Rekindling the Note, and a Blurb on U2

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Rekindling the Note, and a Blurb on U2

March 7, 2008

Most of you don’t know this, but I used to review music. I slated Sitti’s and Agot’s bossa album, praised Charles Mingus’s Black Saint and Harry Connick Jr’s Occasions album. Despite having such history, I’m not interested in preserving the memory here, which means I won’t be posting the reviews on this blog. Why? Because I hated my old writings. They were high-brow, and I used too much musical jargons I ended up infuriating myself. My reviews read like those Pitchforkmedia snobs - they probably have Superman’s power to resist their own chest thumpings - that I realized I’m not informing, but self-validating. Those didn’t help a nick on my blogging carreer, however moot that is. When I’ve began fiction marathons, that’s when I gave my writing proper fine-tunings (and it helped that I read Elements of Style and consider it my Bible ever since). Put it this way, Liz, J or Schumey wouldn’t put me on their blogroll had I sustained my older ways of writing. So, no, I hated reviewing music. A lot of that had to do with the elitisms going on.

But yesterday when I did ramblingvirus’s meme, I realized that I still like to talk about music. Not just that; anybody who’s been on chatrooms with me knows how I light up whenever they bring music up. Give me an album, make me hear it, and you won’t shut me up even if artists threaten me with a code of omerta. I am bold about hating Jolin Tsai, F4, Kenny G, Britney Spears, Akon, Dave Koz, Hale, Gregorian Chants and their likes.

Anyway, with this divine realization, I made up my mind of reviewing music again, but this time I’ll do it with candidness, and cut the name-dropping and technicality. No, scrap "reviewing": this will be more of discussing, like I’m having coffee shop talks with you about music.

I am into jazz, and my goal is to speak of it in ways that will inspire newcomers (not to brag, but I know a lot about jazz. I perused its history and I have more than 200 albums). I will try making that a weekly feature. Choice track will be uploaded too so you can hear it and see if it interests you (and, uh, i.ph team, what’s the storage capacity for audio? Can it be expanded?). Apart from jazz, as I am not someone who only listens to jazz and thinks everything else blows (there are rock fans who are like that, and I don’t respect such group), I will also write about other genres - like rock, hiphop, rnb, soul, funk, pop (whatever that is), folk, blues and maybe even OPM and classical. Speaking of reviews, I have tremendous respect for Francisco Silva, a Portuguese who’s offering a non-insider views on every albums listed on 1001 Album You Must Hear Before You Die, David Thorpe from Your Band Sucks of somethingawful, and The Curmudgeon of The Curmudgeon’s Fortress of Solitude.

I’m doing mental drafts of "getting into jazz based on your background", something I have for years dreamed of writing. I don’t think I need to say this, but I’m preparing heaps for that, and I don’t want to rush such work. Today, in the meantime, let’s talk about one of my all-time favorite rock albums.

The Joshua Tree by U2

I’m growing agitated with what’s happening to a lot of rock songs of late - any genre of music, for that matter. It’s as though the days when music actually talked about something substantive have passed, and nowadays artists are more concerned about bragging. They keep going about sex, sexual frustrations, supermanning dat ho or how badass or G they are. All vacant ego-massagings. I am not in any case a fan of U2 and I am detached from their recent works, but The Joshua Tree is pure love. Oh, sure, it has songs about romances too, but those are mostly done in the innocuous way. Meanwhile, it has songs against war, songs about complex relationships, songs about loss, songs about death and songs about pessimism on modern day America. If you are keen to listening to each song’s lyrics you will find plenty of words to ruminate on. Take, for instance, "Mothers of the Disappeared":

Midnight, our sons and daughters
Were cut down, taken from us
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat

In the wind we hear their laughter
In the rain we see their tears
We hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat

Night hangs like a prisoner
Stretched over black and blue
Hear their heartbeat
We hear their heartbeat

In the trees our sons stand naked
Through the walls our daughters cry
See their tears in the rainfall

Being as instantly recognizable as it is, Bono’s vocals is infused with gospel and blues. He yearns, and that suits this record perfectly. With him the songs are dark, gloomy, haunting, hopeful, angry and passionate. He is notable for such wide range of moods, and no matter what the theme, he makes you believe in everything he says.

And I probably never told you this, but this song is my bliss:

I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For - U2

So you know how this works? Go get it.

Posted by nightdreamer at 3:53 pm | permalink

Previous Comments

Not from the The Joshua Tree, but I have made up my mind long ago that when (or if) I get married, U2’s All I Want Is You will be my wedding song.

Posted by Anne at March 7, 2008, 9:57 pm

Hmm can’t say I know that song much. But, then again, I’m not a U2 expert, it’s just that The Joshua Tree is too great.

I think I’m going to give Achtung Baby a shot. If only my iPod wasn’t so full.

Posted by nightdreamer at March 7, 2008, 10:47 pm

Ah yes. The Joshua Tree is one of my best albums ever, together with Gun’s and Roses’ Appetite for Destruction, Alanis Morrisette’s Jagged Little Pill and Metallica’s Justice for All.

But from U2, I loved most of their albums. Unforgettable Fire and Rattle and Hum where works of genius themselves.

Posted by virus at March 8, 2008, 9:05 pm

It seems you’re into 90’s rock. Not bad. I consider 90’s rock finer than now’s in most cases, although I am quite into White Stripes.

Guns N’ Roses is the best album that I do not own. I like it a lot; and it’s strange that I don’t own it until now. Hmm time for download I think.

So have you heard of U2’s Achtung Baby? How do you find it?

Posted by nightdreamer at March 8, 2008, 10:38 pm

And I just noticed, I wouldn’t for the life of me play “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” on my wedding. My goodness would that be rude. Haha.

Posted by nightdreamer at March 8, 2008, 10:39 pm

I loved that album. I enjoyed most of the songs recorded in it. In fact, that is the first album I bought for 1990’s.

Mysterious ways, the fly and one are really good tracks off the top of my head.

Posted by virus at March 10, 2008, 8:59 am

Cool. I actually just got the album yesterday, and that’s pretty much what I’ve felt about Achtung Baby too.

It’s good because it’s a departure of The Joshua Tree, which means u2 does take the trouble of developing new sounds.

Posted by nightdreamer at March 10, 2008, 9:10 am

only in hindsight, with years and (relative) maturity, could i appreciate eraserhead’s genius. they wrote songs that captured not only the angst of filipino youth in the 90s, but reflected back to their listeners various facets of society.

stupid me, i only realised last year that hey jay was about homosexuality. and a progressive view at that.

Posted by sparks at March 10, 2008, 6:11 pm

The funny thing is although I enjoyed much of eraserhead’s music, I never paid their songs’ lyrics much attention. I guess I was young then and back then only the melodies mattered to me. Then again, there’s always fun to be had when rediscovering songs that have long fizzled out of the collective consciousness.

You just gave me a reason (and, uh, that’s not because I’m homosexual haha) to rediscover eraserhead, and also a reason why I need another iPod. Badly.

This is why I like talking about music - it is always going to lead somewhere, like suggestions of who I should be checking out!

Posted by nightdreamer at March 11, 2008, 12:37 am

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