U2 - The Joshua Tree (Remastered edition) (lala) - I'm putting together a review for the new U2 record, and in the assessment of living dead, it's always handy to go back to the last point the subject was truly alive to me. It's like drawing your faint lines to the edge of the paper to guide the angles of perspective. To this day, the opening of "Where the Streets Have no Name" sounds completely inspiring in the compressed, over-EQ'ed saturation of pop FM radio. U2 and, through production, Brian Eno crafted the some of the only music that sounds better in that environment. Sadly, the audio setup I have here at work is not up to hosting the power and the glory, and it feels like a flat, featureless, no foothold. The Joshua Tree is still pretty tight after 100,000 purposed and circumstantial listens. I believe in kingdom come and where all the colors bleed into one and all, and have found that at a number of times in U2 over the years, but this is no longer what I'm looking for.
OK, once "With or Without You" started sounding like shit, I know there was a problem. Do not listen to the above linked remastered version but instead the Deluxe Edition (lala). Perferably on a badass truck stereo speeding to the horizon, and when you go there, go there with me, maybe at that place high on a desert plane, toss this CD out the window and keep going.
it will come surely as no surprise to you that as a teenaged girl I went to that Joshua Tree show when the tour stopped in my town & I have to tell you that just the other day "w or w/o you" was on the hi-fi & to listen to old Bono belt that one out, well, I could see why we girls were all like at a Sinatra show back in the day. perfectly clear, like St Paul promised.
ReplyDeleteOh I believe it. My similar experience on that tour was Thanksgiving night in 1987 when they played at LSU. I had to camp out for tickets and convince my parents to let me skip Thanksgiving dinner - perfect setup for a perfect concert
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