The Worst of the Best Podcast

U2 - Achtung Baby.mp3
Welcome to the worst of the best podcast. You wanted the best. Well, they didn't freaking make it. So here's what you get from Canada, Ryan and Jason.
Welcome to another episode of the worst of the best podcast. I'm your host with me again today is my brother Jason. Good morning, Jason or afternoon evening.
Depends when you're listening to this, dear listeners, but good morning, Jason. How are you doing?
Yeah, good morning, Ryan. We are definitely recording this in the morning. Looking forward to the conversation we're going to have.
All right. So if you have listened to previous episodes, if you're one of our faithful listeners who listened to everything, we welcome you.
If you are new because you're a big fan of U2, we welcome you to our show. But before we get to U2, so if you really just want to hear our U2 discussion on the album Octoon Baby,
by all means, just kind of skip ahead a little bit because we're doing a real quick, I mean, very quick mini-sode here to honor one of our requests to do Nirvana's Nevermind album,
which ironically, Jason, was released the same year as Octoon Baby. We do want to take your request. We really do.
It would be disingenuous to our listeners if we just did whatever they said. Let's say they said we wanted to do the worst of the best basket weaving products out there.
If we don't know the thing and or if we don't really quite enjoy the thing, then it's not the best. The whole point of this is that we enjoy the thing we're talking about or the topic and then we pick the worst from that best.
The unfortunate thing about Nirvana, both Jason and I have felt Nirvana was a band that they were certainly the best selling type band album in our youth.
They were very popular. Jason and I were peripherally, you know, we knew the album, familiar with it, but we never fanboyed about the album.
It's something we knew and enjoyed as it like, this is an interesting new sound, but it never carried with us. Let's just say like Octoon Baby has for the past 31 years.
The reality is, is they came out with an original look and feel and approach to music and to being a rock, air quote, rock, more grunge band and they broke some ground.
But as we reflect, I don't know.
Yeah. Okay. Well, I get it.
So here we go. We're just going to do quick little snippets from like Jason. I've heard this album.
You know, we heard it a million times in our youth. We really did.
I know I play ahead on heavy rotation for at least a summer type thing.
So what we're going to do here is we're just going to do quick little snippets for our audience.
Yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep,
yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep yep
bloom for yeah first one was smells like tea spirit i mean obviously we know that one in bloom
was the second one i'm very familiar with this well the whole album but this song was big on rock
band when i played rock band back in the day with my kids that was one of the songs on there
third song come as you are
okay fourth song breed
so
so
so
so
i always remember this being one of my favorite songs on the album it's a good banger
i play rocks yeah okay well lithium number five
all right number five are people i wonder if people are picking up my enthusiasm for this album
five poly is it coming through okay
this is a territorial pissings by the way track 7.
so
yeah yeah are you sure that was nirvana not green day yeah drain you track eight
Yeah. Yeah. Are you sure that was Nirvana and not Green Day? Yeah. Drain You, track 8.
Hey look, we're Alice in Chains. Yeah, I know. Alice in Chains did it better. Alright, Lounge Act, track 9.
This is a decent song. The reason why I like this song is my biggest criticism of Kurt Cobain other than he's bigger than what he should have had. I don't know why he was the savior of music. I don't get it. I don't understand it. I don't understand any of it. People are going to hate us. I know, that's fine. Sorry, Peter from Australia. But I will say this song is pretty cool. It's not bad. And I do like his vocal change in this song. Just let's hear that.
True. Covenant's quality. I can let you smile for me. Like you want to call the word. Turn it up, take turns. Don't realize the hell I got you. Fantasy makes me feel a while before. Now I could still arrest myself. Where I...
So I actually like that part because it's higher octave and he screams it. I kind of like that screaming Kurt there. I think it sounded pretty cool there. But...
Stay away. Track 10.
Your love is love.
No way.
Just for those love.
I'm a man.
Yeah.
They're all bleeding a little bit, aren't they?
Like bleeding together. On a plane. Number 11.
That's like a...
