BONO IS DEAD

RIP

STOP PLAYING WITH OUR EMOTIONS LIKE THAT U MONSTER

https://www.wlns.com/pet-of-the-day-community/bono-pet-of-the-day-august-21/

When Bono dies, it's going to be a really big deal

Bono more like Bones, get it like the bones inside of a skelteton

doot doot

Mr. Bono?
Do you have a son named Robert? Robert Bono, aged 17?

You're thinking of Sonny Bono.

I am now humming "Heresy" by NIN

Your Bono's dead
And no one cares

The virginal brides file past his tomb
Strewn with time's dead flowers
Bereft in deathly bloom
Alone in a darkened room
The Fly

maybe, some day

Sound Opinions' old message board had this running thread during the '00s titled "Chris Cornell R.I.P."

Then years after the board crashed, Cornell died and for awhile, before I could remember that thread, I kept thinking, "why do I have some vague recollection of a hoax or a joke about this?"

This is so fucked up. I just started trying to listen to U2 again today. Why, Bono? Why?

Thought this was going to be (and maybe peace, man's cri de coeur is) about Pelosi reading his Ukraine poem aloud (true, see Ukraine thread for inst)

Yeah, that's what this is all about. I dunno. I was cleaning out the fridge this morning and found a moldy lemon and then Lemon got stuck in my head. But this St. Patrick's Day poem is no Lemon. I don't want to stream it now lest he thinks that he had anything to do with it.

I always thought the Irish had the best poets, and now Bono's doing everything he can to prove me wrong.

Come on, at least wait until Bono is dead.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/u2-tv-show-jj-abrams-netflix-1235114349/

(I say this with tough love, because I like a lot of U2 and don't really mind Bono. Still, this is a bit much.)

was bono ever 'cool'?

i mean, i actually like (the first 20 years of) u2, but with him personally the cringe factor was present from the very beginning

mookie otm, mostly

That's a good question. I don't know if he was ever cool, but if I was forming a U2 cover band he would be my first pick to be the singer.

There is not a single dramatic event in the band's history other than maybe, sorta thinking about calling it a day once or twice, wtf?

Once Adam missed a show because he was drunk. Like, literally once.

One key (as I'm sure I and others have brought up) is that they split the money four ways. That's one secret to band longevity.

5 ways, originally iirc

Helps if there's a lot of it.

No egos/all ego

There must be a small part of The Edge that thinks "if we gave Adam the hoist and got a session dude in it'd be a) better and b) more lucrative for the three of us...maybe the two of us" *looks sidelong at Larry*. I mean would the two of them be missed by the fans?

Racking my brains, but let's have a go anyway...

1. Growing up in Dublin, Hewson jr vs senior.
2. Romance with Ali, school, youthful hi-jinks
3. Obligatory crap scene of picking through Ramones covers in a garage
4. Lypton Village weirdness, V Prunes, Shalom group (except for Clayton), tension and doubts created by playing secular music
5. Edge nearly leaving because of above, cracking the USA, Red Rocks
6. Live Aid (again) Hope someone properly archived all those cgi assets
7. Joshua Tree tour doubts, becoming big, being filmed
8. Rattle & Hum misstep
9. Berlin reinvention, nearly splitting up #2
10. Achtung/Zoo TV tour weirdness, Clayton's boozing
11. Playing out whilst v under-rehearsed, motorised lemon
12. Ummmmm, that's all I got

There's no way the Edge, of all people, would even flirt with the possibility of adding a technically adept new member, because he knows they could probably just replace him with a pile of pedals.

XXP - 1'18"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLzMfjQMc-Y

Hanging backstage with the Edge
https://i.pinimg.com/564x/15/94/47/159447f7ec38c6802833233e1eb16719.jpg

Pic sadly missing the poor guy who presses the buttons for him.

I was at the Red Rocks show. It was transcendent. We almost didn't go because of the rain.

Pretty much everyone I know who despises U2 will often concede that the Achtung Baby-era is an exception, with backhanded compliments like they finally developed a sense of humor or stopped taking themselves seriously, etc. That's how I first became aware of the band, and my recollection was a lot of people finding them hilarious for all the random shit they'd do like call the White House at concerts, cavorting on-stage with belly dancers or the deadpan "Numb" video. I didn't go to a show myself until 2009 and when Bono had the schoolkids coming out with Aung San Suu Kyi masks, it was hard digesting that it wasn't some kind of bizarre joke. (Given what's happened with Aung San Suu Kyi, it feels even more regretful.)

