No Line just sneaks behind my top 5, I'd probably rank it at number 6 on my list of U2 albums. I've said before this one's my favorite of the band's work from this past decade. The other two albums I loved as well, but there were a couple songs here and there that didn't grab me as much. This one, however, I love all of the songs on it. The middle part of the album may not have the "strongest" of songs in terms of album flow (and while I like the song itself and find it incredibly fun to dance to, I
hate the title for "Stand Up Comedy"), but I still like the songs themselves.
Top 5 picks would probably be, in no particular order:
1. "Magnificent" Sounds like classic U2.
2. "Moment Of Surrender" Every time I hear this one I feel like I should be getting baptized somewhere, out in some open desert land under a late afternoon/early evening sun. That's always the image that I think of, and I really like that image, for some reason. It's very...peaceful, or something.
3. "White As Snow" Speaking of songs with great imagery... I
love this one, it's so unusual for U2 and just utterly gorgeous. I'm a sucker for winter-themed songs
.
4. "Breathe" Love how this is sung, love the music, love the big, brash, rumbling sound of it all, this song just rocks.
5. "Cedars Of Lebanon" Excellent lyrics in this one. Follows in the vein of "Sunday Bloody Sunday" and "Please"-the first song was full of anger and rebellion, the second full of sadness and pleading, and now "Cedars", full of resignation and warning. Normally there's hope in U2's political songs, this one doesn't seem to have much of it, if any, and I find that an interesting change for them.
Haven't heard much in the way of live versions, and heard none of the remixes for any of the songs off here, so I can't comment on how the studio versions compare to those. But "Get On Your Boots" and "Stand Up Comedy"-I don't get why people are so bothered by those songs. If that sort of sound isn't your thing, that's fine. It's just that I hear all the time about how U2's always so serious, and yet when they let loose with the occasional fun, dance type of song, people don't like it. And I like "I'll Go Crazy...", too. To each their own, though, I guess
.
I'll be very curious to see where they go from here. There's a few sounds in this album I'd like to hear them do a bit more with (a la "Moment Of Surrender" or "White As Snow"), and I'd love to hear the hymn type stuff they were planning to do as well. But if they decide to veer into an entirely different course or do more with the songs they've been playing on tour or whatever, that's fine, too. I look forward to hearing anything else they do down the line.
Angela