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The Nation's Pulse
Stuck in a Moment
In the midst of a week residency on Late Night with David Letterman, on the eve of announcing a massive fall tour of football stadiums, and in the wake of Tuesday's release of No Line on the Horizon, U2 should feel on top of the world. Instead, everything about the Irish rock band suggests the come down, the hangover.
The past decade's Christmastime releases of three greatest hits packages, a digital box set, and numerous concert DVDs are a sign to U2's true believers that their favorite foursome has made the regression from a relevant it band to a greatest hits act. If all that didn't make the point, then the group's new album, No Line on the Horizon, and the near five-year gap between releases that introduced Bono to a new generation of potential fans as a politician rather than a pop star, certainly will.
To be sure, reviewers have queued up on cue to fawn. No Line on the Horizon, according to Rolling Stone, is "their best, in its textural exploration and tenacious melodic grip, since 1991's Achtung Baby." If the sentiment sounds familiar, it is because you may have read the same review in Rolling Stone for any number of late-period U2 efforts. The magazine, after all, dubbed All That You Can't Leave Behind the group's "third masterpiece" and claimed, "With Pop, they've defied the odds and made some of the greatest music of their lives." Call it the lifetime-achievement-award method of reviewing records, in which the band's overall corpus of music rather than the CD under review dictates the tenor of the critique. The reviewer, like the reviewed, plays it safe.
Playing it safe is ruinous to an artistic endeavor in which reinvention has served as the lifeblood. The lineup and Larry Mullen Jr.'s haircut have stayed the same. Everything else changed.
From the get-go, U2's songs obsessed over the two topics to be avoided in polite company: religion and politics. "Gloria," "I Will Follow," and "Forty" come across more as prayers than as songs. The lyrics for the 1983 album War seem culled from the headlines, with songs about nuclear annihilation ("Seconds"), inspired by the Solidarity movement ("New Year's Day"), and lamenting Ireland's protracted unrest ("Sunday Bloody Sunday").
Then, the raw, post-punk U2, with the aid of producers Daniel Lanois and Brian Eno, etched a layered soundscape of ethereal keyboards and haunting background vocals on 1984's The Unforgettable Fire. The U2 of "A Sort of Homecoming," "The Unforgettable Fire," and "Elvis Presley and America" were not the same band that performed "I Will Follow" and "Gloria." The band wasn't so much evolving as it was becoming a new species. Swerves followed this initial swerve, with the bandwagon perpetually adding and losing passengers.
When self-indulgent stage sermons and hosannas to aging rock gods wore thin on audiences, Bono informed fans at a 1989 New Year's Eve concert that the band would "go away and dream it all up again." Achtung Baby's sonic makeover replaced angry-young-man earnestness with jaded irony, the influence of America with Europe, and the sound of roots rock with fuzzed-out guitars, distorted vocals, and club beats. The 1991 album was, as Bono termed it, "four men chopping down The Joshua Tree." After experimentation veered too dramatically from mainstream tastes in the mid-1990s, with Island Records finding one album so commercially unviable that U2 released it under the "Passengers" moniker so not to undermine their brand, U2 opted for an identikit U2 sound on All That You Can't Leave Behind (2000) and How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004). It was U2 playing U2, if you will.
No Line on the Horizon is U2 playing U2 too, only this time around the U2 self-imitation also encompasses the experimental version of the band heard on Zooropa (1993) and Pop (1997). The pretension of experimentation, as it too follows a template, further strips the album of credibility, making it staler than their two previous victory laps.
No Line on the Horizon is, in a word, uninspired. Lyrically, it's about what one would expect from someone on sabbatical from saving the world. It is also sonically pedestrian, which would be more understandable had The Edge, Larry Mullen Jr., and Adam Clayton spent their time earning Time's "person of the year" honors, hob-knobbing with presidents, getting knighted by the Queen of England, and writing a column for The New York Times.
Even on past U2 albums that missed the mark, there was always something to admire: the anthemic quality of "Walk On," the soaring beauty of "City of Blinding Lights," the wit of "The Playboy Mansion," the passion exploding in "All I Want Is You." None of that, which salvaged the LP offerings that weren't masterpieces, salvages No Line on the Horizon.
