U2 Releases New Album ‘Songs of Innocence’ for Free via iTunes

[Musikwala]

Bono Responds to Sharon Osbourne’s Twitter Rant: ‘What a Shocker’

Bono Responds to Sharon Osbourne's Twitter Rant: 'What a Shocker'

Bono said that it’s been “great to stir things up. Thank you for being interested, even if you’re only interested enough to be a crank caller. Just remember this: A lot of Irish blood, sweat and tears went into your junk mail.” He concedes that “U2 attracts a lot of haters, but we’ve got a lot of lovers too, and I think that will always drown out that other kind of noise.”

Well said.

 

[AboutAGirl]

This was an atrocious business strategy for several reasons.

- It was slipped onto people's devices without their consent or knowledge. That's an extremely uncomfortable betrayal of privacy, especially so soon after Apple's iCloud was named in connection to the celeb photo leaks. This time Apple only put some MP3s on your phone but next time they could be putting viruses or propaganda there, and searching your phone for nude pics. Not saying they'll be doing that any time soon, but it's an unsettling thought for people to have it so blatantly demonstrated that they could.

- They put this album on everybody's device and there's no way to delete it! ridiculous! Some people with smaller phones actually had all their memory taken up by this album.

- U2 is past their prime. Only a small, small segment of the entire iPhone world is going to appreciate this album. I mean, I love every album Neil Young comes out with, I sincerely do. But he hasn't put out a record that is essential for casual fans since the early 1990s. Likewise only diehard U2 fans are going to be interested in their new album.

A much, much, much wiser business decision would have been to put U2's Greatest Hits on everybody's phone/device/cloud. This still would have gotten a whole heaping ton of backlash but it would have turned out much better for U2. Now people who aren't familiar with the band would be listening to their best material and a lot of people would be turned into fans that way. Then they start buying other U2 albums and now U2 is making money and making new fans at the same time. Their new album, sure it'll bring in some fans but not many.

 

[Musikwala]

A much, much, much wiser business decision would have been to put U2's Greatest Hits on everybody's phone/device/cloud. This still would have gotten a whole heaping ton of backlash but it would have turned out much better for U2. Now people who aren't familiar with the band would be listening to their best material and a lot of people would be turned into fans that way. Then they start buying other U2 albums and now U2 is making money and making new fans at the same time. Their new album, sure it'll bring in some fans but not many.

Yeah I myself did not agree with the strategy of pushing the album into people's phones without them asking for it. They could've simply released it for free and put it on iTunes. Whoever wanted it could've downloaded it.

Here's what another poster suggested on another board I frequent:

The funny thing is, the 'biggest' way they could have sent this (on an all positive direction) would have been to just quietly out of nowhere load it onto their iTunes page, for free, and not said a single word. Nothing from U2. Nothing from Apple. Nothing from Universal. Just wait. It would have taken minutes to be discovered. The news goes everywhere. No word from anyone. Is it a mistake? Grab it quickly just in case.And then wait some more. Like, a week more. Let people just take it and listen and wonder wtf is this all about. Would have generated an almost equal level of noise because it's new and unusual and kinda funny - and entirely positive.

 

[mrJim]

Bono Responds to Sharon Osbourne’s Twitter Rant: ‘What a Shocker’[/B

Well said.

There are 2 side to this story

“Every songwriter just wants to get heard,” said Bono. “You know, the figure of 500 million is great. That means they got a chance to download it. But the real figure is — and I just heard this today — that 38 million people have actually listened to the album. Apparently, one or two people didn’t like it.”.

stir things or be heard. The Guy is such a contradiction.

And well Sharon isn't all wrong

He is a megalomaniac and it does appear that the music is mediocre



Jim

 

[Musikwala]

Well, first of all Sharon is a loud mouth who has no business commenting on this. She's somebody who has whored out her whole family's daily life on a TV show. It's a joke that she accuses Bono of making music into a business!

Secondly her track record on spewing venom at other celebs is well known. Everybody knows about that incident with Iron Maiden at Ozzfest a few years back.

Thirdly it is her loss and everyone's loss who don't give time for this album to sink in. If you're patient with this album you're wonderfully rewarded with 11 nice tunes! If not, oh well. U2 fans will have fewer people fighting for tickets on the next tour.

 

[Aero]

Too many people do not know the art of ignoring.

If you don't care for something, ignore it. Simple.

It's hard not to.

Bono has become such a douchebag, I can't even stand looking at him.

They used to be this really cool little Irish band but ever since their success, they've turned into a bunch of wankers with Bono being the biggest wanker of all.

Just the way he acts on stage, or in that commercial. It's ****ing annoying.

 

[AboutAGirl]

Since it's free on iTunes as well, I decided to download. Really I quite like it. It helps that this is the only U2 album I own, so I'm far from burned out on the band. But it's stronger and more modern than I expected.

I did find it disturbing that it was included in my iTunes purchases list automatically. But at least it didn't literally download to my computer without my permission.

 

[Lynch]

 

[Phil B.]

I normally stay out of these types of threads because they can become volatile, so with that in mind...

*disclaimer**** This is just my humble opinion.

I find it pretentious that Apple feels they can make a move like this. Our computing and communication devices are always in danger of some third party invasion, generally by those who mean us harm or stand to benefit from our information or intellectual property. We have words like virus, malware, hacking, or identity theft for those issues. When a large corporation (which many of their clients embrace wholeheartedly) enlists a universal icon to push their wares, what do we call that? Unfortunately for me, the bigger view is obscuring the release of a new album by U2. Maybe a few years down the road I will be more objective about the album.

 

[gguerra]

I dont own an iphone but I did get the album and really do like it. I've always liked U2 but was not impressed on their last few albums as being mediocre at best. This one shines IMO and I did not have to skip to the next track even once.

- U2 is past their prime. Only a small, small segment of the entire iPhone world is going to appreciate this album.

As far as them being out of style or past their prime or whatever I don't agree. Just look at their last tour. By its conclusion, U2 360° had set records for the highest-grossing concert tour with $736 million in ticket sales, and for the highest-attended tour with over 7.2 million tickets sold.

Also, and it is quite obvious the band ColdPlay is influenced by U2 or does sound like them quite a bit, especially the vocals.