ENO U2

Is Bono guilty of ruining the musical abilities of Brian Eno???

I've decided that I like U2. I'm still undecided on how Eno-esque those records are. There's a certain spaciousness to the sound, particularly on "Unforgettable Fire" that reminds me of some of Eno's solo records or his Talking Heads production.

The question of where U2 would be without Eno is an interesting one. A comparison with other bands of their eighties hey-day might be instructive. I think one of the reasons why Big Country and Simple Minds are no longer massively successful is that they ceased to develop and continued to plough the same furrow over and over again. While you can scoff at U2 (and probably will) there is a stylistic shift in their music from the likes of "War" and then through the Eno period and beyond. That could be due to Eno opening up their musical horizons. However, I've also heard it said that for all his limits as a musician Adam Clayton is U2's record collector and plays an important role within the band of keeping an ear open for the way music is changing. So possibly they would still have evolved and remained popular without Eno's involvement.

I think Eno & Lanois brought a great deal to U2, and that the combination worked exceptionally well. I'm thinking in terms of 'sound' (aural atmosphere), not 'concept' (holding up crazy placards), mind.

I've been listening to ALL THAT YOU CAN'T LEAVE BEHIND. Best thing on it I think is the trio Peace On Earth / When I Look At The World / New York - this last kind of preposterous but the greatest thing on the LP.

That LP seems pretty catchy next to the new one.

kind of love this quote from steve lillywhite in the latest tape op:
"They love Brian's hatred of anything rock. That's Brian's job, to hate U2. And they like that!"

Yeah, I saw that! For a bunch of doofuses, U2 seems pretty ego-free in the studio. They defer a lot to the judgement of others.

yeah, funny how lillywhite basically describes his job as de-eno-izing the recordings. in the joshua tree doc, i think, eno plays some of the stuff he's added that they've mixed out, and it sounds like remain in light. would be cool to hear complete "eno" versions of some of those songs/records. just for laughs.

I've mentioned it before, but Eno has described each U2 session as sort of a wave, from peak to valley, up and down, as it phases in and out of different permutations and forms. Sometimes they run out of time and it's at its peak/best, sometimes they run out of time in a valley. Surely there have been all sorts of neat ideas lost in the ebb and flow.

reading about their Eno sessions (e.g. Bill Flanagan's book) is far more awesome than experiencing the post-Zooropa product.

This thread inspired me to buy the Flanagan book on Amazon for $0.02.

Would also agree that All That You Can't Leave Behind is a surprisingly good place to listen for Eno-impact. I had always thought this record was a retreat from the spirit of Achtung and Zooropa based on the obvious populism of "Beautiful Day." But the reality is that it's more a consolidation of the experiments during those years. Singles are generally solid (tho I still hate all but the intro to "Beautiful Day"), and the back half is U2 at their textural best.

Lots of shimmer effect, some really good delicate textures.

ah, I was thinking about the partnership between ENA and U2 and wondering.
It's funny that Eno is among the most respected pop artists for the critics and U2 among the most ridiculed and despised. Yet, somehow, Eno seems untainted by this cooperation although it's one of the most important in his career (6 albums over more than 15 years).
isn't it strange ?

oups, no it's more like 7 albums over 25 years !

Oh, I don't know, it helps that the albums he produced were almost all really good and successful! It's the band/Bono that get ridiculed, which he (Bono) would be the first to admit is one of his duties. If people have problems with those albums, it's rarely with the production, and in a couple of cases the production is incredible.

The closest Eno got to push-back, imo, was when he produced Coldplay, and people were like, dude, you did this already with a better band.

eheh true about Coldplay !
how he managed to keep his credibility after that is a mystery...

how he managed to keep his credibility after that is a mystery...

Well, it turned out to be Coldplay's last good album, which helped.

Also, Eno's "credibility" is mostly with boring old twats anyway. Does anybody under 40 give a shit about Eno?

Also, Eno's "credibility" is mostly with boring old twats anyway. Does anybody under 40 give a shit about Eno?

well, I don't know but I suppose there might be some younger music fans who worship him too... and anyway, why does he get a pass from these boring old twats who, at the same time, shit over U2 (and of course Coldplay) ?
Or maybe he doesn't really and it's all in my head !

FWIW, his production credits since that Coldplay disc have largely been limited to cameos, more or less. And a couple of those cameos are great!

