Least single-worthy U2 single?

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Jarvio said:
What do you think is the least single-worthy of U2's singles?

This does not necessarily mean your least favourite single - just the single that you think shouldn't have really been a single off that album.

I think my vote goes to Last Night On Earth.

This, to me, is a song with no hook. I don't hate the song. But I don't particularly like it either. I like it more than singles such as Discotheque, The Miracle, GOYB, Numb (if that counts as a proper single). But those songs still seem like singles, rather than the b-side/illusive album track feel that LNOE gives me.

The intro is AWESOME, but it's only a few seconds. Furthermore, the single version rearranges this intro and ruins it IMO. (It's fine on the video though).

But the rest of the song is just a middle of the road rocker for me with no hook. It surprises me that it was the THIRD single off Pop, let alone a single at all. Gone, or Mofo, would have made more sense in its place.
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I would second your opinion. LNOE was a really cool song, until they hit that dreadful "You Gotta Give It Away" bellowing over and over. Annoying and atonal, it is my least favorite thing U2 has ever done bar none.

That being said, the "rest" of the song is pretty cool and I like it. When that track comes on I just do my best to block out the part I don't like.

But your question really goes beyond the simplistic notion of "song i don't like = worst single."

There is more to the dynamic of that question and it's an interesting one. Without droning on, my vote goes to GOYB in the end.

Not because I don't like the song. I actually like it a lot, really. It just didn't feel right as a lead off single after the previous album kicked off with Vertigo. I wont' elaborate because who cares?

All that being said, I think LNOE is my favorite U2 video. :lol:
 
I think A Celebration is a good song. Better than Another Day. It would have felt right at home on the October album.

GOYB is a tricky one, because I think it is single-worthy, but at the same time, I think it's a bad song.

ABOY I thought was ok for the 4th single off Bomb. But in America, I believe it was the 2nd single instead, directly following Vertigo, which I thought was a bad idea because it has a similar sound to Vertigo, thus not showing much variety with their first 2 US singles off that album.
 
Yeah, my earlier posts about ABOY as a good single were with reference to it being the second single in the US. I still rate the idea. Vertigo had great momentum and it made sense to say "hey people like this facet of new U2, so here's another rocker". The attention remained on Vertigo though and I think the single has been largely forgotten. At least it meant that when COBL came out it had plenty of room to succeed.
 
With or Without You. Too slow, too quiet, too boring. Doomed to failure. Idiots.

To be honest, for many reasons, Boots has to win this inauspicious prize. Bomb was a success, the band had been away a while, they were approaching 50 so were always up against it yet they had people on their side.
Then Boots. It's like sending a text to your mate about how stinky your girlfriend's pits are, only to realise you sent it to your girlfriend.
Disaster.
 
kiwilad said:
To be honest, for many reasons, Boots has to win this inauspicious prize. Bomb was a success, the band had been away a while, they were approaching 50 so were always up against it yet they had people on their side.

Then Boots.
Disaster.
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Yes, but, unlike POPMART, a fail of an album didn't yield empty stadiums on the resulting tour. The 360 tour IS the biggest of all time. In spite of the single and/or album.
 
kiwilad said:
To be honest, for many reasons, Boots has to win this inauspicious prize. Bomb was a success, the band had been away a while, they were approaching 50 so were always up against it yet they had people on their side.
Then Boots. It's like sending a text to your mate about how stinky your girlfriend's pits are, only to realise you sent it to your girlfriend.
Disaster.
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:lol: This is perfect.

And you're not wrong. Bono's personal reputation was tanking (especially in the UK it seems), but the warm glow of Vertigo/HTDAAB and even Beautiful Day/ATYCLB upon the band's musical reputation had not waned fully. Nobody had really noticed WITS in the interim but that didn't matter. I guess they shied away from Magnificent as a lead single because it might have been viewed as too stereotypically U2 and they wanted to make some kind of a statement, but picking Boots instead was a total blunder. The title track might've been the best way to go. Just different enough to pique a little interest instead of sounding like "U2 being U2", but not a daft incohesive copy-and-paste clusterfuck of a song.

From 1983 to 2004 U2 picked excellent lead singles, with the solitary exception of Discotheque. Since 2009 they seem incapable of picking them well.
 
An extended radio-edit of Soon for Songs of Ascent would be awesome. Maybe not commercially but just in a 'yeah so we're going our own way now, follow us if you like' kind of way.
 
