I need your help - my girlfriend is not a U2 fan. (The horror, the horror!)
So I need to convert her, or at least help her see that U2 isn't "pretentious", "self-righteous", "boring"; and that not all their songs "sound the same" (her words). So I'm making her some U2 compilation CDs for her to listen too - she said she'd be willing to listen to them if I made them, so this is my chance!
What I'm thinking of doing is possibly a 3-CD attack, meaning I'll have about 50 songs to work with. I did this with the last girl I was with who also wasn't a U2 fan - I made her a 3-CD set (80s/90s/00s) before I left school for the summer, and when I got back in the fall, she was a huge fan. So I know this can work - I just need your opinions and advice.
Some things to think about when making suggestions -
1) Three 80-minute CD's worth is not very much, considering about 16-18 songs per CD. A lot of good stuff has to be cut. Should I upgrade to four? Or is that just bogging her down too much? Maybe I'd be better off just buying the albums for her then...
2) I want to show a diverse range of U2 sounds, to combat her criticism of their songs all sounding the same.
3) She loves a variety of music - classic rock (Led Zeppelin, Beatles), blues, folk, country & western (real country like Hank Williams or Johnny Cash), and hip-hop.
4) How to divide the CDs? I went with the 80's/90's/00's division last time since it was chronological and it works as a nice way to divide three major "sounds" of U2 (although it lumped the UF/JT sound in with their early stuff). However, I don't believe the quality of songs balance out very nice - taking 15 songs off of the last two albums compared to 15 songs from their first five or six. There's got to be a better way. Expand it to four CDs, breaking up Boy-War and UF-R&H? Eliminate the chronological order altogether, and go by some other theme? Put a bunch of basic rockers on one, slow stuff and "epics" on another, and the AB-Pop era on a third? Maybe sort by mood?
5) One thing I'm thinking about doing is making a "live" album, composed of songs from Under a Blood Red Sky, Rattle and Hum, high-quality bootlegs, etc. Suggestions are especially needed for this, as I myself have not listened to much in the way of bootlegs. Anything that'll knock her socks off?
6) Tracklist suggestions are welcome, like if you've got some sort of running order you love and think works really well.
7) It would be easy to just take U2's biggest 50 songs and put them all in, but then that doesn't leave much room for stuff like The Wanderer (since she loves Johnny Cash), DYFL (to show off their range), or some of their hidden gems. The trick is to figure out what big songs get left out (SYCMIOYO? IWF?) and what "random" songs get thrown in (MLK? Acrobat? Wake Up Dead Man?).
8) To some degree, song length is an issue. Although Lemon is great for showing off their range, it's seven minutes long, meaning two otherwise worthy songs would be cut. Is it worth it?
This is actually a really fun exercise - I challenge you to all do it for any of your friends as well (if you haven't already). I'll be heading out to visit her next Friday for Spring Break (she lives 500 miles away), so I hope to have the CDs in hand by then.
Thanks for the help!
So I need to convert her, or at least help her see that U2 isn't "pretentious", "self-righteous", "boring"; and that not all their songs "sound the same" (her words). So I'm making her some U2 compilation CDs for her to listen too - she said she'd be willing to listen to them if I made them, so this is my chance!
What I'm thinking of doing is possibly a 3-CD attack, meaning I'll have about 50 songs to work with. I did this with the last girl I was with who also wasn't a U2 fan - I made her a 3-CD set (80s/90s/00s) before I left school for the summer, and when I got back in the fall, she was a huge fan. So I know this can work - I just need your opinions and advice.
Some things to think about when making suggestions -
1) Three 80-minute CD's worth is not very much, considering about 16-18 songs per CD. A lot of good stuff has to be cut. Should I upgrade to four? Or is that just bogging her down too much? Maybe I'd be better off just buying the albums for her then...
2) I want to show a diverse range of U2 sounds, to combat her criticism of their songs all sounding the same.
3) She loves a variety of music - classic rock (Led Zeppelin, Beatles), blues, folk, country & western (real country like Hank Williams or Johnny Cash), and hip-hop.
4) How to divide the CDs? I went with the 80's/90's/00's division last time since it was chronological and it works as a nice way to divide three major "sounds" of U2 (although it lumped the UF/JT sound in with their early stuff). However, I don't believe the quality of songs balance out very nice - taking 15 songs off of the last two albums compared to 15 songs from their first five or six. There's got to be a better way. Expand it to four CDs, breaking up Boy-War and UF-R&H? Eliminate the chronological order altogether, and go by some other theme? Put a bunch of basic rockers on one, slow stuff and "epics" on another, and the AB-Pop era on a third? Maybe sort by mood?
5) One thing I'm thinking about doing is making a "live" album, composed of songs from Under a Blood Red Sky, Rattle and Hum, high-quality bootlegs, etc. Suggestions are especially needed for this, as I myself have not listened to much in the way of bootlegs. Anything that'll knock her socks off?
6) Tracklist suggestions are welcome, like if you've got some sort of running order you love and think works really well.
7) It would be easy to just take U2's biggest 50 songs and put them all in, but then that doesn't leave much room for stuff like The Wanderer (since she loves Johnny Cash), DYFL (to show off their range), or some of their hidden gems. The trick is to figure out what big songs get left out (SYCMIOYO? IWF?) and what "random" songs get thrown in (MLK? Acrobat? Wake Up Dead Man?).
8) To some degree, song length is an issue. Although Lemon is great for showing off their range, it's seven minutes long, meaning two otherwise worthy songs would be cut. Is it worth it?
This is actually a really fun exercise - I challenge you to all do it for any of your friends as well (if you haven't already). I'll be heading out to visit her next Friday for Spring Break (she lives 500 miles away), so I hope to have the CDs in hand by then.
Thanks for the help!
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