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Must have him confused with Wilco.

But yeah, Crazy Tonight is the bigger crime. An 11th hour addition that has no place with the rest of those songs. Stand Up Comedy doesn't either, and can't even boast a catchy melody, but at least it's not saccharine.
 
MattD said:
Boots is an utter mess of a song, but I don’t think it’s offensively bad like I’ll Go Crazy. If I were the interviewer, I’d be saying the failure of that album is that song. Kind of sums up why it failed - that desperate contrived, middle of the road shite that torpedoes the album dead. You could release Moment of Surrender as the lead single but the album would still have failed regardless.

And getting that coffee salesman Will.I.Am on board to help write I’ll Go Crazy, well to be brutal any band deserves to kill their career with such embarrassing creative choices. No way back from that.
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Yes.

People should stop fooling themselves that "Moment of Surrender" was this great song. It wasn't. U2 also fell into the trap of thinking it was the new "Bad"... Then, they played it live in stadiums and everyone went to the bog.

(I realize I'm in the minority on a U2 forum, but boy, I dislike that song. Having said that, it's still better than four or five turkeys on No Line.)
 
The Panther said:
Yes.

People should stop fooling themselves that "Moment of Surrender" was this great song. It wasn't. U2 also fell into the trap of thinking it was the new "Bad"... Then, they played it live in stadiums and everyone went to the bog.

(I realize I'm in the minority on a U2 forum, but boy, I dislike that song. Having said that, it's still better than four or five turkeys on No Line.)
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i've always felt that it sounds like it would fit on a contemporary coldplay album.... it's corny and it tried way too hard, i've never understood why some people here rate it so highly. as a single it probably would be remembered now the same way that we remember "violet hill".
 
It's one of the best latter-day songs, but it wouldn't crack my top 30. I can see both sides. I quite like it, just because it is them attempting to settle into a sound that I wish they'd stay in, and is a million times better than all the horrific singles they've promoted in the last 15 years, but it is quite cloying, slow and long.
 
DeVaul said:
Magnificent had the best of both worlds - that driving, chiming guitar coupled with atmospheric elements that hinted at a record that was quite different from the previous two. MOS as a second single to drive home the point would’ve supported the approach without miffing the album launch at radio.
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Agreed. It would have been a very good lead single. It's what people want to hear from the band, but in a slightly different form that signals something a touch more atmospheric and meditative than what HTDAAB brought to the table.

MOS should have been involved in the promotional cycle somehow because it's far too good to bury as a deep cut.
 
MOS has a great groove and sound on the album which the live version just didn't manage to reproduce.

Magnificent was clearly the best choice if U2 wanted a radio-friendly song out there to say to people "here's our latest song, sounding like all those great U2 singles from the past" a la Beautiful Day.
 
lazarus said:
Well I’m not sure if “Best” automatically equals single. Many feel The Troubles is the best on SOI. Not a good single choice. I think Running to Stand Still is JT’s best. Not a single. Or Acrobat.

But I agree with your general point that a slow song shouldn’t be ruled out. When you’re dropping a big left turn album like Achtung Baby, you want to make a splash. But for a more introspective album mostly recorded in Morocco? Boots wasn’t the right choice, and MOS fits both the album as well as its accompanying artwork/promo images.
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see i actually disagree with you on The Troubles. I would have release it as the lead single. It's a beautiful track and is a departure from what U2 has done in the past. in a world where the itunes spamming doesn't happen, where you're just looking to get people's attention, a song like The Troubles would have done just that.


re: Running To Stand Still... they did, actually, release a ballad for the first single, and to my earlier point about releasing something that's a departure and attention grabbing - the infinite guitar effect sounded nothing like anything else at the time.
 
But they did release the right lead off single for SOI: Invisible.
 
Headache in a Suitcase said:
see i actually disagree with you on The Troubles. I would have release it as the lead single. It's a beautiful track and is a departure from what U2 has done in the past. in a world where the itunes spamming doesn't happen, where you're just looking to get people's attention, a song like The Troubles would have done just that.
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I agree wholeheartedly. Could have completely changed the perception around the band at the time, particularly given they collaborated with someone as respected as Lykke Li. Unfortunately, most of the rest of the record is pretty crap.

Interesting with Kendrick, too. XXX is a fantastic song, but was a deep cut on DAMN and didn't really move the needle for U2. And in return, U2 got Kendrick to do some banal MLK-aping adlibs on the two worst songs of their career.
 
Blessed are outdated media formats, they will be gifts for our fan club
 
The season of Lent is a ways off, but Bono already knows what he’s giving up: humility. “During the week there was this story about me not liking the sound of my voice,” he points out, referring to a podcast comment he made about his youthful tone making him feeling “cringe” — an offhand remark that generated reams of headlines and some catty quips from U2 non-fans. “And I was saying, it’s not bad at all. It’s just live is where U2 lives… and I love the (early) recordings, but when I hear my voice on them I just hear the fragility of it.” But he knows people took the self-effacement and ran with it. “It’s OK for me to occasionally try to be fucking straight-up honest with people,” says the singer. “I was trying to be humorous in this interview, and a bit humble.” But he’s come to a conclusion: “It doesn’t suit,” he laughs. “I am back to full-on bollocks.”
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https://variety.com/2022/music/news...-song-saved-my-life-best-original-1235166036/


Bono - not on board with not being on board with his early voice.
 
Headache in a Suitcase said:
https://variety.com/2022/music/news...-song-saved-my-life-best-original-1235166036/


Bono - not on board with not being on board with his early voice.
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Yeah, it's gotta be frustrating to do an interview where you say, When I hear the older songs, i cringe and blush a bit at my voice, like i was straining, and I've only learned to sing later on...

and the headline is: Bono hates all U2 songs, the name of the band, his voice, himself and wants to smash Larry's head in with a hammer...
 
ascender_RS said:
But not quite? What would it take to tip the decision one way or the other?

Honestly, I don't know what people expect from a band who've been together for this long... you're bound to get hits and misses; bad decisions along the way and of course, all of these things might look different when you're now in your 60s and looking back on it all.
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What would sway it back for me is a record of genuine passion. Their output seems so half baked at this point. Perhaps they're just not following their passion at the moment.
 
dreamletter said:
What would sway it back for me is a record of genuine passion. Their output seems so half baked at this point. Perhaps they're just not following their passion at the moment.
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U2's last 2 albums were loaded with "genuine passion". Maybe you just didn't like the songs, which is fine, but the passion was there.
 
The passion is mostly there, IMO it's focus they've lacked. For two records that are supposed to act as a timeline of, and letters to the past, the disparate recording sessions/producers/writers/guests wipe away a lot of the continuity that maybe should have run through the records.

I'd really like for them to commit to like, 4 months in a single non-U2 studio, a few weeks max at Windmill to finish it, and then release the damn thing.
 
I don't think that will ever happen again, just because Edge lives in California. Does Adam primarily live in London now?
 
I think the two albums before SoE were truly excellent, and remarkable that they could put out back to back albums like that so late in their career. But his voice has really paid the price, and I don’t see them getting any better. Not everyone can be Duran Duran and still sound fresh and interesting after 40 years.
 
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