The Joshua Poll

For me, it's "Running To Stand Still" all the way.

i hear that.

It's a fair choice. I'm voting for "Red Hill Mining Town" though.

uh? no i was making a ZING.

i have never heard this awful record.

I REALLY LIKE MOST OF IT AND I DON'T CARE

Actually looking at those tracks I really like about half of it nowadays.

"Red Hill Mining Town." Maybe just because it's the song on this record I'm least sick of. But also because it's a reminder that Bono's politics used to be decent, instead of the his current apologist/spokesman-for-companies-that-use-sweatshop-labor schtick.

I thought this was going to be a poll about all the different versions of the song "Joshua"

Joshua
Joshua
Nicer than Orange Squash you are
Oh By Gosh you are
Joshu-Josua...

http://open2dprot.sourceforge.net/Accession/Icons/radioButtonOFF.gif The Cliff Richard "Young Ones" soundtrack
http://open2dprot.sourceforge.net/Accession/Icons/radioButtonON.gif Morrissey

"Exit" has been long my favorite sleeper.

With Or Without You

"With or Without You"

They're all pretty good actually, apart from the singles.

Saw the I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For video on the box this morning. That's some goofy stuff.

"Trip Through Your Wires". I used to loathe this album but have warmed to some of it over time.

"Bullet The Blue Sky" live can be something special but the album version is a tad bleh.

http://data-allocine.blogomaniac.fr/mdata/1/3/3/Z20051120110732637733331/img/one_tree_hill_soundtrack.jpg

the Pet Shop Boys' cover of "Where the Streets Have No Name."

Geir, you know how you feel about rap coming along and ruining everything? that's how I feel about this album. It, more than anything else, pushed me into the warm welcoming arms of west coast hip hop and thrash metal.

I was no fan of guitar rock at the time, but the synthpop I liked had long since been ruined by the invention of FM synths and PCM synths anyway.

I like the idea of hating it but the guitar sound and production are masterful. Will have to decide what to pick though. I really like all the infinite guitar stuff on "With or Without You." (And, um, I don't want to have to say this but I, uh, kind of like the singing on that too.)

"One Tree Hill" would be bearable (love Eno's quiet synth) were it not for Bono's Jim Kerr imitation.

oh man, i thought this was about the chicago deep house producer joshua... but then i saw the name Geir Hongro. i've never heard this album.

Of course it sounds great! Unfortunately, it also drives me to tears of tedious boredom. Nonetheless, I'll go with "Where the Streets Have No Name" this time out.

Also, I'll usually take the thoroughly loathed Rattle and Hum over this shit most days.

A friend of mine liked In God's Country because it reminded him of growing up in the desert in Nevada and I ended up hearing that a lot until it grew on me, so that's what I'm voting for.

There's that bit in "In god's country" where the Edge stops playing. ahh... And then he starts off again!

Everything on this album after "Bullet the Blue Sky" except for "Trip Through Your Wires" is incredibly boring.

i haven't listened to it in aeons. but come on, "where the streets have no name" is still kinda fucking wonderful. whether it's U2 or the PSBs. i love them both equally.

Xgau otm:

Let it build and ebb and wash and thunder in the background and you'll hear something special--mournful and passionate, stately and involved. Read the lyrics and you won't wince. Tune in Bono's vocals and you'll encounter one of the worst cases of significance ever to afflict a deserving candidate for superstardom

Was that supposed to be in italics?

I'm supposed to have a brain.

(TBH, I don't actually remember much about the songs after "Bullet.")

maybe they found one over at the HTML playground
(xpost)

The Christgau line is great.

Some of you are too snobby for words. Yes, it's pretentious. Yes, it's rockist. Yes, I'm even more tired of Bono singing about Jesus now than I was then. So what? It's really very good, and holds up extremely well. Unless the popists among you are going to go all Taliban and start dynamiting the Buddhas, you gotta show some respect.

For me, "With or Without You". Their best love song to Jesus.

Overplayed-to-death as it is (along with the rest of Side One), "Still Haven't..." has got that classically simple 3-chord melody that can be arranged in a thousand ways and still sound nice. "The Edge" and his echo-delay unit spice it up. And it kinda reminds me of the Buzzcocks' "Why Can't I Touch It?" ,which isn't a bad thing at all.

