Daniel Lanois quote in EW

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Yes, the interview is very recent. As was the airing of the documentary on BBC4. But that documentary was during the making of NLOTH.
The article isn't that clear, but in my view, those are 2 separate things (the interview for his new album and the documentary).

i suppose Occam's Razor dictates that you are correct. the article should be more clear. don't they know how we pour over every syllable in these things for info?

ha!

meanwhile i like how supposedly both NLOTH and VLV produced "enough material for two albums" and yet we haven't heard peep from U2 or Coldplay since. Eno must just have that effect on people. Bless 'em
 
meanwhile i like how supposedly both NLOTH and VLV produced "enough material for two albums" and yet we haven't heard peep from U2 or Coldplay since. Eno must just have that effect on people. Bless 'em
Well, at least we got Prospekt's March from Coldplay.
 
It just occured to me that Daniel Lanois' Here Is What Is (the album) might've offered us some insights to what Songs of Ascent might've been.

The songs on Here Is What Is are kind of meditative, naturally with some pedal-steel tracks in there. The discussions with Brian Eno where they reflect and discuss on some topics which then lead into the next track of the record provide a certain feel too. Don't forget that those were recorded while in Fez with U2 ;).

(I tired to find out if there was anything that could be deciphered from the background noises a while back, but nothing much apart from some flutes and swallows)

The two albums came together in parallel after all...either that or I am just making things up again. :lol:
 
If it weren't for this quote, I would think that it's interesting to have Lillywhite, Daniel Lanois, Danger Mouse and U2 in the same city at this time. Maybe they would have been trying to finish Songs of Ascent and the Danger Mouse album if it Danny hadn't said otherwise:(
 
it looks as if the guitar driven version came more from the demo, but then at some point they thought it needed to be more atmospheric and that's when orbit's version came in. :shrug:


thanks for putting up that demo version. I hadn't heard that in a real long time. There were many guitar parts that I had missed.
 
Lanois is interviewed in the new Rolling Stone.. some thoughts on Horizon:

Daniel Lanois Talks Recent Successes, Frustrations | Rolling Stone Music
Lanois isn't involved with any of U2's upcoming projects, but he says he keeps in regular touch with Bono. "Bono took advantage of his back injury and brought the band into the studio," Lanois says. "I haven't heard anything yet, but I'm sure it's adventurous." Lanois was heavily involved with U2's 2009 disc No Line On The Horizon, which didn't live up to commercial expectations.

Superstar producer Steve Lillywhite, who also worked on the disc, recently made headlines when he gently criticized the album. "They did not have the one song that ignited peoples imaginations," he said. "It's a pity because the whole idea of Morocco as a big idea was great. When the big idea for U2 is good, that is when they succeed the most, but I don't think the spirit of what they set out to achieve was translated. Something happened that meant it did not come across on the record."

Lanois says he doesn't totally agree with that assessment. "Steve came in late into the project so he would have a late-in-the-project perspective," he says. "The record started out brilliantly. We were just full of life when we started it in Morocco. Bono wanted to make a gospel record for the future. The first third of the record was filled with delight and we really hit on something special. We spent a long time on it, perhaps too long. The usual pressures came in at the end, like what's the first single going to be and what's gonna be in the set. If we had put out the record coming out of Morocco it would have been an amazing record, even at that stage."
 
I hope to hear the pre-lillywhite version of some of those songs in some future boxset someday..

Based on that Lanois soundbyte, they might sound the same as the post-Lillywhite versions. But it's just U2, Eno and Lanois (and some Lillywhite) reworking it.
 
I hope to hear the pre-lillywhite version of some of those songs in some future boxset someday..
That would be great. From all this post-album talk you get the impression that those Moroccan sessions were absoluetly amazing and that the songs were better then.
 
Ugh I get so tired of talk of record sales. It's so depressing to know that U2 cares so much about them. U2 seemed super psyched about NLOTH and when it doesn't sell well (by U2 standards... it still sold a butt load) they have to turn around and rag on it basically for being too creative and not easy enough for lame brains with no patience to digest. God forbid the music actually has some depth to it...


