U2DMfan
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it is the band most spiritual album since October
it seems hard to deny this, if not impossible
so why is it such a stretch that the middle 3 tracks fit this spirituality theme?
it seems stranger to me that they were just bunged it there for the sake of it
then when you look at the lyrics they do seem to be about a hands-on approach to spirituality
so why ridicule the idea that it is about an active approach to spirituality when given the facts it seems to make more sense than anything else?
Even though it's fair to say that by 2009, whatever faith I had left in say, 2004, pretty much has collapsed, I enjoy the 'gospel' feel of UC, MOS quite a whole lot. I think whatever they were trying there, new modern gospel, worked quite well. They could have done a whole album like that and my personal spiritual feelings aside, I think it would have been fan-fucking-tastic. Because I think it's sincere and it's also heartening, in a way. Also, musically it's a new territory for them. Still Haven't Found, with more color.
But I just don't buy the idea that those middle 3 songs fit into that vein.
Sounds like excuse making. Perhaps to a small extent, Crazy Tonight I could maybe, I stress maybe, feel that vibe but not Self Indulgent Crapedy or Get On Your Boots.
Boots is just a catchy rock single, end of story. Ok, female empowerment, whatever the hell spin Bonzo wants to put on it, is fine, it's just the catchy lead single to me and I like it well enough, doesn't need to be anything more than that.
SUC, is just the Cliff Notes version of what's been wrong with Bono and U2 for a decade. Almost down the very last note, from Bono's cliche's and over-bearing, self references to the generic faux funk, driven by a riff that I swear I wrote when I was in my 2nd year of playing the guitar. Just baseline, boring, and unremarkable. "Come all ye people" does not make a modern gospel song or at the least certainly (along with the greater whole) prevents it from working as one.
Crazy Tonight is somewhere in between these two songs, although I prefer the mood of the verses and think it has a pretty cool chorus (love the Mountain bit) I don't care for the falsetto throw and that heinous bridge, other than that, I can dig it, I just don't think it's remotely deep.
I don't think it has half the character of MOS or UC, which once again, prevents it from reaching a sincerity that could work for a person like me. I am not sure if I believe in the same things that Bono is singing about in MOS anymore but I sort of want to when I'm listening. On Crazy Tonight or Boots, or SUC, whatever spirituality is supposed to be there, I think reads as too casual to be anything other than the token thought drop.
"My ego is not really the enemy". An ego doesn't go on the voyage of discovery, an ego goes on a voyage of conquest, he's conflating the ideas because he's apologizing on behalf of himself. "Don't take me seriously but do...you see, I'm a contradiction, isn't it clever? Watch this I'm going to make fun of myself, so I can then preach to you once more..."
I don't even mind that Bono preaches, never did, that's part of what's endearing about him. When he was deadly sincere and self-righteous, it worked. When he was ironic about it, yet still serious in his message, it works because you know there is most certainly a point.
These 3 pop songs, whatever excuses are made about them, don't carry enough sincerity, for better or worse, to take as anything other than 3 songs that 'sounded cool' enough to fill the space before they got to the 'weirder' stuff. And that's fine as well, I just can't be sold that there has to be deep meaning in every single song just because Bono drops some 'terminology'.
Maybe all of this I just typed is pseudo-analytical babble but it's how the music makes me feel, so I am just offering a perspective.