I'm actually one of the few fans of Boots, but it was a poor single given it wasn't representative of the album and Magnificent was prime single material.

IGWSHA, Miracle, Fire and Numb are perplexing choices. I can forgive Numb for being a sort of artistic statement.
 
I will say this about IGWSHA, the single mix is superior to album cut. Bono’s voice is turned up a bit at the start and during the bridge at the end.

i remember the day POP came out and i put the CD in the stereo and when IGWSHA came on i couldn’t really hear what he was saying at the start and couldn’t make out anything during the “and i don’t want to know why” part.

i think DYFL would have been a better single.
 
Nah The Best Thing is far better than Boots imo. But the Miracle is better than TBT.

[emoji445] generic rock music starts[emoji445]
The future needs a big kiss

I've got gasoline

Get on yours *boots*
Sexy boots
Ya ya ya ya ya ya

You don't know how beautiful you are
You don't know how beautiful you are

Let me in the sound
Let me in the sound

Ya ya ya ya

[emoji445]generic rock music ends[emoji445]

Oh, Boots.
 
From looking at Wikipedia, the only U2 singles to never reach the top 10 anywhere in the world are:

IGWSHA

In God's Country (but only released in America and Canada)

Invisible (But was it even a proper single anyway?)

The SOI singles (but again, do they count?)

The Boy singles

And, A Celebration

Honourable mention to LNOE, which had it's highest position at #10 itself, in the UK.

TBT doesn't have a top 10 hit on the wikipedia list, but I remember Adam saying it got to number 1 in Mexico.
 
LuckyNumber7 said:
I would say
A Celebration (youth forgiven)
All Because of You
Get on Your Boots

Boots not because it's not leaf single material (it is), but because it's an incredibly bad song.
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How is it possible that any track is both an incredibly bad song and lead single material? Makes no sense. The first job of a lead single is to be a good song.
 
All of the new songs, just because I've never been less interested in an upcoming U2 album. All of the new stuff sucks to varying degrees.

Boots of course. It sunk NLOTH immediately despite all of the good tracks on there.

Fire was a pretty craptastic single in its day too.
 
Iggy Fizz said:
How is it possible that any track is both an incredibly bad song and lead single material? Makes no sense. The first job of a lead single is to be a good song.
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A lead single is supposed to be catchy and arguably poppy. Its supposed to lure you in for more listening. It's not supposed to be the "best" song on the album. That's so subjective - beyond the subjective determination of a lead single.

A lead single is CRAFTED to be a lead single. Catchy hooks, simple pop chord progressions that you know and love, a rhythm you tap your foot to...

A song can absolutely meet that criteria and be dreadfully basic, bland, flat out annoying, and have awful lyrics. Just look at Maroon 5 - a lot of their music is lead single worthy, and it's all bad.
 
Like, you don't think a band writes an album and then just chooses a lead single? They know from the start what their potentials are for a lead single, before they're done writing.

U2's huge problem is it seems since Vertigo they've spent way too long worrying about how to craft a "big hit" lead single, that it leads to overproduction, too many chefs, a manufactured and basic sound, and an abomination to their creativity.
 
LuckyNumber7 said:
Like, you don't think a band writes an album and then just chooses a lead single? They know from the start what their potentials are for a lead single, before they're done writing.

U2's huge problem is it seems since Vertigo they've spent way too long worrying about how to craft a "big hit" lead single, that it leads to overproduction, too many chefs, a manufactured and basic sound, and an abomination to their creativity.
Click to expand...
Paragraph 1... Some do, some don't. I think it varies. We've all read stories of acts who went and completed an album and were sent back by the record company to come up with a single, but at the same time many singles simply come organically and aren't specifically created for that reason.

Paragraph 2... 100%
 
LuckyNumber7 said:
All Because of You represents the first
time since U2 made it big where the quality of the single was total garbage. I can't think of a single I forget of less - fully equipped with the trite U2 chorus -title but lacking an interesting or otherwise unique sound. And the worst part? It was surrounded by enough decent singles that they didn't *have* to release it. I think it's the mark of their decline - it's where their judgement clearly started to diminish.
.
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Agree 100%. But I despise the song, so I'm biased.
 
Boots. Awful song, one of the worst U2 have ever written and released, yet they made it their lead single to the more "experimental" NLOTH :doh:
 
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