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  1. Maybe he means writing their own music in 1977, not necessarily forming in 1977. From my understanding they were all very much beginners musically and relied on mainly covers for a while.
  2. Originally posted by marik:Was re-reading the liner notes, and a couple questions popped up for me;

    1) Bono wrote "at some point in 1977 u2 started making music together" - how can he possibly have the year wrong. after U2 By U2, and even their 40th bday balloon video, it proves they know it was Sept 1976. Did someone not fact check this? Or the way he worded it, do you think he actually meant in Sept 1976 they were only playing covers,and they didnt start any Original material until into 1977?

    2) among all the usual names in the thank-yous like Chris Martin, Noel Gallagher, why on earth is Usher listed? I dont recall any sort of association or collab or meeting or mention of Usher with any member of U2 at all ever?

    3) curious how others interrupt Bono's closing line of "We can spend our whole lives searching for cohesion, and in not finding it, turn the world into the shape of our disapointment. Or not. "


    Regarding your question at the end, the line from Zooropa - “she’s going to dream up the world she wants to live in, she’s gonna dream out loud” - comes to mind. As does the whole of Still Haven’t Found.

    Speaking as a Christian, I think Bono might be suggesting that on the one hand, life in this present age of history will never make total sense or be “cohesive.” That’s life as mortals in a world broken by our own sin and the sin of others. But in Jesus, the life of the age to come has already begun to dawn, meaning we don’t need to let our disappointment at not having it all figured out dictate our lives. We’re invited as Image-bearers of God to become truly human, part of God’s project of putting the world right again, welcomed into a new family by grace and able to reflect that same grace out to the world in working for peace, love, justice...all the things that the band and Bono in particular are so devoted to.
  3. Originally posted by marik:1) Bono wrote "at some point in 1977 u2 started making music together" - how can he possibly have the year wrong. after U2 By U2, and even their 40th bday balloon video, it proves they know it was Sept 1976. Did someone not fact check this? Or the way he worded it, do you think he actually meant in Sept 1976 they were only playing covers,and they didnt start any Original material until into 1977?

    Maybe he means what they did for the later months of 1976 was noise and not proper music
  4. True.... everyone had a garage-punk band making noise then...I know everyone in my school did as it was in my garage... Thank goodness no tapes exist!
  5. Originally posted by Edi:[..]
    True.... everyone had a garage-punk band making noise then...I know everyone in my school did as it was in my garage... Thank goodness no tapes exist!
    I'd actually like to hear those recordings
  6. Something I’ve been thinking about this one lately. It’s one of my favourite albums but unusually for u2 I don’t think much of it is improved live. The miracle I would say is better live but apart from that I don’t really strongly prefer any other song live. I do think the songs in the innocence section were very good live iris, cedarwood Road, song for someone, raised by Wolves but not really better. Every breaking wave, California, the troubles and volcano never quite lived up to the album versions for me but again I do enjoy them live. Looking at the bonus tracks lucifers hands and crystal ballroom I’d say are better on the album, invisible I probably preferred live. It’s just something I noticed while listening to last years subscriber gift. SOE is the opposite, most of that I prefer live. It wouldn’t change my opinion on SOI and I do still listen to the songs live regularly but it really is unique in that as a whole I prefer the studio versions even Achtung Baby which is my favourite u2 album I’d probably rather listen to live versions of most of the songs.
  7. That is an interesting reflection. As you say, they often take good songs to another level live but perhaps less so with SOI. To me EBW gained the most but that started with the bonus version on the deluxe edition which should have been used on the base album. That was a standout on JT19.
  8. Originally posted by deanallison:Something I’ve been thinking about this one lately. It’s one of my favourite albums but unusually for u2 I don’t think much of it is improved live. The miracle I would say is better live but apart from that I don’t really strongly prefer any other song live. I do think the songs in the innocence section were very good live iris, cedarwood Road, song for someone, raised by Wolves but not really better. Every breaking wave, California, the troubles and volcano never quite lived up to the album versions for me but again I do enjoy them live. Looking at the bonus tracks lucifers hands and crystal ballroom I’d say are better on the album, invisible I probably preferred live. It’s just something I noticed while listening to last years subscriber gift. SOE is the opposite, most of that I prefer live. It wouldn’t change my opinion on SOI and I do still listen to the songs live regularly but it really is unique in that as a whole I prefer the studio versions even Achtung Baby which is my favourite u2 album I’d probably rather listen to live versions of most of the songs.
    Very nice reflection indeed, and I more or less agree (even though I don't consider SOI to be among my "favorite albums", but I sure regard it higher than many many fans out there). I'd say Iris and California pretty much improved live too, when played live they got rid of the excesive cheesy production from the album versions. Cedarwood Road and Raised By Wolves "improved" but only when considered together with the strong visuals & the use of the screen, but musically they were inferior to their studio versions. Song For Someone was equally boring and superfluous, The Miracle was equally ignorable... And it's still a travesty that Reach Me Now wasn't played at all and The Troubles was ignored after a handful of tries
  9. Originally posted by deanallison:Something I’ve been thinking about this one lately. It’s one of my favourite albums but unusually for u2 I don’t think much of it is improved live. The miracle I would say is better live but apart from that I don’t really strongly prefer any other song live. I do think the songs in the innocence section were very good live iris, cedarwood Road, song for someone, raised by Wolves but not really better. Every breaking wave, California, the troubles and volcano never quite lived up to the album versions for me but again I do enjoy them live. Looking at the bonus tracks lucifers hands and crystal ballroom I’d say are better on the album, invisible I probably preferred live. It’s just something I noticed while listening to last years subscriber gift. SOE is the opposite, most of that I prefer live. It wouldn’t change my opinion on SOI and I do still listen to the songs live regularly but it really is unique in that as a whole I prefer the studio versions even Achtung Baby which is my favourite u2 album I’d probably rather listen to live versions of most of the songs.
    I have very similar or actually exactly the same feelings about SOI and SOE (and even more about AB, too) when it comes to which version of them are better to listening. I also prefer the studio version of SOI and love and prefer the live version of all tracks on SOE. I'm really delighted listening the live version of SOE as for last subscription gift but SOI live I like much less and rarely listen it.
    By the way I would love to hear EBW played live in exactly album version, full band with plug, not acoustic, not unplugged as usual they played live.
  11. I'll never get tired of saying that the 2nd half of this album is a true masterpiece.
  12. I’ll never get tired of saying that the whole album is a masterpiece. 6 years later and I still enjoy and appreciate it more with every listen.