"Hear Me Coming, Lord..." vs. "We Shine Like Stars..."

[PopFly]

The two ultimate add-ons in U2's live history, which is your favourite? Both are but only one can win this vote.

One
Do you hear me coming, Lord
Do you hear me call
Hear me knocking, knocking at your door
You hear me coming, Lord
You hear me call
Feel me scratching, will you make me crawl

vs.

With Or Without You
Yeah, we'll shine like stars in the summer night
We'll shine like stars in the winter night
One heart
One hope
One love

 

[cobl04]

The former, not even a contest.

 

[Musikwala]

"shine like stars" for me... Chills every single time I listen to it!

One is perfect enough on the album for me.

 

[LemonMelon]

One + Do You Hear Us Coming + Unchained Melody =

 

[jeevey]

Shine like stars. I've never heard anyone else say so, but the live versions of One are often a bit of an overkill for me, lacking the restraint, heartbreak and delicacy of the studio version.

 

[phommel]

Shine like a stars!

Never understood why the Lord needs to hear when I am coming.

 

[cobl04]

I can't fathom anyone saying the latter. Every version I've heard it really just sounds like a couple of extra lines tacked on for the sack of it. Always enjoy when they extend WOWY, mostly for Edge's guitar playing, but I don't see what's so special about "we'll shine like stars in the winter night / we'll shine like stars in the summer night / one heart / one hope / one love". WOWY with the Love Will Tear Us Apart is so fucking superior, seriously.

Whereas the Do You Hear Us/Me Coming Lord verse takes One into the stratosphere if you ask me. I've seen the band four times and not been lucky enough to hear them play it with that snippet, and it kills me, because it goes from being an amazing song to really something else. Bono's vocals are just so incredibly passionate.

 

[Musikwala]

Shine like stars. I've never heard anyone else say so, but the live versions of One are often a bit of an overkill for me, lacking the restraint, heartbreak and delicacy of the studio version.

Very well said! Agreed 100%.

 

[LemonMelon]

One heart/one hope/one love was cheesy Bono before it became a habit for him.

Agreed with Cobbler that Love Will Tear Us Apart is a far better way to finish the song.

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

Do you hear us coming Lord?

:clickclack:

 

[Musikwala]

One heart/one hope/one love was cheesy Bono before it became a habit for him.

It's actually the "shine like stars in the summer night" part that gives me the chills, not necessarily the one heart one hope one whatever. A pitch dark stadium/arena with twinkling lighters only makes that moment that much more awesome!

 

[Hewson]

"They don't understand, we belong together..." at the end of Black...

 

[Nick66]

Good thread.

Shine Like Stars was first and will always be my favourite. Gives me chills every time. I also like that we hear Bono singing "One Love" 3 years before One.

I especially love the extra bit on Slane version...

Sing my song
It's what I feel
Come and sing, man
This is real
From my soul
Coming and hear
I can feel
My senses, dear

I also like Hear Me Coming, quite a bit.

I also quite like the MOS coda, which I know wasn't for everyone but I really came to appreciate.

Life is short
It’s the longest thing you’ll ever do
The worst of the curse
Was that your dreams came true
God is a mirror in which each man sees himself
God is a place where you don’t need any help
When I first met you, your face was like snow
What about wherever you wanted to go
Your face, your grace, your lipstick trace
Your case as you put it down
8.17 on the ground
Your faith in a clown
Don’t leave me now
Don’t leave me now
Alone in the song
Don’t leave me now
Alone in the song

 

[popacrobat]

Do you hear us coming Lord?

:clickclack:

Damn right.

 

[prbiker15]

I love both, but I prefer the former.

 

[david]

During early legs of the Zoo TV Tour Bono would sing a high pitch falsetto intro to Mysterious Ways that went something along the lines of:
"Take her, take her slow, take your baby by the hand, teach her teach all you know teach your baby while you can"

Something like that. Was that a snippet or something he just made up?

 

[LPU2]

Love both, but I vote for the "hear me coming" section. And DAMN them for not putting both of those endings into the recorded versions.

 

[RoKKeR]

I love love love Shine Like Stars, like others have said it gives me chills every time.

 

[Nick66]

Love both, but I vote for the "hear me coming" section. And DAMN them for not putting both of those endings into the recorded versions.

Nah, makes all the more special to hear it live. And since I almost exclusively listen to live U2 vs. the studio records, that's fine with me.

Anyway, while Shine Like Stars might work on the studio version (and I'm not convinced it would), I'm pretty sure "Hear me coming" wouldn't. The One on AB is a much more somber affair than it's typically performed live, and I think the coda in this case would sound incredibly out of place.

 

[prbiker15]

Nah, makes all the more special to hear it live.

I agree.

 

[U2girl]

Shine like stars. Hear me coming is overrated.