I completely agree with you. It's the same with these comments from Stve Lillywhite and now Daniel Lanois:

"The record started out brilliantly. We were just full of life when we started it in Morocco. Bono wanted to make a gospel record for the future. The first third of the record was filled with delight and we really hit on something special. We spent a long time on it, perhaps too long. The usual pressures came in at the end, like what's the first single going to be and what's gonna be in the set. If we had put out the record coming out of Morocco it would have been an amazing record, even at that stage."

I still remember how enthousiastic and blown away he was just after teh record came out...Now, after realising it was no that big radio hit and the lack of commercial success, he reacts like this.

I don't get those things. Cause 90% of the true music fans and U2 fans agree that NLOTH is much better than ATYCLB and HTDAAB...
 
Sure it is, but it could have been even more special if they had released an album from the Fez sessions, I've been harping on that since we caught those YouTube behind-the-scenes clips of the sessions and now we're hearing the same thing from Lanois... I can't wait for an anniversary release of NLOTH.
 
Daniel Lanois said:
The first third of the record was filled with delight and we really hit on something special. We spent a long time on it, perhaps too long. The usual pressures came in at the end, like what's the first single going to be and what's gonna be in the set. If we had put out the record coming out of Morocco it would have been an amazing record, even at that stage.http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/51942/234500
:drool:
C'mon, guys, just do a small digital/vinyl release of SOA. You know you want to...
 
I don't get those things. Cause 90% of the true music fans and U2 fans agree that NLOTH is much better than ATYCLB and HTDAAB...

well, count me as either 10% or "not a true music and/or u2 fan" then... at least as far as all that you can't leave behind is concerned, 'cause that album is superior to no line IMO.. by a healthy margin.
 
There is always going to be an amount of post-rationalization if an album doesn't sell as much as you thought or didn't produce any big hits. I'm sure if Pop had been a bigger success we would have heard nothing of this "it wasn't finished" BS.

I'm in the 90 % :drool:
 
Between the Eno and Lanois comments, it sounds like the band just became too comfortable with taking a very deliberate approach to being inspired and producing something unique. If you don't strike the right balance, you end up with something achingly safe and anything but inspired. You aim for "Achtung, Baby" and end up with "All That You Can't Leave Behind".

The band doesn't seem to know how to get out of its safe zone anymore. Attempts like the one-take version of NLOTH on the album end up sounding like flat, dull, Dad Rock. Bono thought it was an amazing, exciting thing to do. In theory, yes, but in practice "No Line on the Horizon 2" is more sonically adventurous. It's telling that the band couldn't see that. It appears the opening track on the album was more about going through the motions of what is expected to result in something innovative, rather than seeing what really broke some new ground.

Meanwhile, tracks like "Unknown Caller", "I'll Go Crazy if I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" and "Stand Up Comedy" are really at the core of everything that's wrong with the record.

The lyrics to "Unknown Caller" are embarrassingly cheesy, and betray the achingly beautiful musical intro. Gone are the lovely metaphors and timeless quality of earlier U2 (read: Pre 2000). Flood's book of forbidden lyrical clichés has been set aside. Here we have something that sounds instantly dated and uncomfortably calculated and lazy. It's like walking through a long gallery of Rembrant and Picasso paintings, only to run into a Thomas Kinkaid.

Never have the members of U2 sounded more uninspired and out of touch with themselves.

"I'll Go Crazy..." and "Stand Up Comedy" follow the same path of sounding like a bunch of old men trying to sound young, and like they're making exciting music they're excited about. It doesn't work. All three tracks land firmly within Dad Rock territory. For the first time, U2 sound old. Like 1980s Rolling Stones tracks. Do you remember more than one of them? Right, nobody does.

"Get on Your Boots" is like a sparkler that just dies a few seconds after you light it, while you wave it around and hope it comes back to life.

The album picks up creative steam after "Fez - Being Born" and never looks back.

No Line on the Horizon is what happens when you have a band that tries too hard to break out of the box they're in the process of building for themselves. Playing it safe while thinking they're taking risks. Working and reworking the same material until it suffocates under the pressure of spending six months to be spontaneous.

