No Hope on the Horizon: U2’s Newest Album Washes Overboard
It’s not like U2 to be copycats. From their first album, Boy, to their more recent How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, Bono, the Edge, Larry Mullen, and Adam Clayton have created a completely unique sound, building on their pasts and constructing something fresh with every record. It’s sad to see this innovative band (innovative might be an understatement) put out such a miserable mix of rehashed music from the past decade with their new album, No Line On The Horizon.
The album begins with the title track, No Line On The Horizon. Quick, punchy drumbeats combined with Bono’s carbon-copy vocals stolen from the Kings of Leon leave the listener wondering where U2 has gone. The Edge’s trademark razorblade-sharp guitar chording is almost completely obscured. Overly ambient, cheesy synthesizer washes permeated this track.
One would hope that this track is simply a dud, and that the rest would make up for it.
One would be very wrong.
Throughout the album, U2 steals from seemingly every band that made it big in the nineties and early millennium. “Magnificent,” the second track, sounds like a Coldplay song from Viva La Vida, just fronted by Bono (who sounds like Chris Martin at points). Radiohead sounds seem to be a continuing theme throughout. The song “Stand Up Comedy” has an opening riff straight from the Red Hot Chili Peppers. “Breathe” flows exactly like an REM song, complete with copied Michael Stipe word-vomit vocals, jangly guitars, and violins and piano backing it all up.
The copycat sounds are not the only culprit. Brian Eno’s production is horribly obvious and does not contribute whatsoever to the album’s legitimacy. The watery synthesizers that sugar-coat every song and atmospheric delays and reverberations that used to make U2’s sound unique seem dated and overdone. The entire album sounds badly compressed and digitized.
This production, combined with the fact that U2 is obviously copying other artist’s styles, makes No Line On The Horizon feel artificial and faked. Most of these songs follow a verse-bridge-verse structure that bores the listener, and Bono’s lyrics seem nonsensical and random. Almost everything about No Line On The Horizon simply feels wrong.
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With all due respect, I must strongly disagree with Mr. Kuczynski’s review of U2. I received “No Line on the Horizon” almost immediately after it was released, and I have to agree with what Rolling Stone said: that the new album more than likely represents U2’s strongest work since Achtung Baby. Mostly, however, I would vigorously dispute the Saint reviewer’s contention that the new disc amounts to “copycat sounds” ripped from such bands as Kings of Leon, who, despite their obvious talent, I think it should be mentioned, are almost laughably inexperienced compared to U2, which Mr. Kuczynski is right to call innovative. That Mr. Kuczynski would essentially accuse U2 of stealing from such bands as Coldplay, Radiohead, and R.E.M. is further confusing, as most all of these bands have evolved in a kind of creative synthesis with U2. No matter one’s personal opinion of their music, it is extremely difficult to underestimate the influence U2 has exerted over modern rock.
Finally, I must disagree with Mr. Kuczynski’s assessment of Bono’s “nonsensical and random” lyrics, which I nevertheless found to be some of the singer’s most profound lyrics yet. Perhaps, if anything, what Mr. Kuczynski believes to be “nonsensical and random” is, really, the most realistic means of examining and interpreting the seemingly unrealistic 21st century world. I question the supposed “nonsensical and random” quality of lines such as “Stop helping God across the road like a little old lady,” and “Only love can leave such a mark…” To this listener, at least, such “nonsense” seems immensely wise.
While U2 does indeed suck, any reviewer who expresses rage and loathing for an album is preposterous. He or she is like a person who has put on full armor and attacked a fudge sundae.
Dear friend Matt,
obviously you wrote this under some kind of pressure. I don’t know your reasons, but all your compares with bands who admire U2 and learn from them, it’s totally WRONG!
Who can band with unique sound and own music mark, and band who doesn’t know to play different, since their first album, now is coping it’s own fans?
best regards,
I came upon this review when I was looking for a review of “Use Somebody” by Kings of Leon, which I thought sounded a lot like U2, as does Coldplay, which you mention. In fact, Kings of Leon seems to blend a bit of U2, The Police, with a dash of Creed. These are good influences. Well, U2 and The Police, at least.
But it bears pointing out that any comparison of this U2 album as somehow derivative of Kings of Leon is putting the cart before the horse. It’s a matter of chronological logic. It’s also interesting that Eno is attacked here as some sort of has-been, while meanwhile he was integral to the sound on Coldplay’s latest album, which you claim U2 has copied. The fact remains that U2 came first and their sound has evolved from a long pedigree of albums, with an evolving sound.
My critique of this album is that there are few risks on this album and that U2, indeed was trying very hard to sound like, well, U2. If they were inadvertently nicking any current band, I would say it’s more so Arcade Fire, at least on the first track.
Overall, though, the reason U2 may sound like these other bands is because these bands have been listening to U2 for years, not the other way around.
As far as Breathe being reminiscent of REM simply because of Bono’s use of stream-of-consciousness word pictures (which for some reason you disparage as ‘word-vomit’), maybe you are referring to Michael Stipe’s delivery style on a small, small number of the songs he has sung in the last, say, ten years and maybe more so some of REM’s early work. But, a certain delivery style or lyrical composition method is not alone derivative and Bono sounds nothing like Michael Stipe in the timbre of his voice (nor Chris Martin or Caleb Followill). So, the comparison here, especially in a disparaging sense, where you are putting down both REM and U2, strains credibility. It’s a weak comparison and being so, it becomes irrelevant to put down REM, especially on the basis of a vocal delivery style that Stipe rarely uses these days.
Not everyone who listens to music has the depth of knowledge of it or of other disciplines, such as poetic construction, to adequately provide a truly coherent or thoughtful critique. The evidence is plentiful that such as case is found in this review. While I respect a well-founded opinion based on evidence, nearly all of the opinions expressed here are conclusions that are simply founded on a shaky foundation. Mostly, this manifests as erroneous chronology and what seems like either an inability or unwillingness to dig a little deeper into the words Bono is using on this album.
Just because you don’t initially understand something, does not make it ‘nonsensical’ nor ‘random’.