It's like Green Day.
Yeah.
If you didn't know it was Kurt Cobain and you just heard it, it literally sounds like Green Day. Half these songs.
And Green Day were out before these guys.
It'd be an interesting alternate universe experiment.
If you could have Billy Joel Armstrong sing all these songs.
People were like, hey, this is a pretty good Green Day album.
Something in the way.
Oh, here we go.
We all know this one, of course.
Because Batman.
The new Batman film.
Emo Batman.
Okay.
And number 13.
Endless and Nameless.
All right.
Worst song of the album, Jay.
That was Endless and Nameless.
Him trying to channel as Mike Patton.
Okay.
So what do we got here?
This album is...
It sounds like noise.
It's a little bit noisy.
This is old man Ryan talking here.
But I kind of feel like, boy, it just kind of sounds noisy.
And look at me.
We're so angry and against...
You're 24 or 5 years old.
Kurt, settle down.
I just hate the whole...
They were the type of band where...
I'm the anti-rock.
Anti-popular.
Yeah.
Yeah.
If you're really big and popular, we don't like you.
But I was big and popular.
And look at us.
Yeah.
That was the marketing or that was the shtick that they wanted to pull off.
Like Kurt would go on stage.
Like, oh, fine.
I'll perform this live.
And I'll be angry by the end of the set.
I'll begrudgingly come out here and play for you fans.
Like, just enjoy the crowd.
Have some fun.
Settle down.
Okay.
So the album came out.
The MTV music video comes out.
And that was really what sold the band.
That whole visual to go along with the song.
Cheerleaders.
Dance.
That was a solid approach.
And then it's just downhill from there.
I literally listened to the album in preparation to do a full episode to review this.
But I haven't heard the album in could be 20 years from beginning to end.
Right.
And so I really thought I would enjoy the experience.
Down memory lane a little bit.
With Dr. Feelgood, it was kind of like a memory lane.
Like, it was fun to go down memory lane.
Exactly.
Will I ever listen to Dr. Feelgood again?
No.
It was good to revisit it.
I was bored listening to this album.
Yeah, the noise and all that.
But I was literally bored.
And I'm kind of looking back and I'm shocked at how big this album became.
Still seemingly revered.
And I really wonder if that's actually a true experience for people.
Like, do people really put in Nevermind from beginning to end and enjoy it?
They actually, like, I'm really into this on heavy rotation as part of their music playlists.
Just out of curiosity.
I don't know.
And I know there's a couple of our listeners that were excited for us to actually cover this legit.
And we apologize.
Yeah, I'm sorry.
But I was bored.
That's the reality.
Is I put it in wanting to do a review.
And I have nothing.
Nothing.
Be disingenuous to our listeners.
Yes.
If we pretended to like it.
I couldn't pretend to even expound on it.
Yeah.
We wouldn't be able to say anything about it or how it made us feel in our youth.
Because in our youth, we did.
We were aware of it.
We played on heavy rotation.
We got caught up in it.
I know I did.
But then there's a reason why I haven't gone back to it.
And there's a reason why I never listened to any Nirvana after this album.
Because of the little I heard, even as a teenager back then.
I was like, it didn't resonate.
It didn't capture.
No, it didn't capture.
Yeah.
There was no.
I don't even know what it was.
All right.
So we got a worse picture.
I wanted you.
You got a worse picture.
Yeah, it's Pauly.
Pauly's kind of boring.
Okay.
All right.
Sorry.
I feel like I need to explain.
Thank you, Peter.
If you want to send us an email, you can send us emails too.
Well, check the show notes.
I think it's just worstatthebestpodcasts at gmail.com.
But check the show notes to be sure.
Peter, we do thank you for your listenership.
You're one of our faithful listeners.
This is not a slight on you.
This didn't resonate with us the way it did with you and your youth.
I know we're about the same age.
It's just that's how I like it.
And I'm actually very surprised, Ryan.
I want to be honest.
I'm surprised.
But then maybe not surprised because I haven't revisited this album or the band for decades.
Great.