This is being written by the screenwriter of Bohemian Rhapsody solely because that way they can redo this exact scene but from a reverse angle.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0wENg7o-HLg

I'm reminded of the time long ago when U2 played in San Francisco, and Bono started ranting on stage because he saw a sign in the crowd reading "I (heart) SF" and assumed it meant "Sinn Féin"

Aren't they automatically adding to Netflix show to your DVR?

(THUD)
*editing to add the sound of a joke falling flat

i find it regrettable that the dumb poem is now half the Ukraine thread

but i was in a shop after work and Stuck In A Moment came on

and i could just kill at this point

I laughed, alpaca

Racking my brains, but let's have a go anyway...

1. Growing up in Dublin, Hewson jr vs senior.
2. Romance with Ali, school, youthful hi-jinks
3. Obligatory crap scene of picking through Ramones covers in a garage
4. Lypton Village weirdness, V Prunes, Shalom group (except for Clayton), tension and doubts created by playing secular music
5. Edge nearly leaving because of above, cracking the USA, Red Rocks
6. Live Aid (again) Hope someone properly archived all those cgi assets
7. Joshua Tree tour doubts, becoming big, being filmed
8. Rattle & Hum misstep
9. Berlin reinvention, nearly splitting up #2
10. Achtung/Zoo TV tour weirdness, Clayton's boozing
11. Playing out whilst v under-rehearsed, motorised lemon
12. Ummmmm, that's all I got

They should just make it atrociously ridiculous, like an unholy mixture of Pasolini, Lars Von Trier and Julie Taymor

they didn't totally shed their corny nature with achtung baby/zooropa but it's still remarkable how well they did pull it off, i will grant them "cool" for that era

PUT ON YOUR BOOTS
*vomits uncontrollably*

That album could've been a good one and a nice farewell to close the books on U2. Instead, they took out what should've been the lead single, kept in the absolute worst song which did become the lead single and sandwiched it between two more awful cuts. Since then they've dropped into a bottomless hole - nothing they've done has come out right, either artistically or commercially, which is pretty astonishing for a band that had quite a streak of luck throughout its career.

oh wow i had not heard the boots song before

wow

This thread revive always gets me morbidly excited.

I had no idea they split their money in equal parts. That’s actually very cool.

Also REM’s practice iirc

And Radiohead and Coldplay and RHCP, iirc. Probably more, but those are the big ones.

Black Sabbath credited the songwriting to all four of them back in the day, but given the amount of legal wrangling involved every time they reform I'd guess it's not a very even split nowadays.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVYAPmdckBY

Huh, this is kind of fascinating:

“Street Mission” (sometimes called “Street Missions”) is one of U2’s earliest songs, and one that the band recorded in their November 1978 sessions as Keystone Studios.

In November 1978, U2 went into the studio with producer Barry Devlin for their second recording session. During that session they recorded three tracks, “Street Mission,” “Shadows and Tall Trees,” and “The Fool.” All three songs were completed and they were the first songs used to try to gain U2 a recording contract. In 2004, as part of The Complete U2, all three tracks were finally released. “Street Mission” is sometimes mislabeled as “Street Missions” but the iTunes release did not contain the additional S.

“Street Missions” has been mentioned a number of times throughout the years. In U2 by U2, U2 talk about the March 1978 contest they had entered in Limerick:

Edge: I think we played three of our songs. All like three minutes, really simple stuff.
Larry: We did ‘Street Mission’ and a couple of others.

Adam: I think we did ‘Life on a Distant Planet’ and something called ‘The TV Song,’ so named because it sounded a bit like the band Television. It was kind of a melodic, mid-tempo thing whose chief appeal was that we could actually get to the end.

