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Any Rattle and Hum studio only track list has to start with Hawkmoon. Great album opener.

Here's the list I've been playing:

1. Hawkmoon 269
2. Desire
3. Van Diemen's Land
4. Angel of Harlem
5. Love Rescue Me
6. When Love Comes to Town
7. Silver and Gold
8. Heartland
9. God Part II
10. All I Want is You
 
Mine doesn't.

Rattle And Hum isn't an atmospheric album like TUF or TJT. Considering it's mostly paying homage to old-school rock and roll, Desire seems to me to be the most fitting. It's upbeat and not too dense, and like its classic predecessors, short and to the point.

Hawkmoon is too epic and doesn't really represent the album as well. It fits better as a centerpiece where the listener has become fully engaged with the album.

This is the list I've been using for quite some time:

"Side One"
1. Desire
2. Angel Of Harlem
3. Heartland
4. Hawkmoon 269
5. Van Diemen's Land
6. Hallelujah Here She Comes

"Side Two"
7. When Love Comes To Town
8. Love Rescue Me
9. A Room At The Heartbreak Hotel
10. God Part II
11. All I Want Is You


*Silver & Gold omitted because I'm only using studio tracks
 
Mine doesn't.

Rattle And Hum isn't an atmospheric album like TUF or TJT. Considering it's mostly paying homage to old-school rock and roll, Desire seems to me to be the most fitting. It's upbeat and not too dense, and like its classic predecessors, short and to the point.

Hawkmoon is too epic and doesn't really represent the album as well. It fits better as a centerpiece where the listener has become fully engaged with the album.

This is the list I've been using for quite some time:

"Side One"
1. Desire
2. Angel Of Harlem
3. Heartland
4. Hawkmoon 269
5. Van Diemen's Land
6. Hallelujah Here She Comes

"Side Two"
7. When Love Comes To Town
8. Love Rescue Me
9. A Room At The Heartbreak Hotel
10. God Part II
11. All I Want Is You


*Silver & Gold omitted because I'm only using studio tracks

Can we omit "When Love Come to Town" and maybe leave it at 10 tracks?
 
Hallelujah Here She Comes and Heartbreak Hotel are two of my favourite tracks from that era. Love them.
:up:

Yes - it seems like U2 doing what they want at that moment - and I love that.

Since POP, they seem to have lost that sense of freedom. Everything since then seems forced and uneasy. There are still moments of brilliance and they are still better than 99% of everything out there. But I think they are at their best when they are not concerned with hits.

I remember reading a review of JT (maybe Rolling Stone?) and it essentially said - great record, no obvious hits. What an awesome compliment! (and how ironic that it was their most commercially successful album). Just make the music you want and don't worry about if you have #1 hits. How often have you heard a song from Loveless on the radio. Never. Yet - it's regarded as a masterpiece - and certainly one of my all time favorites.

I hope U2 takes that approach in this next decade. They just stay and studio like the Beatles did for a few years - and truly do what no band has ever done (based on the previous pages of this thread) and that is to have TWO separate five year windows of genius.
 
Yes we certainly can, AEON, yes we certainly can.... How do you feel about the studio version of R&H, by the way?

I'm digging it. It's sort of bittersweet. I kind of get "If only they..." feelings...

BUT, the ashes of the official R&H gave birth to Achtung Baby - which to me, is the pinnacle of rock. I was 21 when it came out and it was the ANSWER...
 
It's probably been a year, maybe two, since I've heard Hawkmoon - damn! I almost forgot how much I LOVE this song!
 
FAIL goes The Black Album. That sellout shit doesn't belong on a list with the others.

The Black Album is incredible and totally not a sellout album. They shortened the songs but it's still heavy as shit.
 
Hiring Bob Rock (who produced the poppy crossover Dr. Feelgood for Mötley Crüe) was the first sign.

It's not just that the songs are shorter--listen to those cheesy guitar fills on Enter Sandman. Or the weak and sensitive Nothing Else Matters. Or that emasculated chorus on The Unforgiven. The album is a concession to getting radio play.

Really sad step down from And Justice For All, not to mention the glorious Puppets.
 
Hiring Bob Rock (who produced the poppy crossover Dr. Feelgood for Mötley Crüe) was the first sign.

It's not just that the songs are shorter--listen to those cheesy guitar fills on Enter Sandman. Or the weak and sensitive Nothing Else Matters. Or that emasculated chorus on The Unforgiven. The album is a concession to getting radio play.

Really sad step down from And Justice For All, not to mention the glorious Puppets.

Hell yes. You can tell we are of the same generation.
It was a gargantuan step down from Justice. I can't name one redeeming song on that album. Maybe, I stress maybe Don't Tread On me.

The Black Album is the single biggest sell-out of my lifetime.
And I don't use that term "sell-out" very loosely/often.

