Classic or Dud: U2

Good interview with Bono here:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/10/24/magazine/bono-interview.html

Every once in a while he does one of these, where he plays good sport and sort of takes the abuse while cleverly subverting the appearance of self-awareness to his (more or less) rhetorical advantage.

I want the whole band to know that I for one know NLOTH was meant to be them getting their art rock on again (flawed though it is).

The art rock aspect was not the problem. It's (at the very least) flawed because they wimped out on that promise.

Precisely

It’s a very good album despite the flaws. I think the iTunes album is really good as well, obv they fucked up the release so much though. If they’d just gone the traditional route and maybe dropped a song or two its legacy would be better. Unlike the much lesser followup it sounds like a respectably uncool and occasionally subtle album. I guess it says a lot about me as U2 fan that I still find some positives in Songs of Experience but the only thing SOE has on SOI is it not being slipped into everyone’s library. Their strengths (1984-1997) were their more artsy endeavors, and even several tracks found on Rattle and Hum managed to be pretty great in that vein.

yep. for such an ambitious group their career has been marked by several crises of confidence.

What the, Bono was not naturally black haired?!

https://scontent-ord5-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/323437554_876775090039239_2210211909803804679_n.jpg?_nc_cat=103&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=5cd70e&_nc_ohc=FjxHdajU2WcAX-jK6a2&tn=bnunni0g8BRzxpO7&_nc_ht=scontent-ord5-1.xx&oh=00_AfAoUoc8kOcJ2OvnRkMvad5RCPRwhKDQnbdhRJEXh-klDQ&oe=63CBBAEC

Wow, he looks so much better without the dye job.

lol, he looks like the Irish poet he's always fancied himself!

I just want to call him pappy now that I see the deep wrinkles streaming from his eyes and that distinct mouth/jawline he's got. I'm glad he's embracing the look and idea of being an old man. Kind of wish he had done that much earlier.

into silver fox bono <3

Should see Adam Clayton these days, he’s gone full bearded troubadour.

also a fan

lookin' good bono!

he looks fantastic, hope he keeps it that way

As seen out the car window this morning:

https://i.imgur.com/T7JmrE9.jpg

So the big news of course last night was U2's official announcement of their Las Vegas money printing venture, but the small print is that Larry will indeed be out. Replacement is some dude named Bram van den Berg.

Bram van 3000

How to Dismantle an Atomic Bram

That trailer is fucking cringe

your most important local news story the world must know about

I think the only U2 concert without all 4, to date, is one in Japan (?) when Clayton was hungover (?).

So this is a different ball game really. Makes U2 rather more like the Stones, Cure, or other band where lineup is variable.

I don't know more about the tour.

That was Sydney in November 1993, the day before the Zoo TV film was done (my fav concert film EVAH)

Kinda wish they'd just have retired from touring instead of replacing Larry. It's quite astonishing how long they've gone on with just the four of them and a bit sad to break that streak

I'd rather they'd just wait til Larry's well, and skip over the idea of a Vegas residency anyway.

My guess is with this also being kind of the big launch event for the Sphere thing is that there was a lot of legal wrangling to make it happen and it's probably really difficult for U2 to back out or postpone at this point. But yeah, I've never seen U2 and probably never will, but no Larry is a big bummer.

Yeah I didn't realize he was only undergoing surgery and plans to rejoin. They definitely should have waited for him, not like they need the money

Are there musical reasons for wanting Larry there, or is more about tradition and personnel continuity?

I like Larry and Adam fine bit (speaking as a drummer and occasional bass player), I think their parts are replicate. I would not say that of the other dudes

* but

** replicable

That's probably not wrong but, as noted above, it's exceedingly rare for a band to keep all of the original members this long into a career and it's a shame they couldn't wait a few more months or whatever for him.

I haven't seen the band live in 15 years but I imagine a younger drummer can probably add a lot more energy than Larry nowadays. I was only thinking of the continuity

Though I do think Larry's drumming in fantastic and distinctive on War and some of their early songs

Have to agree with the doubters here!

Inclined to say U2 without Larry Mullen Jr shouldn't happen, as long he's alive.

After this run they should have another Vegas run that is just Larry and three other guys.

Larry Mullen Jr. and the Drifters live in Las Vegas

Kinda wish they'd just have retired from touring instead of replacing Larry. It's quite astonishing how long they've gone on with just the four of them and a bit sad to break that streak

It really is impressive. What other band has managed to perform with the same exact group intact for 40+ years? I don't think there's anyone even close.

Up until the other year ZZ Top would like to have a word.

Larry Mullen Jr.'s U2 Experience

xp Ah, of course - seriously regret missing their show at the Beacon back in 2012. (Wanted to go but didn't have enough money at the time.)

(This specific question came up on Twitter a couple of years back -- other candidates could include Los Lobos, who did expand their lineup but retained the same core since the early 70s as well. Oddly enough the Fixx are a good candidate as well, if just after U2, and one member did step away for a long while, but was never officially replaced.)

Duos meantime are trickier subjects. Sparks is well over fifty years old at this point but then again it's always been Ron & Russell plus whoever else so it doesn't totally count.

If it's with Larry's blessing, cool. But if not -- as strongly implied by the Washington Post piece -- then no, they obviously shouldn't play without him. And it's less "oh, most drummers can play those parts" and more "when Bono wiggles his left earlobe, Larry knows to play ___" or whatever. I don't know if they still do this, but in the Under A Blood Red Sky video you can see Bono giving Larry signals behind his back.

If Larry's maladies are drumming-related (which, like his back surgery, it sounds like they are), I wish he'd talk more about them, and show how younger drummers can avoid bad habits.

And the Four Tops had a 44-year-run with the same lineup (1953-1997).

Larry going on the injured list for a bunch of residency gigs isn't a big thing imo, the weirder thing is the residency. but it might be cool idk, i'm into the idea of them revisiting Achtung Baby, though i'd rather they used this as a jumping off point for making actually making some forward thinking music again. aside from a bunch of NLOTH, they left that behind w/Pop.

Again I like Larry and see the virtue of waiting. However, the timing is about breaking in a new venue, so I kinda get it.

If you think you need the -ahem- WORLD'S BIGGEST ROCK BAND -ahem- to christen your stage, you're not gonna be satisfied with, like, I dunno, Semisonic. Your pristine space-age rafters need to reverberate with the bombastic belting of a Bruce or a Billy or a Bono.

For good or for ill, there are just not a lot of acts operating at that level. I can see why Team Hewson thought it needed to be them, even if they were a man short - if only to avoid it being the Stones or Elton John or REM or Green Day or T-Swizzle or whomsoever.

Compare Mr. Joel closing Shea Stadium with a marquee residency. For which he pointedly brought along a background singer named Paulrus McCartney CH MBE BLT.

In short I can see why an appetite for Iconic Event pageantry might eclipse other considerations.

R.E.M.'s never reuniting!!

Not keen on the idea of a Vegas residency, am keen on them revisiting Achtung Baby, puzzled why they're only doing it now though. The anniversary was two years ago and so was the last Achtung box set.

Also if they're doing Achtung then are they implicitly also committing more fully to the ZooTV nostalgia that they've only dabbled with over time (the Achtung mini-sets on the Vertigo tour and their 2011 performances [Glasto etc.], plus the face-filter MacPhisto from the last tour)?

Iirc, they missed the anniversary for the Joshua Tree Redux tour, too, right?

That tour was 2017 but they did an extra leg in Asia/Oz/NZ in 2019, the other side of the Experience + Innocence Tour