 

[lazarus]

I can't fathom anyone saying the latter. Every version I've heard it really just sounds like a couple of extra lines tacked on for the sack of it. Always enjoy when they extend WOWY, mostly for Edge's guitar playing, but I don't see what's so special about "we'll shine like stars in the winter night / we'll shine like stars in the summer night / one heart / one hope / one love". WOWY with the Love Will Tear Us Apart is so fucking superior, seriously.

Whereas the Do You Hear Us/Me Coming Lord verse takes One into the stratosphere if you ask me. I've seen the band four times and not been lucky enough to hear them play it with that snippet, and it kills me, because it goes from being an amazing song to really something else. Bono's vocals are just so incredibly passionate.

All of this.

"summer night/winter light" is such a generic, high school poetry rhyme, it makes the song worse IMO.

As for One, nothing tops the emotion in this version for me, Bono choking up over the recently departed Michael Hutchence in the altered line "...but I can't raise the dead". He really brings it hard on the "hear us coming" part as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l9fe0Qcg1o

 

[digitize]

I also quite like the MOS coda, which I know wasn't for everyone but I really came to appreciate.

The MoS coda is great. I'm glad that it stuck around through the second half of the 360 Tour.

I have no good way of ranking the verses, though. I guess I would say that WOWY loses more without Shine Like Stars than One does without Hear Us Coming, but I don't know.

 

[digitize]

All of this.

"summer night/winter light" is such a generic, high school poetry rhyme, it makes the song worse IMO.

As for One, nothing tops the emotion in this version for me, Bono choking up over the recently departed Michael Hutchence in the altered line "...but I can't raise the dead". He really brings it hard on the "hear us coming" part as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4l9fe0Qcg1o

This version of One is absolutely perfect. It's probably my favorite. Perhaps it's tied with PopMart Sarajevo and the Modena performance with Bono, Edge, and Eno.

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

.

 

[youarenotimmune]

I can't fathom anyone saying the latter. Every version I've heard it really just sounds like a couple of extra lines tacked on for the sack of it. Always enjoy when they extend WOWY, mostly for Edge's guitar playing, but I don't see what's so special about "we'll shine like stars in the winter night / we'll shine like stars in the summer night / one heart / one hope / one love". WOWY with the Love Will Tear Us Apart is so fucking superior, seriously..

It's actually the "shine like stars in the summer night" part that gives me the chills, not necessarily the one heart one hope one whatever. A pitch dark stadium/arena with twinkling lighters only makes that moment that much more awesome!

All of this.

"summer night/winter light" is such a generic, high school poetry rhyme, it makes the song worse IMO.

The summer night part is nothing special lyrically, yes, but it works vocally. It fits really well after Edge's extended solo.

And yes, the "one heart, one love.." part after "shine like stars" kind of ruins it. And yes, snippeting Love Will Tear Us Apart at the end was fantastic.

Which is why we have this perfect hybrid rendition of WOWY from Chicago 1987, where Bono belts out the "shine like stars" coda so passionately, and then sings Love Will Tear Us Apart instead of the cheesy "one heart,..." line.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obYK5cn614I

 

[Axver]

Hear Us Coming makes an average song kind of worth hearing live, but it can't hold a candle to Shine Like Stars, which really caps off WOWY emphatically rather than just letting it peter out. It's the perfect rousing verse to follow Edge's solo, and the way Bono used to come in with so much passion on "yeeeaaahhhh we'll shine like stars" overcame the cliched lyrical shortcomings. It's not the first time Bono's delivery and perfect placement of a verse made otherwise trite lyricism forgivable.

Suffice to say that when I finally heard Shine Like Stars at my seventeenth U2 concert, I sang it so loudly that the people around me probably still have ringing ears.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obYK5cn614I

This is pretty great.

During early legs of the Zoo TV Tour Bono would sing a high pitch falsetto intro to Mysterious Ways that went something along the lines of:
"Take her, take her slow, take your baby by the hand, teach her teach all you know teach your baby while you can"

Something like that. Was that a snippet or something he just made up?

I've never been able to place it, but if anybody can figure it out I'd love to add it to U2gigs.

(I wish I'd completed a project to add Hear Us Coming... nowadays I haven't the motivation to do so.)

 

[dan_smee]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VV-jYzUu0uw

The solo (despite its simple nature) of the Washington version provides the perfect lead in to Shine Like Stars, and it is why I think that tops Hear us Coming, but only slightly.

As Nick said, the MOS outro is also great.

 

[brooklynmike]

"They don't understand, we belong together..." at the end of Black...

Awesome... Especially the Live on 2 Legs version.


Sent from my iPhone using U2 Interference

 

[brooklynmike]

"Here Us Coming" is superior to "Shine Like Stars". Both great, but the former sends One into the stratosphere. Especially in the Modena and Sydney performances.

Early to mid 90's were a great time for snippets and mumblings. Someone else mentioned the snips in Mysterious Ways from ZooTV- all awesome.