BonoFox1
Blue Crack Supplier
Ok kids!! Lets start a new thread:
Here are the last news posts from our lovely LauraMullen DomoKum and others ::
Here are the last news posts from our lovely LauraMullen DomoKum and others ::
U2's Newfoundland connection
After playing a small role in U2's latest disc, Lori Anna Reid returns home to perform
The Telegram, July 10, 2009
Kip Bonnell
Lori Anna Reid hesitates to take credit, but the Newfoundlander's contribution to one of the biggest bands in the world is both hard to ignore and remarkably fitting.
"I love the record, it's fantastic," Reid says of No Line on the Horizon," U2's 13th studio album, released in March, which has been heralded as a return to form by even the band's toughest critics.
"My dad brought it home and said, 'Your name is in here, missus!'"
Reid has quietly built an acclaimed musical career since she left St. John's in 1990. She started singing here as a child, and later studied classical music at Memorial University, before finishing a degree in voice performance at the University of Toronto.
Along with performing at Carnegie Hall, her vocal talents have been featured in Juno and Genie Award-winning compositions, and documentaries, such as television's The Nature of Things.
Reid and her band perform in Brigus and St. John's Monday and Tuesday.
The singer also has a reputation for rediscovering musical gems and giving them new polish.
Reid's suggestion of a traditional melody to Daniel Lanois, U2's longtime producer, acted as a springboard in the creation of "White As Snow," a haunting song about a dying soldier in Afghanistan. It's a work that The Guardian, the well-respected U.K. newspaper, called "U2's most intimate song....of all the character songs on the album, 'White As Snow' is the most moving."
"I was driving between Banff and Vancouver when I got the phone call from Dan (Lanois)," recalls Reid, who has worked with the musician and producer since 2003, when she provided vocals on his solo tour. "He said he was working on a record with U2 again, and that they were initially thinking about doing a record of hymns....I gave him a few suggestions and one was 'O Come, O Come Emmanuel.'
"I have a hard time taking credit -- I'm just grateful and glad that both Daniel, Bono and the entire band agreed with me that it's a gorgeous hymn."
Lanois says it's no accident Reid's suggestion made the album.
"I think it's fair to say that years and years of friendship and singing with Lori led to this," he said from his recording studio in Los Angeles.
Along with his work with U2, the Quebec native is a renowned solo performer, and one of the most sought-after producers in music. With his trademark sound, he's helped to mould and boost the careers of artists like Bob Dylan, Emmylou Harris and Robbie Robertson.
One of his jobs, Lanois says, is bringing intriguing ideas to U2, "whether it be melodies, chords or other ideas."
"Lori played me a few things that she regarded to be great melodic classics," he says of Reid's recommendation.
"I recorded a little piano version of it and brought that to the U2 camp. She has so much experience singing classical music that it's just embedded in her as an artist," say Lanois, who refers to Reid as a "musical mate" and a "deep soul."
"She just has a very clear understanding of how parts interlock."
While Reid helped push the creative process, she wasn't certain what the final form of her input would be. When she discovered that the finished song centred on the life of a soldier, it all seemed strangely familiar.
"The hair stood up on my arm," says Reid, "because it is such a close topic for me, having been there, having family there, and it's something that's very close to the heart."
In 2008, Reid sang for Canadian troops in Kandahar. She performed "Amazing Grace" at the ramp ceremony for Sgt. Jason Boyce, who died after a roadside bomb exploded.
"It's on so many minds right now," she says of the struggles in Afghanistan. "It's just a travesty that we need to be there, but we do. An injustice anywhere affects justice everywhere, as Martin Luther King said.
"Maybe it's that collective consciousness that resulted in the serendipity of those words being written," Reid said of U2's lyrics in "White As Snow," a track that credits Lanois as co-writer.
It's not the first time Reid has been connected with songs about young soldiers and the ravages of war. Her version of "Willie McBride/No Man's Land" was widely praised by Gen. Rick Hillier (now retired), while Eric Bogle, the song's composer, has called her take "the most beautiful version I have ever heard," saying it reminds him of why he initially wrote it.