In March 1981, Bono lost a briefcase of personal effects in the Pacific North West. The contents of the briefcase were found and returned to him in 2004, and we know that included within was a steno pad with hand written notes by Bono. “Street Mission” is mentioned in that notebook. One page of the pad included possible song names that the band was working on including “Julie Says,” “The Cry,” “Gloria,” “When I Fall Down,” “Pop,” “Cars and Aeroplanes,” “No Man’s Land,” “Talking,” “Spring,” “Father is an Elephant,” “Boy,” “G to E or C to E,” “Shelter from the Storms / The End of Fire,” “Concentration Cramp / Christmas – Gloria,” “Inside Out,” “Beatles,” “Its Just Night Fright” (Fright is crossed out), “Street Mission,” “Drive on John,” “Speed of Life,” “Pete the Chop,” “Love is a Word,” “False Phropfit,” “Beast,” “Instrumentals,” “Is Just As Well,” “Buzz”.

The back of that page has some notes which appear to be partial lyrics to “I Fall Down”: “When I fall down, we all fall down. I shout the fall and falling…” but it also includes some additional notes about “Three voices,” (Possibly “Three Verses”) “Juggle”, “Shelter from the Storm,” and “White”.

Another page in the book had several rough sketches of possible logo designs and some lyrics sketched over the page including “Black Shirt White Hair”, “Beginning – Beauty – The Fall”, “Middle – Status Symbols, Plastic Flowers (Flames?), cars, the bridge silver ware Boy” “Change the face – wall street crash” “Cabaret” “Silver Race”, “Believe in Me,” “War”, “Status Symbols”, “Trumpets” as well as three song names, “Twilight,” “I Will Follow” and “The Ocean”.

On the back of that page are more notes, including “October,” “Rain,” “Shelter from the Storem” again and notes about “Steel”, “Solo”, “Doodle”.

Another page included dates and a note “I Wouldn’t mind being on a windmill”.

It is impossible to know for sure which of these are actual songs they developed, although the first page mentioned is clearly a listing of songs, and the page with beginning and middle noted seem to be an attempt to put together an album.

I remember reading that the writing and recording of October was difficult due to Bono’s notebook having gone missing.

and one of their stronger albums imo

Definitely.

Pretty much everyone I know who despises U2 will often concede that the Achtung Baby-era is an exception, with backhanded compliments like they finally developed a sense of humor or stopped taking themselves seriously, etc. That's how I first became aware of the band, and my recollection was a lot of people finding them hilarious for all the random shit they'd do like call the White House at concerts, cavorting on-stage with belly dancers or the deadpan "Numb" video.

See, I actually like their early earnestness/seriousness. I just don't always connect with the music or find it that interesting, although a few songs are great. Their attempts at humour otoh usually seem a bit strained and cringey to me but I find the music a little more consistently interesting on Achtung Baby and especially Zooropa.

Re songwriting splits:

Radiohead credits all songs to the whole band, but not equal percentages (same with Blur).

Van Halen is the only band I can think of that split songwriting royalties equally, and then retroactively removed a member (Michael Anthony) from the credits, probably settling with a huge one-time payoff.

xpost Where exactly is the humor that people supposedly hear in or c. "Achtung Baby"? Just live? Because I've always thought of it as their darkest record.

It's kinda funny, the Achtung Baby/Zooropa wave mostly passed me by and I've never felt an urge to dig deeper or further beyond a scattered 'oh this is what they're up to now, huh' checkin. The context here was that I was a fairly normie fan of U2 as a middle/high schooler -- "Pride" was the first song of theirs I'd consciously heard, living in upstate New York, and of course The Joshua Tree was inescapable and I worked through a good share of the back catalog (the "Bad" on Wide Awake In America remains truly something). Rattle & Hum came out, tried to force myself to like it for a couple of weeks and then just felt annoyed. Three years pass and I get deeeeep into college radio life and hearing all kinds of things in different areas engaging my interest so when they come back with "The Fly" I'm all "Eh, whatever," and everything about them seemed to be all them talking about listening to the stuff I had been listening to. To which my reaction was "Well then why would I bother listening to you, then?" Reductive thoughts from a 20-year-old but honestly they were just easy to let go and ignore.

my intro to them was via MTV around the Joshua Tree/ R&H era and i do remember liking some of the songs but my god those videos would just play nonstop. so much so that i kind of started to to hate them. might have been the first band i grew to dislike due to overexposure.

probably didn't help that their videos (iirc) were portentous and boring. like "Land of Confusion" and "Sledgehammer" were overplayed too but i still fucked w them.

The humor -- such as it is/was -- was all in their shows. I didn't see any of them (last saw U2 in '87), but from what I understand, however cringey and forced the humor, it was a welcome relief from "we're stealin' it back!"

