When U2 returned to Paris on Sunday to play the first of the two shows that were postponed in the wake of last month’s horrible terrorist attacks, emotion and sentiment ran high. It was no surprise, therefore, that the band had something special up their sleeves – an appearance by New York singer / songwriter […]
Read MoreU2101 – With or Without You
“With or Without You” is another one of those songs that U2 will probably never stop playing live, and I suppose that there’s good reason for that. If I had to choose one song to name as U2’s signature cut, it would probably be this hit from 1987 – their very first American number one. […]
Read MoreU2101 – Mysterious Ways
In the fall of 2002, around the time that U2’s Best of 1990-2000 came out, I was working at a record store in Cincinnati, Ohio. I remember that during the first time I played the store’s promotional copy over the in-store stereo system, when “Mysterious Ways” came on, one of the girls I worked with said “I […]
Read MoreU2101 – Bad
Today I am writing about what I believe to be the greatest song ever recorded – U2’s “Bad”, from The Unforgettable Fire. When I was in college, I once wrote an essay about this song for a class, and I was never quite happy with what I turned in. It’s bugged me for years, so […]
Read MoreU2101 – All I Want is You
One characteristic of Apple’s iTunes program that I really like is the fact that it keeps track of how many times each song has been played by an Apple product (such as an iPhone or an iPad). It is because of this aspect of the program that I am able to report that today’s featured […]
Read MoreU2101 – Beautiful Day
It may not seem like it now, fifteen years and several albums later, but All That You Can’t Leave Behind was a very important album for U2. After the perceived failure of Pop, U2 needed a critical and commercial success in a serious way to not only get themselves back in the good graces of […]
Read MoreU2101 – City of Blinding Lights
Whenever I think of the song “City of Blinding Lights”, I can’t help but think of the “surprise” concert that U2 put on beneath the Brooklyn Bridge back in 2004. To celebrate the North American release of How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, U2 paraded through the city of New York on the back of […]
Read MoreU2101 – Spanish Eyes
Much like “Mothers of the Disappeared” always gets played whenever U2 is in Argentina, another song that always gets played when the geography is right is “Spanish Eyes”, which usually makes an appearance when the band is in – yep, you guessed it – Spain.
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U2101 – Pride (In the Name of Love)
It was good enough to be U2’s first top 40 hit in the USA, but NME magazine thought it sounded too much like “Sunday Bloody Sunday”, a complaint which has never made much sense to me. I’m talking, of course, about “Pride (In the Name of Love), the second most played song in all of […]
Read MoreU2101 – Zoo Station
On Thursday of this past week, U2 began a 4-show stand in Berlin, Germany, which is, of course, well known as the city where parts of Achtung Baby were recorded. In celebration of that connection, U2 performed their song “Zoo Station”, Achtung Baby’s opening track, for the first time in nearly nine years.
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