I'm well-aware that many of U2's best tracks took a while to come into their own in the studio. But something went very wrong here. Ironically, U2 did find a line - the fine one between working smart and working hard undoing your work. It's an easy one to cross, and the result is their 12th studio album.
 
Attempts like the one-take version of NLOTH on the album end up sounding like flat, dull, Dad Rock. Bono thought it was an amazing, exciting thing to do. In theory, yes, but in practice "No Line on the Horizon 2" is more sonically adventurous.
Dad rock? Sweet, give me more dad rock then... NLOTH2 reaks of trying too hard, the speed is too fast and the "punk" shouts at the end are pretty embarassing.

I didn't know NLOTH was apparently one take...:hmm:


The lyrics to "Unknown Caller" are embarrassingly cheesy, and betray the achingly beautiful musical intro. Gone are the lovely metaphors and timeless quality of earlier U2 (read: Pre 2000). Flood's book of forbidden lyrical clichés has been set aside. Here we have something that sounds instantly dated and uncomfortably calculated and lazy. It's like walking through a long gallery of Rembrant and Picasso paintings, only to run into a Thomas Kinkaid.
This is very confusing for Unknown Caller is nothing but a metaphor. And despise the use of Mac lingo I have no idea what is cliche or calculated about this song. Lyrically it's one of the bigger departures Bono has made in a long while.
 
Dad rock? Sweet, give me more dad rock then... NLOTH2 reaks of trying too hard, the speed is too fast and the "punk" shouts at the end are pretty embarassing.

I didn't know NLOTH was apparently one take...:hmm:



This is very confusing for Unknown Caller is nothing but a metaphor. And despise the use of Mac lingo I have no idea what is cliche or calculated about this song. Lyrically it's one of the bigger departures Bono has made in a long while.


Yeah re Unknown Caller - i think Bono was definitely innovative and ballsy. Im one of those who prefer NLOTH2 over NLOTH1, however i think NLOTH2 was still an outtake and needed some corrective work - Bono fucks up halfway through the second verse.
 
Dad rock? Sweet, give me more dad rock then... NLOTH2 reaks of trying too hard, the speed is too fast and the "punk" shouts at the end are pretty embarassing.

I didn't know NLOTH was apparently one take...:hmm:

We can agree to disagree.

This is very confusing for Unknown Caller is nothing but a metaphor. And despise the use of Mac lingo I have no idea what is cliche or calculated about this song. Lyrically it's one of the bigger departures Bono has made in a long while.

A departure says little about the destination. Where Bono actually takes the song is into comically bad lyrical territory. It sounds like it comes from terrible motivational posters on the wall of an office break room somewhere. The lyrics are just flat out embarrassing, and seem incongruous with what we know Bono to be capable of.
 
A departure says little about the destination. Where Bono actually takes the song is into comically bad lyrical territory. It sounds like it comes from terrible motivational posters on the wall of an office break room somewhere. The lyrics are just flat out embarrassing, and seem incongruous with what we know Bono to be capable of.

That's fine it just didn't fit into any of the description you gave. It is a metaphor, there's nothing "calculated" about it, and in order to be a cliche there would have to be an overabundance of songs about God speaking to you through technology... how many of those are out there? :scratch:
 
"NO"








:wink:

I just don't think they fit, they sound antagonizing or angry which doesn't seem to fit the song. The point I was trying to make to Doctor, which I feel was lost, was I trying to turn his approach back on himself and give him an opinion sold as fact type of response...
 
Unknown Caller may be my favorite from the album :drool:

Is it possible, that because you associated the lyrics for UC with these motivational posters on first listen, it keeps ruining it for you? I think these lyrics are brilliant and far from comically bad... and the music is far from Dad Rock. It sounds like nothing I've heard before except the chanting reminds me a little of something from Talking Heads Remain In Light, but that's an experimental record.
 
This is just my opinion, but I think the lyrics from Unknown Caller are embarrassingly and decidedly bad. I literally cringed and shook my head when this song was being played at the shows I attended last year.
 
This is one of those times that while I can completely understand why some people think they're totally cringe-worthy, I still actually really like them.

As opposed to a response of "what the hell, man. you're effing insane." It's more like "I know, I totally get it. But I love 'em!"

Ha.
 
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