I first heard The Unforgettable Fire in John Menzies' record department in Princes Street, Edinburgh and I immediately fell in love with the sound and atmosphere of the album. There were loads of great albums in 1984, World Shut Your Mouth and Fried by Julian Cope, Treasure by Cocteau Twins, Rattlesnakes by Lloyd Cole and the Commotions, Hyaena by Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Top by The Cure and Stoneage Romeos by The Hoodoo Gurus, as well as the ones you mentioned. One of my favourite years for music.
Good choice, and good shout ref Live Aid. Yes Queen is the familiar favourite whenever live aid is mentioned, but for me at the time the relative newcomers U2 stole the show with Bad. So pleased it featured on the Wide Awake in America live ep. My adoration only lasted the 80’s, but those albums stayed with me. Like you I spent a lot of time and energy listening to Frankie in 1984. But not an album I have listened to regularly since then. My honourable mention for 1984 and still a source of pleasure is Purple Rain.
Agree RE 80s U2. I checked out pretty soon after "Rattle And Hum", which really felt like the point they became "U2 as spectacle", rather than"U2 as band". Cheers, D
Elvis Presley and America is still one of my fave U2 songs. I still have no idea what the lyrics are, I don't even want to look them up, but the song makes me feel emotions every time.
Robyn Hitchcocks's albums are unfortunately a little hard to get here in the Netherlands. Maybe the box-set "I wanna go backwards" is a nice option. Underwater Moonlight I love but somehow I've never ventured beyond it... The Unforgettable Fire might be the most important album U2 ever made. Great as War was, they needed a change in sound to not become stuck and with Eno and Lanois they achieved just that. Also some of their best songs are on this album. For consistency I prefer the Joshua Tree but, like you say, perhaps a more calculated effort. 1984 was also the year two of Minneapolis' finest released their MOST classic records, Purple Rain / Let It Be.
I do think Joshua Tree is a great U2 album, and if you'd asked me aged 16, I'd probably have picked it as my favorite. Maybe it suffers from overplay, from over-exposure? But maybe that was the point? It certainly feels like the start of U2-as-a-brand now, even if it didn't to me back then. I think it was clearly aimed at an American audience, and in that respect it was (a) extremely effective, and (b) a sign of the band's huge ambition. I dunno. I just liked the sound of Bono when he wasn't quite so forceful, so direct, and I wish we'd got to hear a little more of that beyond "The Unforgettable Fire". Good call with "Let It Be" too, but I'm one of those crazy weirdos who really loves "Around The World In A Day"...I'm probably not the best referee for a Prince album deathmatch! Cheers, D
@@discellanyThe Joshua Tree certainly "feels" like the biggest album of 1987. The American obsession is already well in place just scanning the song titles for the Unforgettable Fire (Side 2) of course. U2's Achilles heel seems to be humor / (understanding) irony; they're a very serious band at heart... sometimes overbearingly or even embarrassingly so. Ever heard that bit about Bono slow-clapping and preaching to an audience? Still, in the early - *innocent* is a more U2 word perhaps - days, there was this undeniable great passion and righteous concern. With Rattle and Hum it all fell apart somewhat but I do give them credit for the brilliant re-invention that was Achtung Baby. But that's different alright! Sign 'o the Times might be my favourite Prince album actually... many contenders in the Purple One's catalog! Just that Purple Rain is like *the* Prince album, if you know what I mean.
Yeah, it's probably the only U2 album I can revisit without any baggage these days, and luckily it still holds up really well. "A Sort Of Homecoming" instantly chokes me up, and "Promenade" is just unbearably pretty. Cheers, D
Respect for having the courage to talk about this album. U2 were also once a big deal to me. But I cannot listen to any of it now. I credit them with showing a boring kid that music could be taken seriously (perhaps too seriously). I think that’s the best I can say about them. Bored kids living unremarkable straightforward lives were invited to soar around the world and think about injustice and love and pain and drugs and god and religion. But wow, cannot stand them now. Although I do wonder if perhaps that just me uncomfortable with the kid I left behind.
I think I could talk about this one because it still feels like a bit of a Rorschach blot...there's drama, and emotion, and scale, but you end up reading into it what you need to hear. I know there are specific references...MLK, heroin addiction, Hiroshima...but it's all rendered pretty impressionistically (good job, Eno). And you're right..."serious" is the word, and I guess any kid looking for more of "something" in the music of the day, would have come to this record and responded to it (like I did). By "Joshua Tree" and "Rattle & Hum" they'd figured out how to imprint themselves onto Eno's method/template, and they're (retrospectively) less interesting because of that. R&H in particular is just a blatant, clunky travelog/making-of/brochure conceit that even teenage-me could sniff out as being inauthentic. That was the last U2 album I ever listened to. Cheers, D
Great choice, I’d probably go with The Smiths debut as that ended up being the foundation for most of music listening after I heard it for the first time
I was a bit late to The Smiths at the time, I must say, otherwise I'd probably be in agreement with you. It felt like a bit of a crap-shoot as to which singles would bubble to the surface via radio play, TOTP, etc...And, for whatever reason, I got snagged by U2 and not The Smiths. Funny, thinking back! Cheers, D
So many records i had never listened are now playing. Really enjoying your work. Kind regards.
I first heard The Unforgettable Fire in John Menzies' record department in Princes Street, Edinburgh and I immediately fell in love with the sound and atmosphere of the album.