Had U2 been a younger act, an Interscope executive would have undoubtedly sat them down to deliver the five scariest words in the music industry: "I don't hear a single." The nursery-rhyme, sing-along single, "Get on Your Boots," sounds reminiscent of "Elevation" or "Vertigo"—arena-friendly singles from the previous two albums—only redone with trippy beats and electronic effects. The recidivism likely explains its debut on the Billboard Hot 100 at #37, fall to #96 the following week, and subsequent disappearance altogether. Worse still for a band known as much for its deep album cuts (and even B-sides) as its singles, No Line on the Horizon contains no hidden gems, just a string of listenable tracks such as "Breathe" and "Magnificent."
Twenty years ago Bono sang, "I don't believe that rock 'n' roll can really change the world/It's just spins and revolutions, spirals and turns." This hasn't stopped him from testing that hypothesis from time to time.
U2 consistently putting out great records bought Bono audiences with Microsoft's Bill Gates, Pope John Paul II, President George W. Bush, and UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. Unfortunately, the price of releasing long-delayed musical afterthoughts will ensure fewer listeners -- not only on the radio, in concert, and on iPods, but in the Oval Office, the UN general assembly, and the EU Parliament as well.
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Sardu| 3.4.09 @ 9:33AM
U2 is America. They will tread water for a few years, riding the wave of nostalgia they inspired when they ruled the Earth. Then they will fade, and the old timers will wail, gnash their teeth and proclaim that we will not see the likes of them again while the young will never know what they missed.
But it was a great ride while it lasted.
Dave| 3.4.09 @ 10:55AM
As The Who once lamented: " Talkin' ' bout my generation." And if you're a fan from U2's generation ... cool.
Meanwhile, from my bleacher seats, U2 was just a spy plane the Russians shot down when "Ike" was president; Sting is what you get when a mosquito lands up your a-s and Bono ... was Sonny's last name.
Meanwhile, I never quite "got" U2. But that's MY generation. And that's cool, too.
Mike M| 3.4.09 @ 11:07AM
I lost all respect for U2 watching the "Rattle and Hum" movie with the never ending preaching by Bono. Their music died then as well. Bono isn't the "cool dude" most claim him to be, he's just an immature Robin Williams look alike.
John Bennett| 3.4.09 @ 11:16AM
"Unfortunately... but in the Oval Office, the UN general assembly, and the EU Parliament as well. "
Unfortunately for Bono and his Peace Prize craving pretenses no doubt, but fortunate for the rest of us who would be the ones picking up the tab if any of those leaders actually followed his asinine political/economic urgings.
If they ever create a Nobel Price for "Pretension", Bono Vox has a lock on the inaugural award.
Chris| 3.4.09 @ 11:19AM
Without a doubt, the most overrated and overhyped band in the history of rock music. Their sound has always been stale, uninspiring and depressing. Which, come to think of it, is reflective of the generation they represented. Ninety percent of the people who claim to like U2 couldn't tell you why and/or name one of their songs. Sort of like 90% of the people who voted for our current president but couldn't tell you why they voted for him or tell you about any one of his policy positions. It's amazing what great/spin PR can do.
Peter McGrath| 3.4.09 @ 12:14PM
Eno and Lanois are the real muses behind U2 since the mid '80's. Their collaboration, actually, reached its apotheosis with the Passengers CD in '95 which features subdued Bono vocals (less IS more) and hauntingly sublime compositions. Passengers is U2's last great CD. Since then, U2 hasn't included me - they aren't worth the bother.
MattSwartz| 3.4.09 @ 1:35PM
Meanwhile, I never quite "got" U2. But that's MY generation. And that's cool, too.
U2 is from "my generation", and I'd trade their whole catalog in for one side of Neil Young's Live Rust album.
They're good in spots, but so pretentious as to be unlistenable most of the time.
Michael Booth| 3.4.09 @ 1:43PM
I'm saddened the Spectator actually prints an article about a rock punk.
JP| 3.4.09 @ 2:32PM
I have to admit that I'm more of an Edge fan the a Bono fan. But like many, I tired of U2 after the Shake Rattle and Hum album. While the Edge is no Eric Clapton, he did take the rthym guitar to a whole new level on the Joshua Tree album. It is too bad the band (read Bono) was so quick to leave it all behind.