And as if sharing musical wavelengths with Bono and Lanois isn't enough, Reid is driven by a passion for humanitarian work -- both in her neighbourhood and around the world.
As an official consultant for World Vision, she helps encourage child sponsorship at her own concerts, as well as at her performances with other artists, like Lennie Gallant and Michelle Wright. Reid toured with Wright in April, where they sang together and spoke about their sponsored children and their respective trips to Afghanistan.
You can do something in every choice that you make," Reid points out. "We're changing the world, and artists are doing it....Last year, there were more than 6,000 children sponsored at World Vision because of Canadian artists."
When she's not on the road, Reid's Toronto surroundings seem far removed from her Newfoundland roots. But inside her apartment, there are links to the place she left behind.
"I've got two photos that my dad took in Torbay, with icebergs in the background, and the icebergs just dwarf the little boats, of course," says Reid, who returns home once or twice a year.
"Along with the painting he did, it's like a huge seascape theme around the room."
Reid is heavily involved in her new community. In June, she performed a sold-out benefit for a meals program for homeless people at St. Stephen in the Fields Church -- a venue she helped previously when it was facing financial difficulties.
Allan Cannon, a music industry veteran who recorded the show, was moved by Reid's talent.
"I was hoping to capture something magical....I believe that there was plenty of magic on that evening," he said. "This is one of the finest examples of a cappella...absolutely outstanding."
"What really fires me up is when I'm performing live," says Reid, who has been working with a new band for the past year.
The group features Mike Janzen on piano, George Koller (bass, cello) and Newfoundland native Greg Hawco (guitar, percussion, vocals).
Reid's two shows here next week will feature a mix of original compositions, songs with jazz elements and traditional arrangements.
"It's quite a wonderful thing when we get up there," said Reid. "I can tell stories, sing songs friends have written or co-written, or a couple of classical songs -- I know it all sounds very disjointed, but it's not."
One of the standouts in Reid's current setlist is "Avalon," a devastatingly beautiful arrangement with improvised elements that finds her voice soaring and looping through a plaintive piano part and tribal drumbeat.
Partly inspired by the struggles of Demasduit, one of the last Beothuk women, it's a song without words, yet limitless with feeling.
"Everybody has a song, and every song tells a story," Reid insists. "The power of a really great song cuts through political lines, things that normally divide us....It's about what makes us human."
Reid and her band have two performances next week, along with special guest Bill Brennan -- Monday at St. George's church in Brigus at 8 p.m., tickets are $20, and are available at the door (www.stgeorgesbrigus.ca); and Tuesday at Memorial University's D.F. Cook Recital Hall in the School of Music. Tickets are $22 and are available at the St. John's Arts and Culture Centre, telephone 729-3900.
© The Telegram, 2009.
Hindu Leaders Urge Bono To Address Roma Issue
July 13, 2009
Leading Hindus are urging U2 frontman BONO to focus his humanitarian
efforts on the Roma apartheid in Europe in the hopes his support could
end the suffering of displaced Indians.
Religious leaders insist the alarming treatment of Roma people, who
migrated to mainland Europe from India in the 11th century, is a
social blight for Europe as the 15-million Roma people face social
exclusion, prejudice, high unemployment, racism, substandard education
and hostility - and Bono has been suggested as their saviour.
Rajan Zed, the leader of the Universal Society of Hinduism, states,
"(The) Roma issue should be one of the highest priorities of human
rights agendas of Europe and the world."
And he hopes Bono will not remain "a silent spectator when fellow Roma
brothers/sisters were reportedly facing blatant injustice and
discrimination in Europe".
Meanwhile, Thomas Hammarberg, the Commissioner for the Human Rights of
Council of Europe, has revealed, "Anti-Gypsyism continues to be a
major human rights problem in Europe. Governments must start taking
serious action against both official and inter-personal discrimination
of Roma."