Actually, that reminds me that the first U2 show I saw, in early 1985 (Christ, 37 years ago this Tuesday) had some fun amongst the earnestness. I remember a guy in the audience jumped onstage, picked Bono up like he was a baby, twirled around a couple times, put Bono down, did a backflip, and jumped offstage. Bono gave him a thank-you bow. And maybe the guy in the audience was thinking, "This show is too earnest. I need to do something about that."

Read that too fast and thought you were saying Bono was twirling a baby around and the visual was bemusing.

"Whoops, sorry, didn't mean to let go."

If I could, yes I would
If I could, I would
Let it go

Arc of a Baby, their Steve Winwood tribute.

If only.

"If you see a kid, fling it."

Now I hear U2 covering Husker's "The Baby Song."

Run that slide whistle through a memory man!

Now I’m hearing “It’s the baaaaaby song! Once more, it’s the baby song!” to the tune of “Pride.”

i read the massive coffee table book 'u2 by u2' last year.
and they all totally rip into bono and his world stage thing.
also, there is a big part of their late era story that i had no idea about, (i.e. serious health issues re edges daughter), and the way the rest of the band dealt with the situation was massively impressive.

they seem like decent people, always have, imo.

and that is exactly what comes across when you read the book.
they are hugely self aware, but clearly still a 'gang of four'.
i.e. i cant imagine they would ever sack and then hire a stand-in in order to save a few quid.
when you read the book you come to realise that they are probably tighter as a crew now than they have ever been.

I read Bill Flanagan's Until the End of the World long ago; still consider it one of the best-written rock bios. Four dudes + Eno/Flood taking the piss out of themselves as they Struggle to Reinvent Themselves. Meanwhile Bill Clinton gets elected, war breaks out in the former Yugoslavia, Adam discovers supermodels, Bono discovers sunglasses, they get piss-drunk in Tokyo, and record the best songs of their career.

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQQi8pg0X2I2wJAf_9Qi-d4CdbwjF0F_jS05A&s

^"When the electric razor dies halfway into shaving your scrotum!"

I read Bill Flanagan's _Until the End of the World_ long ago; still consider it one of the best-written rock bios. Four dudes + Eno/Flood taking the piss out of themselves as they Struggle to Reinvent Themselves. Meanwhile Bill Clinton gets elected, war breaks out in the former Yugoslavia, Adam discovers supermodels, Bono discovers sunglasses, they get piss-drunk in Tokyo, and record the best songs of their career.

Ya I read that as a teen and felt like I must’ve dreamed a lot of it in restrospect, Bono’s “nautical kleptomania” was hysterical

Apparently Bono threw shade at Musk over the whole USAID / DOGE fiasco on Rogan. I ain’t watching it but good for you Bono.

Hahahaha

How did I never see this thread before?

Hittin’ the trees like Bono

He moves in musksterious ways

Pride (in the name of doge)

Daddy's Gonna Play For Your Flaming Tesla

Stuck in a model y you can’t get out of

The Electric Co.

Pretty good piece on this Bono-Rogan ep: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/bono-joe-rogan-elon-musk-1236234504/

“America is big” is gonna stick with me for fucking years gdi Bono

Is that why he still hasn't found what he's looking for?

I think Bono is a bright guy, and I suppose I respect the fact that his frontman armor - that is, both his ego and I guess, ironically, lack of ego allows him to bear the brunt of criticism/mockery for being an oft ridiculous focus, a role the rest of the band is happy to cede - somewhat protects him when he hobnobs with conservatives in an effort to get a more positive message out. That is, I dunno, should a prominent Democratic leader go on Joe Rogan they hurt their appeal/brand, but Bono can get away with it because he can take a hit. It's kind of similar to the Columbo approach to solving crime. "Hi, it's me, silly-looking frontman of the popular rock band U2. Look at my big glasses and listen to my colorful aphorisms. By the way, there’s food rotting in boats and warehouses. There is 50,000 tons of food. The people who knew the codes — who were responsible for distributing that aid — were fired. That’s not America, is it?”

"Help the downtrodden or I will make it so you cannot delete my music from your iTunes"

if you made this guy about 300% more po faced and narcissistic than he was in the 80's. Then basically, you end up with Thom Yorke.