It was practically the polar opposite of what they were before. Forget commerce, I am talking creatively, musically. Completely anti...that sort of thing. It was nothing short of a betrayal at that time.

I don't blame them for wanting to evolve. But like that? No. Never.
 
I respect them for trying something so foreign to them. It's probably their most experimental record in terms of stretching the boundaries of what they do. Their 91-97 work is clearly more original, but it also taps into their roots because they mainly come from 70s art rock and post punk.

This is the way I always thought of Rattle & Hum. For trying something new to them. They we're trying to pay homage to American music, partly the blues, partly soul, partly Dylan. That's why the album is all over the place. I never really would count this as one of their regular albums. It's more like a "greatest hits" album of America. Plus a soundtrack. But It's still in my top 6 albums made by them. Some great tunes and some that don't seem finished: Hawkmoon.
 
I don't blame them for wanting to evolve. But like that? No. Never.

Just curious. You'd be happy if Metallica kept playing the way they did from teens to their mid-twenties? Wouldn't you get bored and eventually outgrow their style?

Wonder what it would have been like if U2 kept playing the same way from their teens to mid-twenties. No TUF, JT, AB. So were they sellouts too because all Bono wants is to be on the radio and be #1?
 
We're all entitled to our opinion, but I obviously have to disagree with pretty much everything you said except for the four songs you praise. I have to say I don't really understand how you can suggest 'When Love Comes to Town' has "absurd" lyrics. This stanza is particularly brilliant:

I was there when they crucified my Lord
I held the scabbard when the soldier drew his sword
I threw the dice when they pierced his side
But I've seen love conquer the great divide

The last line has nothing to with the preceding three. It's moronic.
 
The last line has nothing to with the preceding three. It's moronic.

Often Bono (and many others) use the word love for God or Jesus. Here it is both Jesus and his love.

To Bono - the love of Jesus is all forgiving and can conquer all.

I think the lyrics in this song are great, but I still don't care for it too much.

This is a rare occasion for me - this is a song where I like the lyrics but don't like the music. Lately, it's been the other way around.
 
I really don't get why this transition has appeared on three lists. Drunk Chicken >>> Bad would make as much sense.

I always found it to be a great transition. Bono's "Stop" ("Stop it"?) and that abrupt ending followed by the strums of the guitar from AIWIY.

If you look at the previous album, Exit didn't sound like the rest of the album, its cacophony well placed near the end, followed by a more downbeat coda (a similar strategy seen on TUF, Pop, War, and Zooropa).

You also have God Pt II's doubly-ironic line "you glorify the past when the future dries up", as the band has been paying homage for most of the album, but on this song is definitely putting a foot forward into the sound they would explore on Achtung Baby. So in this regard it functions best in a meta-fashion by being right at the end.


Just curious. You'd be happy if Metallica kept playing the way they did from teens to their mid-twenties? Wouldn't you get bored and eventually outgrow their style?

And what style was that, pray tell? The band was doing both shorter tracks and longer epics. They also had slower tracks like Fade To Black, Sanitarium, and One. It wasn't about a certain style but a diversity of approach, and Ride The Lightning, Master Of Puppets, and And Justice For All don't all sound alike. With the Black Album, everything just became shorter and more radio-friendly. That's not progression, it's concession.

wow! More than REM's "Green"?

Green at least had Orange Crush, You Are The Everything, and World Leader Pretend. But that album is definitely a huge drop in quality and substance.
 
Hiring Bob Rock (who produced the poppy crossover Dr. Feelgood for Mötley Crüe) was the first sign.

It's not just that the songs are shorter--listen to those cheesy guitar fills on Enter Sandman. Or the weak and sensitive Nothing Else Matters. Or that emasculated chorus on The Unforgiven. The album is a concession to getting radio play.

Really sad step down from And Justice For All, not to mention the glorious Puppets.

Absolutley spot on :up:

(it pains me to admit/agree :wink:)
 
Mine doesn't.

Rattle And Hum isn't an atmospheric album like TUF or TJT. Considering it's mostly paying homage to old-school rock and roll, Desire seems to me to be the most fitting. It's upbeat and not too dense, and like its classic predecessors, short and to the point.

Hawkmoon is too epic and doesn't really represent the album as well. It fits better as a centerpiece where the listener has become fully engaged with the album.

This is the list I've been using for quite some time:

"Side One"
1. Desire
2. Angel Of Harlem
3. Heartland
4. Hawkmoon 269
5. Van Diemen's Land
6. Hallelujah Here She Comes

"Side Two"
7. When Love Comes To Town
8. Love Rescue Me
9. A Room At The Heartbreak Hotel
10. God Part II
11. All I Want Is You


*Silver & Gold omitted because I'm only using studio tracks

OK - This is the playlist I listened to last night and all morning so far (but I kept the studio version of Silver and Gold, it fits perfect between A Room... and God Part II).