Okay.
Well, there we go.
15 minutes into the show.
We're ready to rock and roll with an album that Jason got released the same year as Nirvana's Nevermind in 1991.
It was Octoon Baby, U2's seventh studio album.
Bono and the boys were approximately about 30 years old when they recorded this album in Germany.
This was already their seventh album.
They're just barely 30, if not shy of 30.
I think Larry might have been 28.
Their career was already impressive.
And, you know, with Joshua Tree absolutely propelling them into superstardom, followed by Rhyno Hum, which had kind of mixed reviews.
It did, which is weird.
I love that album.
Specifically, I think it had a lot to do with the movie.
Maybe they were trying to make themselves bigger than you.
Yeah.
Well, it's funny.
Think about how young they were.
Again, we talked about Rhyno Hum.
That was out three years previous to this.
So they were 25, 26, 27.
At the height of their career, they're 25 with Joshua Tree, 26 years old.
Think about how big they were at such a mid-20s.
And so, yeah, maybe a little bit of a self-indulgence came out with the film.
Yeah, that's the word, yeah.
But can you imagine if our podcast ever got big and we were like on a Joe Rogan type level?
A little bit of self-indulgence is almost not what's expected, but it's that human part of just being human.
Quick history here.
You and I were definitely U2 fans, but I always wasn't such.
In fact, they were a band that I begrudgingly liked.
Quick history here.
You and I are big Guns N' Roses fans back in our early teens, 12, 13, 14 years old.
We're huge GNR fans.
And that kind of like Skid Row, Metallica.
U2, for me in particular, was kind of like a band, like a soft kind of rock band.
Who do they think they are?
And there was like a back in the day with radio polls and what have you.
And U2 won a radio poll.
I think they beat out Guns N' Roses' Sweet Child of Mine or Patience, one of the two, for the best song or ballad of the year.
Big, huge poll.
And I remember hating, like, how dare U2 get more votes?
How dare U2 be more popular with or without you?
And I remember kind of feeling that way.
You know, I'm a kid, right?
So, like, I'm 13 years old.
I don't know who Bono is.
I don't know what their legacy is.
I have no idea.
But I remember thinking, who are these guys?
This boy band type, you know, they're soft.
They're so soft compared to GNR.
But as we get to this album, this album came out when I was about 15, 16 years old.
I'm a little bit older now, a little bit more mature.
Of course, I heard the single from the album.
I bought the album on a CD.
I fell in love with Actoom Baby right away because of the very changes they made for this album.
And then I retroactively went back and enjoyed them even more.
Okay, so they had a whole career before Actoom Baby.
We grew up listening to the Van Halen, ZZ Top, Motley Crue, even like a little bit of Iron Maiden.
You know, I'm talking about like grade three, four, five, six.
Hard rock.
Hard rock metal.
Hard rock vein of music.
So that was our background.
Behind those harder rock scenes was U2, which we weren't exposed to.
And it wasn't really until Joshua Tree that it became part of our permutations of music experience.
Along with the rest of the world, that album just exploded.
You know, there's the main three songs on Joshua Tree.
The Joshua Tree album was a fantastic album, mainly because of those three songs.
Which I often skip when I listen to that album.
Well, nowadays, yes.
Because it's so familiar, yeah.
Right.
That album, as fantastic as it is, I don't think is their...
Is it the best work they've ever done?
I don't know.
Fast forward through Rod on Hum, Solid, and then coming to Actoom Baby.
I remember watching Much Music and Canadian's version of MTV.
I remember watching Much Music and The Fly came on.
Yeah.
And it was their first single.
I saw Bono on all his black leather, those big sunglasses, the completely different sound.
And I went to you and I said, Ryan, I know this is hard to kind of explain.
These guys are cool after all.
But these guys are...
This song rocks.
This whole album is a complete departure from their previous albums.
The whole look, the whole vibe.
If you listen to Rod on Hum and this back-to-back, they're completely different bands in a lot of ways because of the soundscape.
It's the same group, but a reinvention of themselves.
