I don't get it

[amniar]

Hello there. I am having a problem and I was wondering if people could help me.

I've listened to ATCYLB and I've listened to HTDAAB (I which they'd make the album titles shorter because I hate typing out acronyms, TBH).

Now, there are a fair few people on here who keep talking about how HTDAAB is like a second ATCYLB... like it's the same.

I'm not hearing this.

Am I going mad?

I admire ATCYLB and can appreciate the songwriting and the maturity of the record and maybe I'll appreciate it more when I get older, but it didn't excite me and I don't listen to it often.

However, after hearing HTDAAB I was delighted. It was much more exciting, had much more depth, was more interesting and was just better all round. In my opinion of course.

That said, even if I didn't like either of them, the pair do NOT sound all the similar in terms of style and the sonic landscape. I am struggling to understand people who say they are.

There isn't quite the leap from Rattle and Hum to Achtung Baby to Zooropa to Passengers to Pop to ATYCLB. Maybe that is what is confusing/upsetting certain people. Instead, it seems similar to the leap from War to Unforgettable Fire.

Or rather, it seems like they've gone back to square one with ATYCLB ("mmm, let's get our fans back") and are now expanding it a bit ("mmm, okay let's test the water a little").

That's what I think anyway. What do you all think?

 

[U2Kitten]

I don't hear it either, and it is a shame so many people are not 'getting' the new album

Sometimes I wonder if anything other than Pop II will satisfy some of the whiners here. They don't want the band to repeat themselves but they want more of Pop!

As I said in another thread, I don't think the band are holding back and being 'safe' and I don't see this album, or ATYCLB as being commercial. Nothing they have done has ever fit in with the current music scene of the time and it's all been at least relatively successful. U2 are like no other band. But I don't believe they have some huge groundbreaking experimental shit inside them they are holding back because they are afraid it won't sell. I believe what we got with this new album WAS U2, was exactly what was inside 4 guys in a studio over 3 years, and it came out on the record. They are obviously very proud of the finished product they worked so hard on. Like it or not, this is the band in 2004, there is no mysterious Pop II lurking inside them, just as there is no War II. Time to get over it.

 

[Aardvark747]

Dont agree with the ATYCLB - HTDAAB comparisons myself...

 

[melon]

I disliked ATYCLB, for the most part, and it bothered me enough over the past four years that I've been listening to Sigur Ros far more often than U2.

But I really like HTDAAB. If they take another four years to make another album, then, at least, I'll be sitting pretty in the meantime.

Melon

 

[Erin go bragh]

Hello there. I am having a problem and I was wondering if people could help me.

I've listened to ATCYLB and I've listened to HTDAAB (I which they'd make the album titles shorter because I hate typing out acronyms, TBH).

Now, there are a fair few people on here who keep talking about how HTDAAB is like a second ATCYLB... like it's the same.

I'm not hearing this.

Am I going mad?

I admire ATCYLB and can appreciate the songwriting and the maturity of the record and maybe I'll appreciate it more when I get older, but it didn't excite me and I don't listen to it often.

However, after hearing HTDAAB I was delighted. It was much more exciting, had much more depth, was more interesting and was just better all round. In my opinion of course.

That said, even if I didn't like either of them, the pair do NOT sound all the similar in terms of style and the sonic landscape. I am struggling to understand people who say they are.

There isn't quite the leap from Rattle and Hum to Achtung Baby to Zooropa to Passengers to Pop to ATYCLB. Maybe that is what is confusing/upsetting certain people. Instead, it seems similar to the leap from War to Unforgettable Fire.

Or rather, it seems like they've gone back to square one with ATYCLB ("mmm, let's get our fans back") and are now expanding it a bit ("mmm, okay let's test the water a little").

That's what I think anyway. What do you all think?

In reference to the point you make about transitions from one album to another, I'd say the road from Behind to Bomb is more along the lines of UF to JT than it is from War to UF. Just my thoughts anyways.

 

[amniar]

Re: Re: I don't get it

In reference to the point you make about transitions from one album to another, I'd say the road from Behind to Bomb is more along the lines of UF to JT than it is from War to UF. Just my thoughts anyways.

Thanks. That's probably more like it actually. I knew I was on to something though!

 

[dandy]

me either. ATYCLB is my least favourite of all the albums, and the bomb is the happiest i've been with a new release since (gasp) the joshua tree.

i don't see the bomb as the companion to ATYCLB. there are elements of ATYCLB in some of the songs, but i can hear elements of all their previous work in these songs. to me, the bomb is the culmination of 25 years of work, with the added bonus of still sounding fresh and relevant.

 

[GiacomoHoldini]

When I first listened to Atomic Bomb, I thought it sounded like All That You Can't, Mark II. That is, until I went back and listened to All That You Can't again. Then I realized that Atomic Bomb is much deeper, and stonger all the way around. The first four songs on All That You Can't are amazing, true classics, in my opinion, and nothing on Atomic Bomb equals those songs in sheer tunefulness. But after those four songs, All That You Can't gets a bit spotty, and sounds smaller in scale. I still think it is a great album, but Atomic Bomb sounds more solid throughout, and there is an indefinable greatness to the music that does not reveal itself until you've listened to it several times. It trades the melodicism on All That You Can't for a more spare, more austere, but also more satisfying internal grandeur. The similarity between Atomic Bomb and All That You Can't is superficial. On a deeper level, they are very different, and I am inclined to say that Atomic Bomb is the greater album.

-Edit-

For those who have only listened to the album once or twice, give it more time. I didn't really like the album at first, either. It takes a lot of time to unfold. I don't know if you'll end up liking it any better after ten listens, but I have really grown to love it after, say, five.

 

[No. 3.5]

I disliked ATYCLB, for the most part, and it bothered me enough over the past four years that I've been listening to Sigur Ros far more often than U2.

But I really like HTDAAB. If they take another four years to make another album, then, at least, I'll be sitting pretty in the meantime.

Melon

Theres nothing wrong with listening to sigur ros - although I haven't been able to get into their album with no name.

I'm hoping HTDAAB will grow on me - although saying that I've only had one listen so far. With my one listen the only comment I can make is that it seems to lack energy. Vertigo sends me into a frenzy of dancing and then nothing.

 

[amniar]

Theres nothing wrong with listening to sigur ros - although I haven't been able to get into their album with no name.

I'm hoping HTDAAB will grow on me - although saying that I've only had one listen so far. With my one listen the only comment I can make is that it seems to lack energy. Vertigo sends me into a frenzy of dancing and then nothing.

One listen?! Give it a chance Even I gave Rattle and Hum more than one go...

 

[melon]

Theres nothing wrong with listening to sigur ros - although I haven't been able to get into their album with no name.

Of course there's nothing wrong with Sigur Ros. But for a once-obsessed U2 fan as myself, it was disheartening to realize that another group had eclipsed them.

But, really, I'm happy that I'm no longer an obsessed U2 fan. It takes up way too much energy! Now I'm just a contented fan.

And as for Sigur Ros, I look forward to their new album (estimated for spring 2005) and tour eventually!

Melon

 

[ZeroDude]

Sigur Ros eclipsed U2, Radiohead they may have eclipsed but not U2, i gotta disagree........