Jonny Come Lately
The New Kid In Town
Personally, I like U2 - the only album of theirs I own is The Joshua Tree, which I think it is an excellent album. I am also familiar with quite a few of the songs from Boy, War and The Unforgettable Fire (which, as an aside, is a quite brilliant album title).
I like their music and am an admirer of The Edge - although quite a few of my favourite guitarists favour lengthy guitar solos I think his playing style of less is more works very well for the band. I like the Christian themes and Biblical images/phrases that appear in their music, not only does this appeal to me as a person but it also differentiated them a lot from, and the use of vivid imagery in their lyrics (think 'under a blood red sky' from New Year's Day, or the lyrics from Running To Stand Still, for instance).
Additionally, U2 are a band that was born to play in massive venues, with Bono's vocals and The Edge's guitars both being extremely well suited to filling stadiums. Contrast this with Coldplay, the band often described as U2's natural successors (I don't think they are myself, they don't have enough charisma, are too eager to please and aren't experimental enough) - in adapting to play stadium concerts Coldplay lost a lot of the intimacy that made albums like Parachutes appealing in the first place.
My number one favourite song by U2 is probably Where The Streets Have No Name, the imagery of the lyrics is powerful and I love the delay effect on The Edge's guitars in the intro and at the end of the song in particular (If you love this song and don't mind technical articles, read this, I think this is quite interesting: U2's Natural Logarhythm: Exponential Decay in the Delay of The Edge's Guitar).
They lose me a bit after The Joshua Tree, I'm not really keen on disco/industrial music and therefore what little I've heard from the 1990s hasn't appealed to me especially. Their early 2000s releases mark a step backwards in most respects, although I haven't heard much from this era either. U2 are not a band that reaches out to my generation, I would have been 9/10 when Atomic Bomb was released (too young to really be aware of it) and New Line On The Horizon seemed to have relatively little cultural impact in my neck of the woods. I think they can be seen as the last of the rock dinosaurs, in some ways.
I'm not particularly keen on Bono as person although in the era I'm most familiar with and like best I don't think this gets in the way, and in any case albums like Boy largely preceded his rise to prominence. And, for all his faults he is a great singer and a great frontman.
I like their music and am an admirer of The Edge - although quite a few of my favourite guitarists favour lengthy guitar solos I think his playing style of less is more works very well for the band. I like the Christian themes and Biblical images/phrases that appear in their music, not only does this appeal to me as a person but it also differentiated them a lot from, and the use of vivid imagery in their lyrics (think 'under a blood red sky' from New Year's Day, or the lyrics from Running To Stand Still, for instance).
Additionally, U2 are a band that was born to play in massive venues, with Bono's vocals and The Edge's guitars both being extremely well suited to filling stadiums. Contrast this with Coldplay, the band often described as U2's natural successors (I don't think they are myself, they don't have enough charisma, are too eager to please and aren't experimental enough) - in adapting to play stadium concerts Coldplay lost a lot of the intimacy that made albums like Parachutes appealing in the first place.
My number one favourite song by U2 is probably Where The Streets Have No Name, the imagery of the lyrics is powerful and I love the delay effect on The Edge's guitars in the intro and at the end of the song in particular (If you love this song and don't mind technical articles, read this, I think this is quite interesting: U2's Natural Logarhythm: Exponential Decay in the Delay of The Edge's Guitar).
They lose me a bit after The Joshua Tree, I'm not really keen on disco/industrial music and therefore what little I've heard from the 1990s hasn't appealed to me especially. Their early 2000s releases mark a step backwards in most respects, although I haven't heard much from this era either. U2 are not a band that reaches out to my generation, I would have been 9/10 when Atomic Bomb was released (too young to really be aware of it) and New Line On The Horizon seemed to have relatively little cultural impact in my neck of the woods. I think they can be seen as the last of the rock dinosaurs, in some ways.
I'm not particularly keen on Bono as person although in the era I'm most familiar with and like best I don't think this gets in the way, and in any case albums like Boy largely preceded his rise to prominence. And, for all his faults he is a great singer and a great frontman.