You heard the single and you went and bought the album in an instant fan.
Before we start breaking down the album song by song, I have to say, this is a near, in my opinion, a near perfect album.
It's an incredible album.
I believe it is top three best produced albums of all time.
Sure.
I think from beginning to end, the production value, the consistent sound, the whole approach to making this record.
I'm not saying it's the top three best albums in my mind.
I mean, it probably will be right up there.
Some are the top ten.
We have to start picking.
Yeah, absolutely.
But production value, top produced album.
Good.
Yeah, I love it.
For those, again, who are listening to our show for the first time, because you are a huge U2 fan.
I mean, you're not fans of us.
I understand that.
But bear with us.
The name of our show is The Worst of the Best Podcast.
So this is a great example where we take something that's the best of, so it's somebody's career, whether it's acting, but we also cover conspiracy theories, check out our other shows.
We cover all sorts of topics, food, movies, actors, music.
U2 is not only one of the best-selling bands in the world of all time, we're now going to pick apart their best-selling.
I think this is one of their best-selling, if not one of their top-selling, but also amongst fans and critics, this album, it would be between this and Joshua Tree.
That would be to discuss which is their top album, both sell-wise and critic-wise.
But for you and I, this is our favorite.
So personally, this is the album I think you and I both enjoy the most from start to finish.
Of all the albums I've ever listened to in my life, this is top three, probably.
But really quickly, it's funny enough, some of my favorite songs that they've ever done are on other albums, if that makes sense.
Like, for example, from Rattle and Hum, All I Want Is You.
I mean, it's not one of the most incredible songs ever written, period.
Even though that album might have been critically criticized by critics and fans, but that album carries some of the best songs ever.
It just has some incredible songs on it.
And then Zuropa was another kind of maligned album after Octoon Baby.
I think, I don't know how you follow Octoon Baby.
But Zuropa, I love the song, title track, Zuropa.
I mean, I just love that song.
The way it sounds, the way it builds up.
Anyways, there's just some great tracks on that album, too.
But let's get into it.
Zu Station is the opening track.
So right away, if you were to buy this album, let's just pretend you lived under, not under a rock, but let's say you didn't watch much music or MTV.
You didn't listen to the radio.
You're a big U2 fan.
And you're like, hey, great.
They got a new album out.
It's been a few years since Rattle and Hum.
Here we go, boys.
You put in this, and this is your opening sounds.
You would be like, did I grab?
This is the point.
It is a complete different soundscape to anything they've ever approached, how they've ever approached writing music.
The song Zuropa, as you know, the band went to Berlin to do a lot of the initial recording.
The band was under a lot of strife during the recording of this album.
And I'm saying this general notes.
We're not a Wikipedia podcast.
Obviously, if you're a huge U2 fan, you're going to know all this stuff.
You're going to know more than Jason and I do.
But for a couple of listeners who casually listen to our show, no matter the topic, we're kind of speaking to them here.
U2 recorded in Berlin.
They were under a lot of stress and as a band, creatively.
So the band went to the Berlin Zoo after arriving in Berlin to record Actun Baby.
And Bono got the idea there to use the zoo as a theme.
The zoo image would reappear on the next album, Zuropa.
And, of course, their tour, the Zoo TV tour.
And I saw that tour.
Yeah, I did too.
Here's some of the track lists, Jay, really quickly here that we saw in Vancouver.
It was November 4th.
You saw the Zuropa.
Did I see Zoo TV tour?
I saw it because it was like banged back to back, right?
Yeah, they did.
They were still doing under Zoo TV.
Yeah, that's what it was.
Yeah.
We both saw them on tour during the Zuropa Zoo TV tour.
During that tour, of course, they used a lot of images, imagery with the backdrop of the TV screens to showcase, you know, the media and, you know, the things that are at you and the images.
Bono changed his image to that kind of rock star look.
Which is kind of funny because he created that character, the flies, what he referred himself to as in studio to mock stardom, to mock popularity, to kind of like showcase what they as a band had become.