One should also remember when the band formed 31 years ago Adam Clayton couldn't play bass (actually he couldn't play anything), Mullens and the Edge were the only ones who actually had any music training (far less than many children today), and Bono was just another punk-rocker. Three decades later one could say they've been the most popular long playing band of the rock era. Not bad for a group of Irish teens.
So Sue Me| 3.4.09 @ 2:36PM
I think it's hilarious that these guys, like many of O's cabinet picks, are not big fans of paying taxes. It's all over the British papers that they've moved their business out of Ireland to avoid its high tax rates. Welcome to U2, a band from the Netherlands.
Fascinating, is it not, that people have a tremendous affection for spending other peoples' money. When it's their own, it's another story.
I, on the other hand, just had 30k withheld from a bonus check, all for a variety of taxes.
Peter McGrath| 3.4.09 @ 2:48PM
Why be sad, Booth? Life is about more (lots more) than angst over that ninny, Obama the Poltroon. And, no, Bono is not a rock punk, he's the dim-witted spokesperson for a certain segment of the left which is proudly hygiene-free.
D. S. Christopher Hubert| 3.4.09 @ 3:04PM
I have been a U2 fan for quite some time. Not as big a fan as some (I really grew up on relatively unknown King's X... still love their old stuff!), but I've always enjoyed their music. I'm not sure that I'll bother with their newest stuff, but will continue to enjoy all of their previous albums, regardless of Bono's opinions...
Pingback| 3.4.09 @ 4:04PM
Big Hollywood » Blog Archive » Politics Plays Hell With Your Poetry links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Zach| 3.4.09 @ 4:50PM
Maybe it's just my generation; I grew up listening to Joshua Tree, Rattle and Hum, and Achtung Baby. Zooropa came out the year I finished high school, and it became one of my most-listened-too albums. I own and enjoy the Passengers LP as well ("Slug" and "Your Blue Room" are very good tracks).
I think All That You Can't Leave Behind might be the perfect U2 album, though. I don't think you can name an artist that can make tracks as good and diverse as "Wild Honey", "New York", "Grace"; and "In a Little While" has one of the finest guitar parts, in my opinion.
That's not to say there aren't misses. I don't really pull out Pop or How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb and listen that much these days. But really, the lifetime achievement treatment is pretty well deserved.
Tarantula| 3.4.09 @ 7:13PM
I've never "not" liked them. I've always considered U2 a good listening band with flashes of brilliance. "Who's Gonna Ride your Wild Horses" still rates high for me...
(30K So Sue Me? S*#t!!!
Bubba| 3.4.09 @ 7:19PM
I've been a huge U2 fan for years, having seen them six times in the last 12 years, and this is the first time I've been disappointed by a new album, right off the bat. When the album was leaked online, the band put the entire album on their MySpace page:
http://www.myspace.com/u2
(It looks like it's still there, for what it's worth.)
I've listened to it online and then bought the CD yesterday. Having now given it a very close, focused listen, I definitely think the new album isn't as bad as I initially feared: there are moments. Still, I don't think it's a great album, I find absurd the comparisons to The Joshua Tree and Achtung Baby, and I doubt my opinion is going to improve greatly over time.
U2 is best known, I would guess, for what could be described as "elevation" and "innovation." The former is the ecstatic lift some of their best songs produce for the listener, and the latter is the recognition that, while they very rarely don't sound like U2, they fairly consistently expanded their musical horizons during their creative peak, which Mr. Flynn documents quite thoroughly.
(I would say that, since U2 never "played U2," All That You Can't Leave Behind was a change for the band -- if not exactly new territory -- because they distilled their essence back to the basics of Boy, October, and War while keeping in the arsenal all the tricks they learned along the way. It's the quintessential U2 album, if not their best. What was troubling was how much Atomic Bomb was a retread of this album.)
Neither elevation nor innovation is appreciably noticeable in this album. Attempts to soar fall flat, and the effect is as disappointing as watching a jumbo jet cruise down the highway but never taking off, and there's nothing here in terms of textures that you couldn't find in their output from 1991-2000. (Worse, in some cases the feeling of deja vu is palpable, as the title track's riff during the chorus is essentially the same riff from "The Fly".) They're not flying as high, and the ground they're covering isn't new territory.
