Dirty Pope

It was only a matter of time: @U2 has scored the infamous never-seen photo of Pope John Paul II in Bono’s shades. They got it from a display at a Harvard economic conference, so it seems to be the real deal…

THE SHITS

U2 have not been nominated for any Brit Awards. Darlings of last year’s event, they’ve been shunned by a fickle panel who have favoured instead such mediocre punters as Robbie Williams and Bob The Builder. Here‘s what the Sun thinks. So there you go.

When I Look At The World

Have you ever felt there is something about the Edge, that though he struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and flies to Ibiza for his birthday, he’d be just as happy hanging with the lads at a cosmology symposium? And as he poses, often awkwardly, for photographs, is he not thinking: ‘Why am I here?’

So it was, the frivolity over, that last Friday the Edge gathered with other top brains to discuss the future of the universe and celebrate super-scientist Stephen Hawkin’s birthday. If you missed the birthday boy

Deconstructing It Up Again

Great to see a hefty interview with the whole band in January’s Spin magazine, as previously noted. U2 are characteristically ‘on message’, wheeling out the various mantras of the last twelve months.

But can you, maybe, hear the sound of four men sharpening their axes, preparing for a bigger challenge? To leave behind all that you really thought you couldn’t. For ATYCLB can indeed, it seems, do a little wrong. Bono: ‘The album does lack a bit of some of the things that I think our band does [well], some of the anarchic, slightly abstract things; it might be a little too tightly constructed.’ Adamant that U2′s PR is carefully conceived and impeccably polished, this contributor can’t help feeling this modest snippet belies a turning point. Post Elevation, ALTYCB quietly becomes the past, to make way for something new.

Article and cover image at youtwo.net. Thanks as ever.

UK Chart Strategy Tragedy

Walk On entered the UK charts at no 5 yesterday. This upset scuppers an attempt to release singles from ATYCLB according to their order on the album, and then achieve a corresponding chart listing: Beautiful Day reached number 1, Stuck In A Moment 2, and Elevation 3, before the surly Walk On refused to play along. Under this system, when poor Grace is released in late 2003 (as Elevation 2001 finally wraps in North America) she will have to put up with a paltry 11. Presumably this ‘chart position streamlining system,’ as its no doubt called, is an attempt to cut the number of different numbers used in the complicated business of managing U2, maybe to save on costs.

A man named James Masterton at Dotmusic.com also has pointless chart reflections here.