I was watching MTV in my rooming house in college in 1984. A U2 video, probably Sunday Bloody Sunday, came on. One of other roommates who happened to be in the room said, “They’re so concerned.”
U2 has done a pretty good job of reinventing themselves as the years have gone by. That’s pretty rare. Even rarer is when bandmates can stay together. Everyone from Pink Floyd to The Beatles parted ways with a fair amount of hostility. U2 seems to stay together with no hint of infighting or “creative differences,” and I wonder why?
But back to the review of Mofo. Or forward to the review. This is an odd song. I know it’s trying hard to be driving and edgy, but for one reason or another, every time I tried to listen to it all the way through, I found a distraction, usually another song in my library. I’m trying to like this song, I really am.
I hate to be one of those guys who thinks they know everything about music and what’s good and what’s bad, because hey, I’ve never sold a million copies of anything. But I give Mofo a thumbs down.
I miss The Unforgettable Fire.
Not my favorite U2 song by any means (in fact it’s the one song of theirs that sounds nothing like “them”), but U2 remains my favorite band, across all eras, because they remain steadfastly “U2” whether experimenting with electronica or returning to their punk origins. The earlier albums (up to and including Joshua Tree) are songs of sheer uplift. Their Nineties period gets a bit tiresome, really, but fortunately only lasted for three albums before hitting the brick wall that was Pop. Their most recent stuff is too autobiographical and inward-looking, and I believe they should retire at this point. But No. 1 band? Yep, for about a million reasons.