1. I think I like this one better. I do remember not loving it on first listen. So far though SOE is kind of sad to me. This album felt more uplifting.
  2. VIVA Songs of Innocence !

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    Songs of Innocence is a very strong album, complemented by the new record. I thought it was instantly arresting in a way that SofE is a slow burner. I'm keeping an open mind until it beds in, but I'm certainly not feeling the hyperbolic 'wow' factor coming across from the early reviews. I'm definitely not objective enough not to confuse 'amazing and classic' with 'new and exciting'!
  3. SOI was great No doubt, But this album i don't know i just feel something i have not felt with U2 for a while.
    My partner loves it and she's never ever really been into U2. I think its appealing to outsiders.
  4. I used to love SOI, but then SOE came out... And somehow it managed to actually improve SOI to me.

    The songs I had been neglecting lately (the first 5) have been revitalized when combined with SOE.
    And the rest somehow make more sense (sonically) when placed inside the atmosphere of SOE.

    I keep recalling what they've said on Joshua Three, about the songs not making total sense without the b-sides.
    To me, this happens here
    What one album lacks, the other exceeds. Both SOI and SOE complete each other.
  5. Originally posted by Bloodraven:I used to love SOI, but then SOE came out... And somehow it managed to actually improve SOI to me.

    The songs I had been neglecting lately (the first 5) have been revitalized when combined with SOE.
    And the rest somehow make more sense (sonically) when placed inside the atmosphere of SOE.

    I keep recalling what they've said on Joshua Three, about the songs not making total sense without the b-sides.
    To me, this happens here
    What one album lacks, the other exceeds. Both SOI and SOE complete each other.
    If I had to pick a single U2 record as my favourite, it's Songs of Innocence. It's my 'heart' record. But the release of Songs of Experience didn't dull or dampen SOI in my eyes at all. Just like you say, it strengthened it. The reprises, the little shouts back and forth, the alternative perspectives... these two great narratives and great collections of songs play together just as they should.

    So, my true favourite U2 album is Songs of Innocence and of Experience.

    (Also, I love that about TJT b-sides - 'With or Without You doesn't make complete sense without Luminous Times and Walk To the Water,' like Bono once said - it's true.)
  6. Originally posted by bazzzz:i consider soi with soe a double super concept album from the birth of the 4 bandmates all over their lifes, i mean an autobiography in music and lyrics,imo


    That was the original intent too yeah? I do think they're both stronger as a whole than as separate projects. If the production on SOI matched SOE (or the other way around if you're into that sort of thing ), then I think this would be one of my favorite periods for U2 ever.
  7. Originally posted by CMIPalaeo:[..]
    If I had to pick a single U2 record as my favourite, it's Songs of Innocence. It's my 'heart' record. But the release of Songs of Experience didn't dull or dampen SOI in my eyes at all. Just like you say, it strengthened it. The reprises, the little shouts back and forth, the alternative perspectives... these two great narratives and great collections of songs play together just as they should.

    So, my true favourite U2 album is Songs of Innocence and of Experience.

    (Also, I love that about TJT b-sides - 'With or Without You doesn't make complete sense without Luminous Times and Walk To the Water,' like Bono once said - it's true.)
    I never understood why Bono said that. Can you explain? WOWY makes plenty of sense to me as a song and I don’t know what about those other songs is supposed to enchance it.
  8. Originally posted by RattleandHum1988:[..]
    I never understood why Bono said that. Can you explain? WOWY makes plenty of sense to me as a song and I don’t know what about those other songs is supposed to enchance it.
    Walk To the Water is a stroll through a lost, more romantic Dublin... maybe remembered through the flattering haze of nostalgia. It's a love song but not a perfect, easy love, you get the sense that the characters are almost skirting round each other in a way, both tugging in their own directions (the guy telling jokes nobody would listen to, lying about/exaggerating his career, the image of him yearning for the woman - 'let me in, let me love you'). Luminous Times is, in a similar vein, a song about a relationship, and the man is obsessed with the woman, taking comparisons of her from vaguely natural in Walk To the Water ('like a field of corn,' 'you were blown by the wind') to like various major forces, natural or otherwise (avalanche, thunder, waves, etc). By this point it seems as though the guy is distanced from his partner - it's a song that's literally begging for love and salvation, but he says he's not even in love with the actual person anymore, he's in love because he needs that emotion/relationship to hold him together. It's the breaking point to With or Without You, which is obviously about a fractured relationship in which the participants feel that being apart and being together are both unbearable outcomes. Additionally, it carries on some of the same imagery, of seas and storms. So thematically, I can see the three songs as a narrative, following a man and a woman in a brittle, faulting relationship that are too uncertain of any ability to proceed together or apart that they stay in the same rut, after a somewhat more rosy beginning (in Walk To the Water). They also have a similar atmosphere/imagery (to me at least).

    Of course, you don't need the b-sides for With or Without You to work. It's pretty clear what With or Without You is about, what it means. It's just a lot nicer to have the added background of the b-sides. It's really just about the only example I can think of a U2 single and its b-sides forming a cohesive narrative unit.

    That's what I felt after revisiting those three songs after reading that quote some time back. I dunno, though. I'm sure a lot of fans probably feel totally differently!
  9. I’ve been listening quite a bit to this album and I have to say I’d probably put it back up to 3rd behind the big 2 in album ranking. I initially said I preferred SOE but whilst my favourable opinion of that album hasn’t changed my love for this album has literally grown on every single listen. Last night I was lying back chilled out listening to it and I loved the mood, the vibe and the atmosphere it created, even the songs I initially thought were only ok I’m really into by now, the Miracle, volcano and and sleep like a baby tonight, I’m finally getting them. The others that I loved anyway, like the album, sound better on every listen. I remember over 3 years ago listening to this album for the first few times and thinking wow they’ve done it again, it’s maybe only now though and over the last few months I’m realising the extent of how great this album is.
  10. Originally posted by deanallison:I’ve been listening quite a bit to this album and I have to say I’d probably put it back up to 3rd behind the big 2 in album ranking. I initially said I preferred SOE but whilst my favourable opinion of that album hasn’t changed my love for this album has literally grown on every single listen. Last night I was lying back chilled out listening to it and I loved the mood, the vibe and the atmosphere it created, even the songs I initially thought were only ok I’m really into by now, the Miracle, volcano and and sleep like a baby tonight, I’m finally getting them. The others that I loved anyway, like the album, sound better on every listen. I remember over 3 years ago listening to this album for the first few times and thinking wow they’ve done it again, it’s maybe only now though and over the last few months I’m realising the extent of how great this album is.
    I love SOI. I think it’ll be appreciated more and more as time passes.
  11. Originally posted by deanallison:I’ve been listening quite a bit to this album and I have to say I’d probably put it back up to 3rd behind the big 2 in album ranking. I initially said I preferred SOE but whilst my favourable opinion of that album hasn’t changed my love for this album has literally grown on every single listen. Last night I was lying back chilled out listening to it and I loved the mood, the vibe and the atmosphere it created, even the songs I initially thought were only ok I’m really into by now, the Miracle, volcano and and sleep like a baby tonight, I’m finally getting them. The others that I loved anyway, like the album, sound better on every listen. I remember over 3 years ago listening to this album for the first few times and thinking wow they’ve done it again, it’s maybe only now though and over the last few months I’m realising the extent of how great this album is.
    Glad to hear the love for this album is growing. When SOE came out, it only made me like SOI even more, because I thought they went so well together.
  12. Just thinking, remember when this album suddenly dropped? What a thrill that was, never been so eager to get back from work. Great moment to be a U2 fan.