I think the stuff Eno did with U2 is mostly excellent, and I don't consider myself to the biggest U2 fan.

yeah u2 fell off the face of the earth as soon as he wasn't involved

It's funny that Eno is among the most respected pop artists for the critics and U2 among the most ridiculed and despised. Yet, somehow, Eno seems untainted by this cooperation although it's one of the most important in his career (6 albums over more than 15 years).
isn't it strange?

it's not strange, because he's worked with so many artists who are not U2. his U2 production might define him for a lot of people since they have a massive audience, but tbh i think about him fairly often and i often forget he has anything to do with U2 or coldplay or the like. i just think about his solo stuff and bowie and talking heads and harold budd and the Obscure label and promoting laraaji etc etc etc

people would also give U2 a pass if somehow they also collaborated with lots of other people and did great work, but whenever they try to branch out into something new you get shit like Spiderman

I thought critics love u2, didn't their last album get 5 stars in rolling stone?

Critics love Mick Jagger too. His last solo album got five stars in Rolling Stone.

In all fairness, since the emergence of the woeful shitheap that is The 1975, I've been sorely tempted to take back every negative thing I've ever said about U2. I won't, but when someone sets the bar that low then the temptation is undoubtedly there.

i'm looking at metacritic and all the recent u2 albums have "generally favorable reviews"

they're just a band that some people like to bellyache about

The 1975 have written twenty-four songs better than U2 in the last three years.

the last two albums are good imo but i'm on board with these dudes. how to dismantle an atomic bomb is their worst though. moreso than R&H.

xpost:

If you say so, Denise.

For me, Zooropa is the last truly satisfying album they made front-to-back, and I think Pop had the potential to be something better than it actually is. I think 'Hold Me Thrill Me Kiss Me Kill Me' was a great standalone single, and I do enjoy 'Beautiful Day' and 'Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of', even if I didn't rate that album.

Pop was where i got off the U2 train -- i loved most of Zooropa, but Pop just seemed lame.

There's some good songs on Pop that were ruined because of how they chose to make the record. Realistically, it could have taken them less time to make it and the end results could have been better. Zooropa at least showed that they could pull off a quick record when they wanted to.

FWIW, "No Line" is the first U2 album that gives Eno/Lanois co-write credit, and it's pretty dull.

Still not understanding what part of the '80s so revolts you that The 1975 become lepers, but it's for another thread.

So the 1975 is a 2016 band that sounds like the 1980s?

So the 1975 is a 2016 band that sounds like the 1980s?

Yep. And they're really good.

...for nothing!

FWIW, "No Line" is the first U2 album that gives Eno/Lanois co-write credit, and it's pretty dull.

"Magnificent" may not be the best thing they ever did – but it's a pretty solid single with a good hook and some great chiming guitar work. "Moment of Surrender," OTOH, might actually be the best thing they ever did – Eno's description of how it comes together here is quite good: https://youtu.be/8HDFCiN1XWw.

There are some other good moments as well (admittedly, "Get Your Boots On" is garbage). But my sense is that it's better than a bunch of records these guys have made away from Eno and Lanois.

Yeah, I was just listening to it, actually, and ran into the same problem I always do: starts fine, got some nice high points, some real low points, and ... I can never finish it. Then I forget it exists. Anyway:

better than a bunch of records these guys have made away from Eno and Lanois

U2 has made a whopping two albums sans Eno or Lanois since hooking up with them, "Pop" and the most recent one. It's definitely not better than "Pop," and I'm not sure it's better than the latest, either.

U2's prob - and no amount of Eno or Lanois can help this - is that they have the luxury of writing in the studio, and have done it this way for some time. They let the tapes roll, jam a bit, then when they settle on something they like Bono starts improvising vocals. Then it's a matter of shaping and refining stuff, which goes on until apparently the absolute last minute. Sometimes a great song gets run into the ground. Sometimes a go nowhere idea is built into something incredible. But when the clock stops counting down, the band is left with what it has, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse. And really, I'll always have time for this band's "worse," since it's often better than some similar band's best. But the issue I have with nu-U2, Eno or no, is the complete lack of studio risk, or surprise. U2 has radically remade itself three times: the first from jagged post-punk, the second into Eno-Lanois epic widescreen art rock Americana mode, the third as deceptively dark alt-rock with Achtung. Yeah, "No Line" did not benefit from the "experimental" buzz, but it wasn't just that it wasn't "Zooropa" it's that what was left I can't even conceive of as *ever* being experimental. Just more U2 in its current mode.