There were loads of great albums in 1984, World Shut Your Mouth and Fried by Julian Cope, Treasure by Cocteau Twins, Rattlesnakes by Lloyd Cole and the Commotions, Hyaena by Siouxsie and the Banshees, The Top by The Cure and Stoneage Romeos by The Hoodoo Gurus, as well as the ones you mentioned. One of my favourite years for music.
Good choice, and good shout ref Live Aid. Yes Queen is the familiar favourite whenever live aid is mentioned, but for me at the time the relative newcomers U2 stole the show with Bad. So pleased it featured on the Wide Awake in America live ep.
My adoration only lasted the 80’s, but those albums stayed with me.
Like you I spent a lot of time and energy listening to Frankie in 1984. But not an album I have listened to regularly since then.
My honourable mention for 1984 and still a source of pleasure is Purple Rain.
Agree RE 80s U2. I checked out pretty soon after "Rattle And Hum", which really felt like the point they became "U2 as spectacle", rather than"U2 as band". Cheers, D
Elvis Presley and America is still one of my fave U2 songs. I still have no idea what the lyrics are, I don't even want to look them up, but the song makes me feel emotions every time.
This was needed - your perspective on this band that lost it's way... when their bigness inspired and took you away... it was magic
Robyn Hitchcocks's albums are unfortunately a little hard to get here in the Netherlands. Maybe the box-set "I wanna go backwards" is a nice option. Underwater Moonlight I love but somehow I've never ventured beyond it...
The Unforgettable Fire might be the most important album U2 ever made. Great as War was, they needed a change in sound to not become stuck and with Eno and Lanois they achieved just that. Also some of their best songs are on this album. For consistency I prefer the Joshua Tree but, like you say, perhaps a more calculated effort.
1984 was also the year two of Minneapolis' finest released their MOST classic records, Purple Rain / Let It Be.
I do think Joshua Tree is a great U2 album, and if you'd asked me aged 16, I'd probably have picked it as my favorite. Maybe it suffers from overplay, from over-exposure? But maybe that was the point? It certainly feels like the start of U2-as-a-brand now, even if it didn't to me back then. I think it was clearly aimed at an American audience, and in that respect it was (a) extremely effective, and (b) a sign of the band's huge ambition. I dunno. I just liked the sound of Bono when he wasn't quite so forceful, so direct, and I wish we'd got to hear a little more of that beyond "The Unforgettable Fire".
Good call with "Let It Be" too, but I'm one of those crazy weirdos who really loves "Around The World In A Day"...I'm probably not the best referee for a Prince album deathmatch! Cheers, D
@@discellanyThe Joshua Tree certainly "feels" like the biggest album of 1987. The American obsession is already well in place just scanning the song titles for the Unforgettable Fire (Side 2) of course.
U2's Achilles heel seems to be humor / (understanding) irony; they're a very serious band at heart... sometimes overbearingly or even embarrassingly so. Ever heard that bit about Bono slow-clapping and preaching to an audience?
Still, in the early - *innocent* is a more U2 word perhaps - days, there was this undeniable great passion and righteous concern.
With Rattle and Hum it all fell apart somewhat but I do give them credit for the brilliant re-invention that was Achtung Baby. But that's different alright!
Sign 'o the Times might be my favourite Prince album actually... many contenders in the Purple One's catalog! Just that Purple Rain is like *the* Prince album, if you know what I mean.
aw i'm really glad you picked this one. i still have a very big soft spot for it, particularly, funnily enough, the two tracks you quoted lyrics from
Yeah, it's probably the only U2 album I can revisit without any baggage these days, and luckily it still holds up really well. "A Sort Of Homecoming" instantly chokes me up, and "Promenade" is just unbearably pretty. Cheers, D
Respect for having the courage to talk about this album. U2 were also once a big deal to me. But I cannot listen to any of it now. I credit them with showing a boring kid that music could be taken seriously (perhaps too seriously). I think that’s the best I can say about them. Bored kids living unremarkable straightforward lives were invited to soar around the world and think about injustice and love and pain and drugs and god and religion.
But wow, cannot stand them now. Although I do wonder if perhaps that just me uncomfortable with the kid I left behind.
I think I could talk about this one because it still feels like a bit of a Rorschach blot...there's drama, and emotion, and scale, but you end up reading into it what you need to hear. I know there are specific references...MLK, heroin addiction, Hiroshima...but it's all rendered pretty impressionistically (good job, Eno).
And you're right..."serious" is the word, and I guess any kid looking for more of "something" in the music of the day, would have come to this record and responded to it (like I did). By "Joshua Tree" and "Rattle & Hum" they'd figured out how to imprint themselves onto Eno's method/template, and they're (retrospectively) less interesting because of that. R&H in particular is just a blatant, clunky travelog/making-of/brochure conceit that even teenage-me could sniff out as being inauthentic. That was the last U2 album I ever listened to. Cheers, D
Great choice, I’d probably go with The Smiths debut as that ended up being the foundation for most of music listening after I heard it for the first time
I was a bit late to The Smiths at the time, I must say, otherwise I'd probably be in agreement with you. It felt like a bit of a crap-shoot as to which singles would bubble to the surface via radio play, TOTP, etc...And, for whatever reason, I got snagged by U2 and not The Smiths. Funny, thinking back! Cheers, D
Yay me first!