Live music review:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZtsEY7AVMg&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=McwdN9E86So&feature=fvst
I’m going to review U2’s With or Without You as performed during the 360 Tour. I’ve chosen two videos of the song, the first as they performed it at the Rose Bowl and the second at a stadium in Sao Paolo, Brazil. The Rose Bowl video is professionally done and uses the audio feed from the mics, while the Sao Paolo one is filmed by a member of the audience in the nosebleed section.
I’ve chosen this song because I was at the U2 concert in Raleigh and had the time of my life. I was seated in the lower section of the stadium and sat enthralled the entire time. It was the first concert I’d ever been to, and it blew my mind.
A lot of my friends from UNC went as well and really enjoyed it, but I have heard some critics claim that it was too much. I want to use these two videos to explore that idea because I think it brings up a lot of questions about Bono’s style and ability as a performer to keep multiple generations entertained.
The first thing you should know is that this is the song the band closed out almost every show with on this tour. It was their final encore at Carter-Finley and it was the same in Sao Paolo and in Pasadena. In my experience, you can always expect something a little different in an encore.
Aside from the complaint that the huge stage, the screens and the hoopla surrounding the show were just too much, I’ve also heard people complain how Bono intentionally changes or ‘messes up’ the vocal timing on this song whenever he performs it.
I think the Rose Bowl video illustrates just how Bono intended the performance to be received. The giant screens allowed for close-up shots of all the band members even from the nosebleed section, so in many ways you did feel a sense of intimacy, which is what the Rose Bowl performance is all about. It’s true Bono does change the vocal timing -- he makes you hang on every word by missing the beat he’s supposed to come in on just slightly ever time. And before I’d ever been to a concert, whenever I heard recordings of live performances, I would get annoyed. “They always mess up the songs -- it’s stupid!” I would say. But seeing U2 live changed my view on that.
While I still am not a huge fan of listening to concert recordings, what I realized at this show was that if he didn’t change it up, you would get bored and feel like you were just listening to the original record. What Bono managed to do with this and many other songs in the show was keep everyone’s rapt attention, simply with his voice, and mesmerize them with the unbelievable set.
The Sao Paolo video gives a much better idea of the scale of these performances, which brings me to the issue of whether or not Bono tried to do too much. Did the band overestimate the size of their own personalities? Was a huge set required just to fill their egos? I’ve heard people say Bono is just too full of himself. But I totally disagree.
One of the most spectacular things I’ve ever seen was when Bono told everyone to hold up their cell phones and turned Carter-Finley into a miniature galaxy. The giant disco ball that you can see reflecting off the entire stadium in this video comes in at a close second. And as I mentioned before, the giant 360 screen gave you a sense of intimacy that’s actually kind of hard to believe you could feel from so far away.
You can’t deny that Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. must all have a pretty high esteem of themselves in order to dream of a stage so huge and a set-up so self-glorifying, but I think it’s pretty fair to say they’ve earned it. They were a huge favorite of my parents’ generation and they’re still well-loved by my generation -- and that’s quite a feat considering how diametrically opposed those two groups of people are.
I think this performance accomplished everything Bono set out to accomplish with it -- he satisfied an audience of epic proportions screaming out for one more song, and he put a spin on it that kept everyone holding their breath, wondering what he would do next, all the while appearing approachable and accessible.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SZtsEY7AVMg&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=McwdN9E86So&feature=fvst
I’m going to review U2’s With or Without You as performed during the 360 Tour. I’ve chosen two videos of the song, the first as they performed it at the Rose Bowl and the second at a stadium in Sao Paolo, Brazil. The Rose Bowl video is professionally done and uses the audio feed from the mics, while the Sao Paolo one is filmed by a member of the audience in the nosebleed section.
I’ve chosen this song because I was at the U2 concert in Raleigh and had the time of my life. I was seated in the lower section of the stadium and sat enthralled the entire time. It was the first concert I’d ever been to, and it blew my mind.
A lot of my friends from UNC went as well and really enjoyed it, but I have heard some critics claim that it was too much. I want to use these two videos to explore that idea because I think it brings up a lot of questions about Bono’s style and ability as a performer to keep multiple generations entertained.
The first thing you should know is that this is the song the band closed out almost every show with on this tour. It was their final encore at Carter-Finley and it was the same in Sao Paolo and in Pasadena. In my experience, you can always expect something a little different in an encore.
Aside from the complaint that the huge stage, the screens and the hoopla surrounding the show were just too much, I’ve also heard people complain how Bono intentionally changes or ‘messes up’ the vocal timing on this song whenever he performs it.
I think the Rose Bowl video illustrates just how Bono intended the performance to be received. The giant screens allowed for close-up shots of all the band members even from the nosebleed section, so in many ways you did feel a sense of intimacy, which is what the Rose Bowl performance is all about. It’s true Bono does change the vocal timing -- he makes you hang on every word by missing the beat he’s supposed to come in on just slightly ever time. And before I’d ever been to a concert, whenever I heard recordings of live performances, I would get annoyed. “They always mess up the songs -- it’s stupid!” I would say. But seeing U2 live changed my view on that.
While I still am not a huge fan of listening to concert recordings, what I realized at this show was that if he didn’t change it up, you would get bored and feel like you were just listening to the original record. What Bono managed to do with this and many other songs in the show was keep everyone’s rapt attention, simply with his voice, and mesmerize them with the unbelievable set.
The Sao Paolo video gives a much better idea of the scale of these performances, which brings me to the issue of whether or not Bono tried to do too much. Did the band overestimate the size of their own personalities? Was a huge set required just to fill their egos? I’ve heard people say Bono is just too full of himself. But I totally disagree.
One of the most spectacular things I’ve ever seen was when Bono told everyone to hold up their cell phones and turned Carter-Finley into a miniature galaxy. The giant disco ball that you can see reflecting off the entire stadium in this video comes in at a close second. And as I mentioned before, the giant 360 screen gave you a sense of intimacy that’s actually kind of hard to believe you could feel from so far away.
You can’t deny that Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. must all have a pretty high esteem of themselves in order to dream of a stage so huge and a set-up so self-glorifying, but I think it’s pretty fair to say they’ve earned it. They were a huge favorite of my parents’ generation and they’re still well-loved by my generation -- and that’s quite a feat considering how diametrically opposed those two groups of people are.
I think this performance accomplished everything Bono set out to accomplish with it -- he satisfied an audience of epic proportions screaming out for one more song, and he put a spin on it that kept everyone holding their breath, wondering what he would do next, all the while appearing approachable and accessible.
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