I must concede - this would have been a 4 out of 5 star album. Perhaps with a little more work shortening some of the drawn-out endings, a 5 star album. Sure, When Love Comes to Town isn't my favorite, but it's okay and it does belong the album.

It comes across as a bit raw and organic - and a wonderful embellishment of the Joshua Tree vibe in the same way Zooropa was to Achtung Baby. Had they put this out with a better album title and in the same manner they did as Zooropa - it would have probably been considered a classic.
 
Just curious. You'd be happy if Metallica kept playing the way they did from teens to their mid-twenties? Wouldn't you get bored and eventually outgrow their style?

Wonder what it would have been like if U2 kept playing the same way from their teens to mid-twenties. No TUF, JT, AB. So were they sellouts too because all Bono wants is to be on the radio and be #1?

I said explicitly in the quote you used that I don't blame them for wanting to evolve - just not in that specific way. What more did I need to say? I wish Pearl Jam would evolve one of these years too. But just because I wish PJ would become more musically adventurous doesn't mean I want to them to make an album evocative of Maroon 5.

And the absolute harsh truth, as much as some won't want to hear it - is that ATYCLB was a distant 'cousin' to the Black Album. But U2 wanted to be on the radio and #1 in 1980. That said, ATYCLB was definitely pandering.

Anyway, I've had that U2 conversation for over a decade on this forum, so I am leaving it alone. Just know, I'm not some dude who heard about Metallica in the early 90's and retroactively deduced that the Black Album was a sell-out. I was into Puppets and Justice when I was 13, 14 years old in '88/'89. This was part of my formative years as a fan of non-mainstream rock.

In 1988/89/90, Metallica dramatically, vociferously, stood against everything having to do with cock-rock, hair-band bullshit. They made exactly one music video in the 80's. And then they went out and hired Bob Rock and made a neutered radio-friendly pile of shit. Why? Even Lars will tell you they wanted a #1 album (etc.) That's different from U2 or REM in a lot of ways but most notably because Metallica were THE standard-bearer for being an alternative to ass-rock in the 80's. Even Cobain was a fan of theirs back then.

I had a few close friends who were (real) hardcore punks. They felt the same way about Green Day, for one example, when they made their breakthrough in '93 but even that was not comparable to what Metallica did.
 
wow! More than REM's "Green"?

Not even close. REM and practically all "indie", post-punk or college-radio bands, make effectively 'pop music'. There is no great wonder that it has or would have commercial appeal. Mostly it's a question of exposure. I'm not saying REM didn't covet more of that mainstream success with Green, I'm just saying it's not comparable to what Metallica did. What Metallica did was to explicitly do the OPPOSITE of how they made their bones in order to have commercial success. If the Black Album was not a 'sell-out' then sell-outs in rock simply do not exist.
 
Anyway, I've had that U2 conversation for over a decade on this forum, so I am leaving it alone. Just know, I'm not some dude who heard about Metallica in the early 90's and retroactively deduced that the Black Album was a sell-out. I was into Puppets and Justice when I was 13, 14 years old in '88/'89. This was part of my formative years as a fan of non-mainstream rock.

In 1988/89/90, Metallica dramatically, vociferously, stood against everything having to do with cock-rock, hair-band bullshit. They made exactly one music video in the 80's. And then they went out and hired Bob Rock and made a neutered radio-friendly pile of shit. Why? Even Lars will tell you they wanted a #1 album (etc.)

Exactly.

I was an even bigger fan of Iron Maiden back in the day, and while their approach became more sophisticated over the same period, even introducing synthesizers, the evolution was gradual and there was a lot less fan discontent as a result.

Metallica continued their sellout as the went in a more "alternative" direction with Load and Reload, in an attempt to ride the wave of post-Nirvana trends.

And when they went back to being "hard" and stripped down with St. Anger, in an attempt to reclaim their former thrash glory, it just sounded so empty. I liked Frantic to a certain extent but yeah they're basically done.
 
Exactly.

I was an even bigger fan of Iron Maiden back in the day, and while their approach became more sophisticated over the same period, even introducing synthesizers, the evolution was gradual and there was a lot less fan discontent as a result.

And all that has happened for Maiden, is that they have become increasingly more and more popular and more respected in the hard rock community. You could even argue that they are currently considered THE greatest pure metal band of all time within that community. They never did what Priest did. Or certainly any other unfortunate examples which I will not use.

And it certainly wasn't just because they 'stuck to their guns', it was because they made some pretty amazing music that progressed. Slayer 'stuck to their guns' too and you could buy their third, fourth and fifth albums ('86-'90) and own the effective extent of their creative output. In other words, I am a HUGE fan of evolution of sound. Even if it's Madonna. I don't blame Metallica for wanting to do something different - I just blame them for what they DID.
 
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