I have lived with this album for nearly a week now. Listened to U2 talk about it on Radio 4. Had on constantly through Spotify and now have finally bought the thing on ITUNES. I even went the whole hog and bought the special edition.
You need to remember I have been a fan since Unforgetable Fire and then ofcourse I went back and bought the back catalogue. U2 has taken the top spot from REM in my musical affections – which is nearly as unheard of as changing football team allegiance. So I really really want this album to be good (especially after my football team have just thrown away the premiership title race.) I am hoping to meet Bono this year ( its a kind of annual hope I have) and so i wanted to tell him he’s done a great job with the work on global poverty and that I thought his latest album was the band’s best yet.
So first the details on the special edition:
The top of the range option is the CD / DVD / Hardback book option. I can’t imagine the book will be any good. So unless you are thinking of making a long term investment (you might get more of a return than in a bank at the moment) I’d skip it.
1) The DVD content is available on the ITUNES download special edition or on Amazon.
LINEAR – a 50 minute film by Anton Corbajn is the content on the disc.
its a predominantly black and white movie which acts as a kind of video track to the album. U2 appear in one of the videos which is filmed as if you are watching them on a TV. Its a pretty poor – can’t imagine I will be watching it again soon.
2) ITUNES extra video track FEZ
This is a video that follows the band around Fez in Morocco. There’s a lot of material available of the band working on this album if you google it on the internet. So again nothing worth writing home about on this one.
3) The Album itself
If you have read my precious blog article on this album you will know my initial reaction to the album wasn’t great.
here are the songs that grow on you over time:
1) Magnificent – is the best track for classic U2 fans – its kind of ULTRAVIOLET meets ELECTRICAL STALL.
2) Stand Up Comedy – funky , creative, innovative, catchy – my favourite track on the album.
3) Get on your boots – I like this song apart from the chorus now – its the song I end up singing most often from the album.