spanisheyes
Forum Moderator, The Goal Is Soul
This day in U2 history, February 12, 1997, U2 announce PopMart at a New York city
K-Mart. U2 appear at a Manhattan K-Mart store to announce tour dates for their
upcoming "PopMart" world tour. The band answers questions from the media and performs "Holy Joe" live on a makeshift stage in the lingerie section of the
store. The event is broadcast live on MTV and VH-1 in the U.S., on Much Music network in Canada, and elsewhere around the world on TV and radio.
A year later, on February 12, 1998, one day after playing in Santiago, Chile, Bono visits a cemetery there and uses the opportunity to call on former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet to account for the fate of those taken away, and presumably killed, during his regime. Bono is surrounded by several mothers of the missing.
From the opening of Popmart in K-Mart, in the lingerie section, singing 'Holy Joe', a song that would not even appear on the album Pop, but as a b-side to Discoteque stands in such contrast to a year later when Bono appears in a cemetary, asking for justice along with 'Mothers of the Disappeared' from Chilean dictator Pinochet as to the whereabouts of their children, their husbands, their lovers, their fathers.
From capitalism to justification from injustice, we see U2 moving into the fabric of societies, in one case mocking the riches of one, to the pleading of another in whose hands have spilled the blood of the innocent, who have almost vanished into oblivion, while the voices of their living sing...
Midnight, our sons and daughters
Were cut down and taken from us
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat
In the wind we hear their laughter
In the rain we see their tears
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat
Night hangs like a prisoner
Stretched over black and blue
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat
In the trees our sons stand naked
Through the walls our daughters cry
See their tears in the rainfall
Call Popmart what you may, but for me it was a year where U2 stretched themselves into wartorn countries, into countries that were once seathing with ethnic hatred, as well as countries who are wealthy to the point that Popmart did not look at all out of place.
But Bono never did lose sight of speaking out about the injustices that he saw all around him, choosing not to remain silent, but use his songs, his voice to bring about change, bring about hope, bring about courage to the faces of those marred from years of suffering and uncertainty.
It is U2 using rock and roll as a vehicle to challenge us spiritually, politically, and socially is why I've come to love and appreciate this band so much. Even at times when creating an extravaganza of the senses in Popmart that was extraordinary in what it represented as far as art in contrast, songs of brilliance, as well as reaching into borders once unreachable with the message in U2's songs, and in Bono's heart and soul.
Chris
K-Mart. U2 appear at a Manhattan K-Mart store to announce tour dates for their
upcoming "PopMart" world tour. The band answers questions from the media and performs "Holy Joe" live on a makeshift stage in the lingerie section of the
store. The event is broadcast live on MTV and VH-1 in the U.S., on Much Music network in Canada, and elsewhere around the world on TV and radio.
A year later, on February 12, 1998, one day after playing in Santiago, Chile, Bono visits a cemetery there and uses the opportunity to call on former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet to account for the fate of those taken away, and presumably killed, during his regime. Bono is surrounded by several mothers of the missing.
From the opening of Popmart in K-Mart, in the lingerie section, singing 'Holy Joe', a song that would not even appear on the album Pop, but as a b-side to Discoteque stands in such contrast to a year later when Bono appears in a cemetary, asking for justice along with 'Mothers of the Disappeared' from Chilean dictator Pinochet as to the whereabouts of their children, their husbands, their lovers, their fathers.
From capitalism to justification from injustice, we see U2 moving into the fabric of societies, in one case mocking the riches of one, to the pleading of another in whose hands have spilled the blood of the innocent, who have almost vanished into oblivion, while the voices of their living sing...
Midnight, our sons and daughters
Were cut down and taken from us
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat
In the wind we hear their laughter
In the rain we see their tears
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat
Night hangs like a prisoner
Stretched over black and blue
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat
In the trees our sons stand naked
Through the walls our daughters cry
See their tears in the rainfall
Call Popmart what you may, but for me it was a year where U2 stretched themselves into wartorn countries, into countries that were once seathing with ethnic hatred, as well as countries who are wealthy to the point that Popmart did not look at all out of place.
But Bono never did lose sight of speaking out about the injustices that he saw all around him, choosing not to remain silent, but use his songs, his voice to bring about change, bring about hope, bring about courage to the faces of those marred from years of suffering and uncertainty.
It is U2 using rock and roll as a vehicle to challenge us spiritually, politically, and socially is why I've come to love and appreciate this band so much. Even at times when creating an extravaganza of the senses in Popmart that was extraordinary in what it represented as far as art in contrast, songs of brilliance, as well as reaching into borders once unreachable with the message in U2's songs, and in Bono's heart and soul.
Chris
