Many years before Bono thought his civic duty to lecture people about giving part of their salaries to third world debt while gouging fans with extortionate ticket prices, and just a few years before he and his mates hit megastatrdom with `The Joshua tree', U2 were a fledgling Irish rock band with two albums underneath their belt.
They realized that promise with `War', one of the more impassioned , raw ,aggressive albums ever made. The album was as Bono put it, a slap in the face to complacent music listeners everywhere. I would go so far as to say the album is akin to a petrol bomb exploding outside your door, and while you are on the inside, your innards shake from the force of the blast.
I was angry kid back then and u2`s post punk aggressiveness appealed to me. It was a soundtrack for my formative years.
Here, U2 address the Irish troubles(Sunday Bloody sunday), resolutions that we mean to keep but do we ever(New year`s day), standing up for your position in life(Like a song), immigration(The refugee), an energetic love song not steeped in sappy sentimentality(Two hearts beat as One), needing a hand while being overwhelmed)Drowning Man and a beautiful adaptation of a psalm that closes the album(40)
My better half reckons I resemble the kid on the cover shot when I was a youth. And that cover even conveys the rawness of the album before you hear it. Here, the kid is unsmiling, possibly angry with a cut lip.
This was an album that was unaplogetic.and uncompromising. Why people prefer Joshua tree(1987), a work where sensitive ponytailed men were soul searching is beyond me. U2 compromised a bit in my book.
Many people here on this site feel U2 are overrated. Back in`83 for a kid such as myself., U2 were possibly the best band in rock, not falling or giving into trends.
Nowadays, I have no more use for U2, but those are my reason alone.
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