Beyond that, there's an obvious tension in the album between the urge to provide interesting sonics and the urge to make really well-crafted songs, but neither is present in abundance. Zooropa had cool sounds, and All That You Can't Leave Behind had great songs, and Achtung Baby is a masterpiece because it had both. I'd rather have the songs than the sonics, but there should be at least one or the other.
I believe U2 is still capable of making great music, but in the last decade, I think their best stuff has been when they're not trying too hard: "In a Little While," "Wild Honey," and "Window in the Skies" have an effortless quality about them, and I think they're great songs because of that.
But those songs aren't in the same emotional place as "Where the Streets Have No Name," and it seems like U2 is desperately trying to recapture that particular spirit rather than do what they now apparently do best.
Anyway, GREAT REVIEW, Mr. Flynn. I'm glad to see that a critic who understands U2 so thoroughly and recognizes that they've made great albums in the past, can see past the hype regarding other critics' feedback.
Bubba| 3.4.09 @ 7:29PM
In a quick reply to Chris, U2 may well be overrated and overhyped, but they have still made a few of the greatest rock songs, ever:
- New Year's Day
- Pride (In the Name of Love)
- With or Without You
- Where the Streets Have No Name
- One
- Mysterious Ways
Arguably, "Beautiful Day" belongs in that list, too, and while there are some great hidden gems, too -- like the sparse "October" from 1981, or the quiet "Grace" from 2000 -- it's just disappointing that there haven't been any obvious giants or gems in the last album (or two).
And, in reply to Zach, I want to reconsider my point that Zooropa had sonics but not songs. It has at least three gorgeous songs in "Stay," "The First Time," and "The Wanderer."
Bob| 3.4.09 @ 7:30PM
I'm with Mr. Booth. I am always amazed by the fact that otherwise serious people can take modern popular music seriously. This reminds me of the gibberish that people write about modern art.
Will| 3.5.09 @ 3:44AM
Yes, the album stumbles on some tracks (Boots), and yes, Atomic Bomb was boring and uninspired. However, I challenge anyone to find a pop artist in the past five years that has taken the time and effort to produce a cohesive album, more than just a collection of hit or miss attempts trying to find the catchiest single. U2 is one of the biggest bands in the world, and they had nothing to gain by creating a legitimate album besides the satisfaction of at least attempting an artistic statement. The last three songs really shine, and White as Snow is one of the prettiest songs I've ever heard (yes, I know its based on Emmanuel).
(And, because I know someone else is thinking this: U2 review in the American Spectator? Surely, surely we're Bono-baiting aren't we?)
regent| 3.5.09 @ 4:54AM
YouToo can sing and make noises like U2.
So stop buying the CD of U2. Save it for the prolonged recession.
Dave Lincoln| 3.5.09 @ 9:48AM
OK, first, for Mr. Booth, U-2 does not play punk rock, and I've got nothing against punk rock. I would like to back up Mr. JP's comment. If I ever met Bono in person, I'd tell him that I don't care about his leftwing causes, and he ought to stick to his day job. The fact is, even with his good rock voice, he would be NOWHERE without The Edge.
It is indeed the great rhythm guitar that makes this band any better than a thousand other rock bands with "a cause". The Joshua Tree is a concept album, a concept itself which is hard to come by nowadays when people download a song at a time. It would be in my top 100 albums. Still, it doesn't matter what the lyrics say, you've got to have great tunes and a great sound. For this band, that great sound comes from the quick chord changes of the rhythm guitar of the Edge.
You'd be NOBODY, Bono, hear me, NOBODY, you'd be a 2 bit hack riding in a 40 year old ex-Trailways tour bus, without the Edge. Without him, you're dead to me, got it - I have no Irish left-wing-useful-idiot rock activist.
Astro| 3.5.09 @ 2:11PM
Mr. Lincoln -- Mr Booth (curious pairing of names) didn't complain about a 'punk rock' article, he complained about an article about 'a rock punk'. Quite a different thing.
The thing I've never gotten about U2 - or much of contemporary rock - is how any young person these days can identify with their message. Rock has always been appealing because of its message to the young, reaching them at a personal level, about their greatest fears: sex, death/war and drugs. I suppose youth can relate to injustice in some 3rd world county somewhere; but then so can we all. Where's the angst on a personal level?
