious in the end? It's that In Rainbows already is Radiohead by the numbers, it's Radiohead in their comfort zone. I believe that In Rainbows places in Radiohead's catalogue the same that ATYCLB is for U2's catalogue. Cry, scream to me, ban me, but that's pretty much what I feel about the band's last effort.

Besides that it's very natural that being Radiohead considered this days what U2 meant for the overall public in the mid 90's (yes, totally different contexts, totally different audiences, totally different music - but the kind of acceptance is pretty much comparable).

 

[corcovadosong]

IR is Radiohead by the numbers?

tell me what songs match and mirror Radiohead's early output, what would be "comfortable" for them.

tell me what experimental music is to you. because it sounds like to you innovative music implies heavy use of processed sounds and fast tempos.

IR is maybe the most innovative album in Radiohead's history. Using some fairly normal instrumentation, they've applied the Kid A approach to acoustic, non-programmed sounds. If 15 step, Nude, Arpeggi, All I Need, Reckoner, and Videotape are conventional Radiohead for you, then I think you need to listen to more Radiohead.

IR is a heartbreaker. But just b/c it utilizes emotional content and guitars doesn't mean it's normal. Videotape sounds like no song I have heard before, and I think it was definitely not Radiohead's comfort zone.

but why am I saying this anyways? b/c that's how you feel, and you're crazy enough to think that ATYCLB can possibly be analogous to IR. how that comparison works, I have no idea.

 

[Irvine511]

No, it is not. Unfortunately, because "Boots" (which I like, by the way) is a by far weaker 1st single than "disco" – regarding the music, the lyrics and the video.

i like "boots" too. but i think it's a stronger song than "disco" by miles and the video was very cool. "disco" did debut in the US top 10, but it plummeted quickly, and that was a much different world.

the point is that both songs make the casual listener go "WTF?" and many casual listeners don't like either of those songs. i had friends email me to tell me how much they thought "boots" sucked, which is a marked difference from how BD and Vertigo were generally received.

what the "disco" video did was make U2 look like idiots to the general public, and what "boots" has done is make U2 sound like confused old men to the general public.

that's not to say that either perception is right, but it is to say that both of these perceptions are validated by the general reaction to each respective single and the overall performance of their respective albums.

 

[Aygo]

IR is Radiohead by the numbers?

tell me what songs match and mirror Radiohead's early output, what would be "comfortable" for them.

tell me what experimental music is to you. because it sounds like to you innovative music implies heavy use of processed sounds and fast tempos.

IR is maybe the most innovative album in Radiohead's history. Using some fairly normal instrumentation, they've applied the Kid A approach to acoustic, non-programmed sounds. If 15 step, Nude, Arpeggi, All I Need, Reckoner, and Videotape are conventional Radiohead for you, then I think you need to listen to more Radiohead.

IR is a heartbreaker. But just b/c it utilizes emotional content and guitars doesn't mean it's normal. Videotape sounds like no song I have heard before, and I think it was definitely not Radiohead's comfort zone.

but why am I saying this anyways? b/c that's how you feel, and you're crazy enough to think that ATYCLB can possibly be analogous to IR. how that comparison works, I have no idea.

In Rainbows has all over it lots of clues and sonic landscapes that were already presented by its predecessors. Almost all songs have something that resembles to the past of the band: some from Kid A and Amnesiac, some from Hail To The Thief, and there is a lot from Ok Computer too. We only have to pay attention and to create distance from the album. A good number of the songs from the last album were written lots of years ago. Is it surprising and so negative for the fans if the album has lots of reminiscences from past Radiohead?

The analogy is perfect. All That You Can't Leave Behind has a little of the atmosphere of The Joshua Tree, some of the rawness of the 80's (half of the album from the early years, another half from the Lovetown era), it has keyboards that ressemble from the The Unforgettable Fire era... But it the end, the cover and the package is so particular that you find it hard to really find where the reminiscences come from.

Radiohead has already had its The Joshua Tree (Ok Computer) and its Achtung Baby[I/Zooropa[/I] (Kid A/Amnesiac). I understand that Radiohead is like lava for the Earth these days, is it for Radiohead fans to accept that the band found a comfort zone too (within its own sound)?
I could bet that within the next 10 years, when the fever for the pseudo-alternative/undergound goes away (you can bet that this cycle's gonna end soon too) Radiohead is gonna start a period of a lower appreciation by a larger public or even some backlash - depending on the next career moves.

 

[mikal]

is this thread where i can discuss U2's upcoming album titled "Songs Of Ascent"?

 

[AtomicBono]

is this thread where i can discuss U2's upcoming album titled "Songs Of Ascent"?

is this the forum where we discuss the band U2?

 

[bathiu]

is this the forum where we discuss the band U2?

no, it's a forum for Coldplay, Radiohead and will.i.am discussions only, didn't you know?


( )

 

[elevated_u2_fan]

Again with the Radiohead talk?!

Christ, people, can we give it a rest?!

And this is coming from me - a professional thread derailer...

 

[BVS]

IR is Radiohead by the numbers?

tell me what songs match and mirror Radiohead's early output, what would be "comfortable" for them.

tell me what experimental music is to you. because it sounds like to you innovative music implies heavy use of processed sounds and fast tempos.

IR is maybe the most innovative album in Radiohead's history. Using some fairly normal instrumentation, they've applied the Kid A approach to acoustic, non-programmed sounds. If 15 step, Nude, Arpeggi, All I Need, Reckoner, and Videotape are conventional Radiohead for you, then I think you need to listen to more Radiohead.

IR is a heartbreaker. But just b/c it utilizes emotional content and guitars doesn't mean it's normal. Videotape sounds like no song I have heard before, and I think it was definitely not Radiohead's comfort zone.

but why am I saying this anyways? b/c that's how you feel, and you're crazy enough to think that ATYCLB can possibly be analogous to IR. how that comparison works, I have no idea.

I see exactly what he's saying and I agree, as do many.

Just because IR sounds "weird" compared to what's on the radio doesn't make it experimental music, because Radiohead have been doing this sound since Kid A. Experimenting would mean Radiohead would have to leave this sound they've created.

That being said, I like IR and I think it's Radiohead perfecting what they started with Kid A.

If the next Radiohead album is still in the same vein as the last four they will be stale.

 

[powerhour24]

Gah! OUT! We have news that U2 is in the studio this week, and still it gets sidetracked, 90% of Just the Bang and the Clatter is already RH talk, take it there.

 

[dan_smee]

^ snap!

See what you did Dig???

Ok, so we can all agree IR sucks, now, SOA will be mega.

That is my factual, and unbiased opinion

 

[ozeeko]

fuck experimentation, at the end of the day I like Radiohead because they write interesting music whether it's with electronic beats or a fucking glockenspiel.

In Rainbows rules, and NLOTH is an above average U2 record.

Hopefully SOA will be above above above average, closer to flat out awesome.

Hopefully Bono will learn how to write again (he's proven he can with MOS, WAS and COL). I guess a better way to say it is hopefully he will unlearn how to write disturbing cheese (CT, SUC).

And hopefully Edge doesn't play molten metal, we all know what happens when he tries this...(lame Zepellin riffs)