But sure, "Moment of Surrender" is great.

best songs on NLOTH are the first three and the last three. my favorite is maybe 'breathe'. i have good memories of this album for a few reasons, number 1 being that their Rose Bowl show was pretty incredible, at least from right by the stage.

'songs of innocence' was, the tone deaf campaign aside, a solid middle-of-the-road U2 album which thankfully didn't really have a 'vertigo' or 'get on your boots'. well, 'volcano' is kind of close, but it's a lot better than those two songs.

"Volcano" is actually the first U2 song I've truly enjoyed since whenever, the 80s I guess. But that Joey Ramone tribute is everything pretentious & dumb about Bono in 1 convenient package

OTOH, "California" is pretty great.

Also, that's a very good post, Josh. One minor quibble and expansion:

U2 has made a whopping two albums sans Eno or Lanois since hooking up with them, "Pop" and the most recent one. It's definitely not better than "Pop," and I'm not sure it's better than the latest, either.

U2 has radically remade itself three times: the first from jagged post-punk, the second into Eno-Lanois epic widescreen art rock Americana mode, the third as deceptively dark alt-rock with Achtung.

On the former point, it's more like three albums -- Eno and Lanois only produce one song on How To Dismantle an Atom Bomb. The rest is Lillywhite, Chris Thomas and Jacknife Lee (Lanois has a co-production credit on another song with Thomas).

To the latter, I would also add that U2 have remade (or at least, self-consciously repositioned) themselves two or three additional times — first, when they left behind irony and "reapplied for the job of the best band in the world" (barf) with All That You Can't Leave Behind, secondly, when they ditched the widescreen panoramas (again) for the rockist pastures of How To Dismantle an Atom Bomb and the aborted Rick Rubin sessions, and thirdly, when they returned to that sound (again) to make No Line On the Horizon with E&L. At this point, it almost doesn’t matter. They all end up sounding like U2 — sometimes the guitars have more distortion, sometimes less, but they all have a single or two worth your time, some decent album tracks and at least one hideous stinker.

But particularly when you add Pop and Spider-man to the mix, it's hard to look at the endless churn of shifting musical styles and producers to no real end without wondering how a such a popular band with a sound this recognizable could find itself in what is effectively a permanent state of identity crisis.

i want to add that U2's single worst sound in their arsenal is whenever they anchor a song to an overly compressed riff from The Edge. sometimes the songs aren't horrible i guess but when you hear superior recent songs like 'magnificent' or 'beautiful day' next to middling songs like 'get on your boots' or 'vertigo' or 'the miracle of joey ramone', you wonder why they constantly stray from the sound that everyone wants from them for the singles that kick off their recent albums.

what is effectively a permanent state of identity crisis.

Well, they're flailing around for relevance, aren't they? I do give them credit for at least trying. The last (current?) tour pretty impressively tries harder than the last few to focus on a theme/new record, which they play almost in its entirety, right? And some old warhorses have been dropped from the setlist to do it.

Man, still trying to listen to "No Line" again, and I get to a song like "Unknown Caller." It starts out promising, and old U2 would have left it a mood piece, as it begins, but new U2 tries to blow it up into an anthem at the same time, with some of the worst lyrics ever. (And the rare Edge solo!). I think "Moment of Surrender" might seem so strong because the band lately seems afraid to just be quiet or otherwise risk people not paying attention. They used to manage the balance and dynamic so much better, on stuff like "Mothers of the Disappeared" or especially "One Tree Hill."

Hmm, "Breathe" is a pretty good song. (with bad lyrics) Maybe it's just a matter of bad sequencing?

cannot think of that song or album without thinking of nabisco version

ahah. yeah, especially since I have never listened to the real version of the album !

https://english.elpais.com/usa/2021-10-11/u2-the-boom-and-bust-of-the-worlds-biggest-band.html

Good article on Achtung's 30th

TIL of the "Passengers" album with Eno... which wasn't even worth a mention on this thread?

Passengers - Original Soundtracks 1

good job board

It might be 30 years since I listened to The Joshua Tree so I don't know but there seems to be more Eno and Lanois to this than anything on the album. A bit generic maybe but also not too far from side 2 of RIL or somewhere in AGW.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZloDgx4Lq0