The fears that rock spoke to during its own youth have now largely subsided. Sex is commonplace and XXX porn is available for free. The war in Iraq in no way affects todays young the way Viet Nam affect the young back in the 60s. And drugs, well, hmm; what's left to be said?
Seems to me rock has reached its middle age, and is looking kind of paunchy. Might as well be doing songs about Bernie Madoff and gettin' laid off / union dues and 401(k) blues.
Dave Lincoln| 3.5.09 @ 6:19PM
You are right, Astro, he said "rock punk". I read that too fast.
I don't think the problem with current "music" is that kids can't identify the message. I was alluding to this before - the message doesn't matter unless you have a good tune to go with it. If you have a good tune and a good sound, the "message" could suck or be non-understandable, and the song would still rock. Think "Louis, Louis". Nobody knows the lyrics, but that doesn't matter. You could have a song that really relates to the times, and your personal angst, (WTF that means?) but a bad voice to sing it. What have you got? Bob Dylan, that's what! How can you fix it? Get Jimmy Hendrix to play it, or failing that, the Byrds or even Peter, Paul, and Mary.
Now, you've got the rap/hip-hop that is not music at all, and it's no wonder the kids have to go back to the 70's and early 80's to find anything that rocks; most notably they like Led Zepellin. It doesn't matter what Robert Plant is singing about, it's the sound, not the lyrics. What was Robert Plant's message? Listen to his voice, along with Page's guitar, J.P Jones's bass, and Bonham's seriously loud drumming and you'll get the message. If you don't, then you really don't get the music. The same with the Dead. Their great songwriter, Robert Hunter (who didn't play with them, I think) wrote some great lyrics, but that's not all. If you can't understand Gerry's guitar and Phil's bass, you you don't know that music.
So, with rap, it sucks so bad, what good would a message be, even if it had one? You can't fix sucks. OK, I'm rambling now .... where's that confounded bridge?
Jim| 3.5.09 @ 11:18PM
U2 reminds me of multiple John Kerrys: long-winded, pretentious, self-important bores.
cam| 3.12.09 @ 11:22AM
I haven’t heard the album at all yet, but my thoughts are usually “hey, good for them, if they can still put together an album that people will buy after all these years, then go for it.” And even if he was right and it was a terrible album, I’d still bet that bad U2 is better than most of the crap out there nowadays anyway. The American Spectator usually prints stuff like this once every other month or so, and I cringe every time…. Stick with your forte. They fall flat on their faces when they wade into cultural stuff in an attempt to be “relevant.” I find it amazingly humorous that a right-wing magazine with huge free-market leanings is poo-poo-ing a capitalist venture like this. U2 sees demand, and creates a product. The fans buy it of their own free will and their positive or negative experiences with it will shape their future U2 purchasing decisions. Isn’t that the kind of capitalism that the AS should be championing?
Michael| 3.13.09 @ 1:19PM
Christopher Hubert said it best, King's X rocks!!
Roy| 3.14.09 @ 1:47PM
The bottom line when it comes to U2, for me, is that they (er, Bono) should have stuck to music and shut up about politics and economics.
They've had their ups and downs musically, too. I think No Line On the Horizon (much like Zooropa) will be one of the "downs" rather than "ups." But all in all, they've put out so many great songs that it's hard to deny their reputation's validity. It seems to me a lot of people lose their taste for U2's music based more on the mind-numbing political perspectives of Bono than on the music itself.
I could listen to the quintessential U2 sound in tracks like Where the Streets Have No Name, Pride (In the Name of Love), I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For, etc. over and over again without tiring of them. The masterful rhythm guitar work of The Edge on songs like these never gets old, and you find it from their oldest albums to their more recent ones. Putting that mastery of the delay effect together with Bono's vocals is musical magic. But they can also put out a solid, fuzzy-guitar rock vibe with tracks like Mysterious Ways, Beautiful Day, Vertigo, Elevation, City of Blinding Lights, etc. and I don't seem to get tired of that either. Then you have the tracks that don't fit those molds but they're still great, like One, Stuck in a Moment, With or Without You, Yahweh, Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own and others.
When I look past the politics, there's enough true musical quality and substance to make me proud to call myself a U2 fan.
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