The Musical Journy of Lady With The Spinning Head?

[quadcaster]

Hey all,

I'd love to know a bit more about this awesome song. Obviously the band came to a point where they decided that the verses would become The Fly and the chorus would become Ultraviolet. What point of making Achtung Baby do we think this occured? Do we have much info on the tune?

Chris

 

[santiago]

Hi, this is one of my favourite songs ever, particularly the Extended Dance remix by Alan Moulder (which in fact has many elements from earlier versions of the track).

I'm not sure whether you're familiar with the demo version that is on the Salomé tapes? It's musically very similar to the extended dance remix, and features two sets of vocal takes from Bono. Interestingly enough in this version, the bridge (the section with the echoy drums in the remix) has an early version of the Ultraviolet intro vocals.


YouTube - U2 - Take you down / Wake up dead man (Mix version)


To make things more complicated, the lyrics Bono sings feature the lyrics "wake up, dead man" prominently, so they were already playing with that idea at that time.

And One was reported to come from two different new sections the Edge wrote for Ultraviolet at Hansa studios Berlin and then Lanois and Bono suggested that he plays both parts together as a song.

So to recap, Lady with the spinning head is related to many later u2 songs and exists in three beautiful versions (counting the demo).

If anyone knows more, I'd be glad to hear it!

 

[santiago]

Hmmm... I'm at work so can't check the video, but the image looks a bit dodgy. Hopefully the audio is ok. I'll check from home.

 

[trevgreg]

Why am I seeing the Backstreet Boys in that video pic, lol.

Always loved Lady With The Spinning Head and that particular demo for it. It does neatly show how parts of it went into The Fly and Ultra Violet in the end... and that bridge with the lyrics that sound like the intro to UV makes that later connection all the more apparent. Kinda neat how One kind of spun out of it unintentionally as well. Imagine that!

 

[Larry's girl]

Love it, love it, love it

"Lady with the spinnig head" deserved to be included on AB. It's one of my favorite U2 songs and demo version from Salome sessions is great too. Especially because you have 3 different amazing songs in one.
It would be really nice to hear "Lady" live this summer on tour. :fingers crossed:

 

[financeguy]

Lady with the Spinning Head has some interesting lyrics.

 

[AliEnvy]

It's cool that musically it spun off into The Fly, UV, One but lyrically it's closely aligned to Zoo Station.

Ready for the shuffle, ready for the deal.

 

[Melon50]

I know this is an old topic but for anyone interested... I tried to (re)mix all the spin-offs of UV1 (aka Take You Down) on the backing track of it. It's not a great "song" by any means but more of a proof-of-concept..

The basic track is the drums/bass/guitar from the AB demo, which I left intact but cut a little shorter. The original vocals I removed.

I then added (most of the actions starts after 2mins):

- The lead vocals from Lady with the spinning head (for the 1st half of the song)
- The Fly guitar Riff + Solo (up to the point where the songs take a different chord direction)
- Lemon! I added the "Midnight" piano + vocals (had to change pitch/tempo of that though)
- The start vocals from Ultraviolet (Light my Way) which fitted in the "break" after the solo
- From the same song I added Edge's backing vocals and Bono's "baby, baby, baby" part
- And at the very end the guitar part that ends The Fly, and there I cut the basic track to end

https://youtu.be/a2yMl5cb734

 

[one_cool_dude17]

I know this is an old topic but for anyone interested... I tried to (re)mix all the spin-offs of UV1 (aka Take You Down) on the backing track of it. It's not a great "song" by any means but more of a proof-of-concept..

The basic track is the drums/bass/guitar from the AB demo, which I left intact but cut a little shorter. The original vocals I removed.

I then added (most of the actions starts after 2mins):

- The lead vocals from Lady with the spinning head (for the 1st half of the song)
- The Fly guitar Riff + Solo (up to the point where the songs take a different chord direction)
- Lemon! I added the "Midnight" piano + vocals (had to change pitch/tempo of that though)
- The start vocals from Ultraviolet (Light my Way) which fitted in the "break" after the solo
- From the same song I added Edge's backing vocals and Bono's "baby, baby, baby" part
- And at the very end the guitar part that ends The Fly, and there I cut the basic track to end

Hey there! I’d love to hear this but it says the video is private & wont let me watch it. Can you PM me a link for it?

 

[Zooptom]

EU am still expecting to listen it on live