In a recent report about the ongoing problem, he cited incidents where
Roma children were forced to strip and violently slap one another in a
Slovakia police station and the sudden eviction of Roma families in
Belgrade without alternative accommodation.
Zed has also urged Pope Benedict XVI, the Archbishop of Canterbury,
Dr. Rowan D. Williams, and other church and faith leaders to address
the issues facing the Roma people.
When the real U2 show up well be in trouble (U2.com)
July 12 2009
Wednesday, 17th June 2009. Barcelona. Production rehearsals.
Having arranged to move to the band's hotel upon their arrival, I had to fit in a hotel change en route to the stadium when I got up this afternoon. The crew are staying at Mrs McGinty's boarding house just off La Rambla, so I checked out and took a cab down to the Hotel Fabulous by the Olympic Port, to be fawned over by armies of professionally obsequious staff. I only had about 30 seconds to check in and get out of there, so pretty much just threw my bags into my new room and bailed.
At the stadium we awaited the arrival of Adam and Larry, whose enthusiasm for the new production equalled that of their band mates. What astounded everyone though was that within a couple of hours of arrival, the four of them got up on the stage and played through an entire set without stopping. Astonishing! Unprecedented! I have no idea who these people are, but when the real U2 show up we'll be in trouble. During the run-through Bono took his radio mic and went right up to the top of the stadium, where (somehow) he managed to continue to sing in time, whilst adding astonished comments about how it all looked from up there.
After dark my team and I worked on the songs that required the screen to do its moves. The video content isn't quite there yet, but the way the whole thing works together is very promising. We worked till dawn and then took a runner van back to the Hotel Fabulous
Most important day so far (U2.com)
July 12 2009
Bono and Edge arrived this evening, which would put this into the category of 'easily the most important day so far.' And... they loved it. I'd asked Bono (by text) to walk into the stadium and go straight to his mic position, to experience the wide open feeling on stage. This he did (after looking up at the structure with that now familiar look of shock-and-awe of first-time viewers) and it was clear he had got it in one. 'Its invisibility is what is so remarkable,' he said, which is so true. When you're at floor level, you really feel like there's nothing there, it's all way up high.
Edge on the other hand, leapt from his vehicle and immediately went to the very top of the stadium, completely circumnavigating the building. He was clearly very excited and that became very infectious. I was delighted of course, as usually it takes a little while for them to settle into their new home but this felt extremely natural. That's 50% - we get the other 50% tomorrow.
U2 Croker gigs have a bit missing
Sunday July 12 2009
APPARENTLY, when he heard Bono singing I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For, Boy George, in reference to Larry Mullen, was moved to suggest he might try looking behind him. Bono might get a shock of a different kind if he looks behind him at the band's 360 tour gigs in Croke Park later this month, because there will be nobody there.
U2 fans were cranky last week with the news that the 360 degree view of the stage available to fans in Barcelona would be reduced by a quarter in Dublin, as Hill 16 would remain closed. Now that's a cutback, and the worry now is that U2 will bring a Bord Snip mindset to other aspects of the show. Maybe they will arrive on stage and announce that Adam Clayton was given the night off, so could the crowd hum along in a low, rhythmical fashion. What would be the reaction if Bono pruned his trademark woo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-baaaaby down to a woo-hoo and sing the rest yourselves? The stunt of ringing the US president could be revived but will Bono mortify us by asking Obama to accept reverse charges?
The biggest worry of course is that, due to the swingeing cutbacks, Bono will only be able to save part of the world during the show. Just when his fans start to think they could listen to him all night banging on about the benefits of debt forgiveness for sub-Saharan Africa, Edge hisses over that they're going to miss the last bus to Killiney if he doesn't launch into Magnificent and wind up the show.
It could be worse of course. The Croke Park gigs might go from 360 to 270 to 0, if the electricians decide it's in the national interest to pull the plug.
Pat Fitzpatrick