I got the box for review a bit ago and was struck by how much it was familiar. I dunnno. I used to really dislike it, being named Joshua and having people assume it was my favorite album because of that (and I was, I dunno, like eight when it came out?). But in hearing it again, I got to like Bullet The Blue Sky and a couple other albums that had kind of a taut guitar line behind them. It really does sound great. Though I was kind of glad to let some of the other guys in the office, for whom this album was THE THING of their youth, cover it. I guess I just don't get the hate or the love—it seems like a solid B album.

Another "With or Without You" vote for the infinite guitar coda. Fans of the album should download the MFSL CD, as it's a noticable improvement on the standard CD.

i'm an idiot. i voted for 'red hill mining town' even though i acknowledge in my head that the first three single-bearing tracks on this record are better. heaven help me!

I don't understand people who don't vote for either "With or Without You" or "Bullet the Blue Sky".

In the old days there would have been a parenthetical remark in your screen name elaborating on this.

I don't understand people who don't vote for either "With or Without You" or "Bullet the Blue Sky".

Those are the two worst tracks on the album.

And 'Where the Streets Have No Name' I suppose.

ELABORATION:

Of the singles, I think "With or Without You" is far and away the best. The way the song slowly builds to the end may be total Songwriting 101 pandering to base emotion but that does not make it any less effective. By contrast, the menacing snarl of "Bullet the Blue Sky" features both the most interesting beat on the album and works through a sentiment that is unseen on any of the other tracks; it's far and away the most distinctive song on the album and the one that always leaps out to me whenever I hear it, which is why I voted for it.

As I said earlier, the only song on the second half of the album that isn't completely boring is "Trip Through Your Wires" and I only realized this after hearing it out of the context of the album four years after the fact.

"With Or Without You" (the Bobcat Goldthwait version only adds value)

As much as I hate this band, Dan's right - "With or Without You" towers over the other songs on this record, it's good stuff once you put your fingers in your ears to miss the "on a bed of nails she makes me wait" line

Also, I'll usually take the thoroughly loathed Rattle and Hum over this shit most days.

That one is the only U2 album that is even worse than "Pop"!

I don't understand people who don't vote for either "With or Without You" or "Bullet the Blue Sky".

"Bullet The Blue Sky" is awful. Tuneless rubbish that threatened to destroy an otherwise excellent side 1.

"With Or Without You" has a great build, and is the one I would have voted for hadn't it been for the presence of the beautiful "Running To Stand Still". The latter is the best thing U2 ever did. Also better than anything on those two most recent albums that I like better than this one.

i voted 'mothers of the disappeared'

i will also rep for 'rattle & hum'. and 'pop' for that matter.

"Bullet The Blue Sky" - cuz it sounds like Zep.

great album. great enoscapes on the second side especially. "mothers of the disappeared"

John D otm, though I suppose were I able to be mind-erased and listen to the record completely without context, there would be some pleasing tones. If I didn't grow up in Tempe, where they made that pretentious doc. If I hadn't seen that U2-song church service trainwreck on tv. et cetera ad inf

'too much fucking perspective'

I heard this album at the time FAR too much, but I have recently found myself able to listen to it without cringing and recalling why I used to like it so much. It has a certain aesthetic coherence that's nice though a bit shallow. I suppose one could say this of a lot of U2's work. It kind of reminds me of 'The Magnificent Seven' (yes, I know it was a remake) inasmuch as it's a very cartoonish vision yet somehow compelling nonetheless. It's leitmotif is a very European take on a kind of American stereotype, like the Lucky Luke comics in France, but in a strange way, I don't think think that's necessarily an illegitimate thing.

I'm also not telling you what I voted for 'cause this is AOR. It would be like picking an aria out of an opera and not realizing its key place in the work as an entirety.

some arias are better than others

some arias' mothers are better than other arias' mothers

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

I'm embarrassed to admit I got "With Or Without You" in my head today for NO REASON WHATSOEVER. In some perverse way, I decided I'd like to hear the whole album again, something I haven't done since...at least '91, and even then it wasn't by my own choice.

I recall Bullet The Blue Sky as being the best from this.

i'm very lukewarm toward this but 'with or without you' is a justifiable classic.

Dear "Bullet The Blue Sky" fans: WTF?

Isn't this thing like pompretentious lyricses 101?

That goes with the territory - it's just that reciting them makes 'em a bit more noticeable. Me, I like it (didn't vote for it) for the drums and the feedback.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Rattle and Hum (even with a handful of WTF tracks) >>> The Joshua Tree

I agree that Side 2 of "The Joshua Tree" is one of the most boring sides of music that U2 ever made ...

The way the song slowly builds to the end may be total Songwriting 101 pandering to base emotion but that does not make it any less effective.

This fits better as a description of "Where the Streets Have No Name" (my fave) than "With or Without You"!

One vote for "Exit" makes me sad.

The fourth and less famous single wins? LOL at ILX being contrarian as always :)

Rattle and Hum (even with a handful of WTF tracks) >>> The Joshua Tree

Rolling 2008 HIGH AS A MOTHERFUCKER awards

HEARTLAND from RATTLE & HUM

ONE OF THEIR BEST TRACKS EVER

They were my fave band when I was 14, let's not forget.

I used to have a job working at a "haunted house" on the New Jersey waterfront, 1989. I remember one of the shops had "Bullet The Blue Sky" playing loud as I passed...it was really something else.

touristy area

at least one vote for each song. cool.

Rattle and Hum (studio versions only)

Great tracks: Hawkmoon, Desire (their most underrated single?), All I Want Is You, Love Rescue Me, Angel of Harlem

Good tracks: Van Diemen's Land, God Part II

Passable tracks: When Love Comes to Town, Heartland

The Joshua Tree

Great tracks: Where the Streets Have No Name, Bullet the Blue Sky, With or Without You (depending on the day)

Good Tracks: I Still Haven't Found ..., In God's Country, Trip Through Your Wires

Passable Tracks: the rest, although the entire album is hurt by terrible sequencing that makes the second half incredibly boring compared to the first half

That's a pretty clear win for Rattle and Hum, and the gap only widens once you include tracks like the live version of "Bullet The Blue Sky" (although I admit that the live tracks drag down the album as a whole).

I always thought I was the only one who didn't get "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For." I'm glad to find out I'm not alone.

All this hate for Side 2 is depressing me, though. Sometimes I'll get into Side 2 so deep I won't come back out for days.

i can't remember the last time i consciously thought to listen to anything by U2

the 90s?

Rattle & Hum can go suck a dick.

only one?

Yeah, Rattle & Hum sucks aside from Heartland, though.

I kind of like "Van Diemen's Land".

I always thought I was the only one who didn't get "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For." I'm glad to find out I'm not alone.

Just 'cause I VOTED for it doesn't mean I "get" it! (Or need to.)

almost bought the CD at the store
Where The Streets Have No Name

And you give yourself away
and you give
and you give

I almost bought the CD

but I settled for my iPod instead

stop
don't hurt me now
not now
stop

Bullet the Blue sky

"outside it's america"

You know I heard Martin Luther King Jr
speak on the radio yesterday

That man is the soul of America.
You can be an atheist like me and still be in wonder at his words.
Listen to him speak.

Playing Red Hill Mining Town now.

One Tree Hill

"I Trip Through Your Wires"
reminds me of

Austin Texas band
Zeitgeist

Does anyone remember them?

I know they changed their name from/to The Reivers.

That's the extent of my knowledge tho.

Wow. In God's Country is a great tune.

Meanwhile, an update on the joshua tree from the front cover:
http://www.joshuatreenationalpark.net/u2tree.htm

Aw, sad.

I just wanted to thank this thread for making me rediscover the b-sides "Deep In The Heart" & "Race Against Time" which were two of my fave b-sides of the Joshua Tree era, and I'd missed out on them for years because I don't have them on vinyl anymore and naively assumed the B-Sides CD comp included ALL of the Joshua Tree b-sides and it didn't! Yes I have all the b-sides on tape somewhere but haven't pulled that one out in ages.

Thanks ILM.

P.S. I still continue to believe that the b-sides are better than the Joshua Tree album tracks 90% of the time.

"In God's Country" deserved to win, though. I think that's fantastic that it did. Does anyone else love the sound of Larry Mullen's drumming the way I love the sound of Larry Mullen's drumming?

yeah i'm a larry mullen fan. there's nothing inherently mindblowing about him, but he does a lot of stuff well without making much of a deal of it. and that marching beat at the start of "sunday bloody sunday," every drummer learned it like every guitarist learned stairway to heaven. it was one of the few things people would recognize from the drums alone. but really i think of mullen mostly as a toms player. i think that's his strongest playing.

I like the idea of hating it but the guitar sound and production are masterful.

^ agree with this.

Hoos, how come you're never on messenger anymore?

a quarter of a century old

Then Play Long looks for U2 and finds Eno all the way: http://nobilliards.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/u2-joshua-tree.html