They truly felt we're bigger than we maybe should be or bigger than we ever intended to be.
So now we're going to, in an ironic way, embrace the popular.
It's self-deprecating.
It's like self-deprecating.
Look how cool I am.
I'm a cool rock star.
I wear cool.
It's funny how Bono has kind of kept that glasses, kept the shades throughout the years.
He says it's because of his eyesight.
What's it called?
Guacamole?
What do you call that?
Glaucoma?
I don't know if he's got glaucoma.
The bright lights in his eyes bother him.
So, fair enough.
I think it's great.
That was the genesis of the character.
But I don't say that Bono became the character or the character became Bon or whatever.
But it's just like life and art, art and life.
I just like that idea that Bono became the fly in an ironic way.
But he created the fly to not become the fly.
It's just a funny transition that he kind of carried for many years.
But now he doesn't do that anymore.
Per se.
But he's kept the long hair.
Kind of combed back for a long time.
He did that look for a long time.
But he looked great.
And he looked great during this tour.
He embraced it and had fun with that.
Keep all that imagery in mind.
What the tour was like.
And the images on the big screens.
And now here is the opening sounds that you're going to hear.
Put in the same for the first time Zoo Station.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
And now here is the opening sounds.
This is a complete departure from.
Anything that people have experienced with U2.
The sound.
Yeah, I mean that's going to be the overarching theme.
Right.
As we go through it.
It's just their layered approach to Edge's guitar.
That kind of atmospheric soundscape in the background.
Even Bono's vocals here has an effect on it.
The kind of distortion.
The other thing I wanted to bring up.
Is the way that he sings in this album.
Is very different as well.
It's almost a talk scene.
It's kind of like a subdued.
I noticed it's a softer vocal.
I can't quite hear you Bono.
Like I noticed it was a little bit softer than I remembered him in the background.
It wasn't quite in the forefront sound of his vocal.
You can almost think it's that's the band on the equal level.
Everyone.
You hear everyone the same singer included.
If that makes sense.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Like he's not really going out of his way to sing per se.
And obviously it's a very purposeful approach.
Not that he isn't singing.
Right.
That's not what I'm saying.
But it's a very pulled back.
Listen to this right now.
I can't sing.
But I'll just totally what you're trying to get in here.
For example.
You know.
I'm ready.
I'm ready for the laughing house.
I'm ready.
Then you go back to Joshua Tree.
With or without you.
Right.
You got that way.
Like whoa.
crescendos.
And what I like about this album.
And I'm not going to pretend I even know truly the understanding of all the lyrics.
Right.
Of course.
Or what not.
Or what they were trying to convey to me as a listener.
But it's the whole package.
That's why I think this is one of the greatest produced albums of all time.
It's the whole thing.
It draws you in.
Yeah.
This was a noticeable or a very strategic shift for the band.
They were trying to draw the MTV generation, which was very big at this time.
So they knew that they kind of had to.
Yeah.
Look.
This is their seventh album for any band.
A seventh album.
Bands do this all the time.
You name the band.
Around the seven year itch, as they say in the marriage or the seventh album, you kind of
have to, I don't want to say reinvent, but a lot of bands.
Every band.
A lot of our favorite bands have kind of shifted to jar our fans and to bring in new ones.
And it worked.
Because you and I came in as new fans and we retroactively went back and listened to their
old stuff and enjoyed it.
This electric futuristic sound for a 15 year old, 16 year old Ryan, 17 year old Jason.
This is what brought us in.
This is the sound that said, oh, these guys are, they're a little bit heavier.
They're a little bit more tougher than we thought they are, so to speak, on the music scene.
Yeah.
Right.
The next track on the album, Jason, is the song Even Better Than The Real Thing.
They actually started writing this during the Rattle and Hump sessions.
And they originally called it just the real thing.
Bonnell had this to say about the song.
The song is much more reflective of the times we were living in.
When people were no longer looking for the truth.
We were all looking for instant gratification.
It's not substantial as a lyric, but it suggests a certain sexual tension and desire to have
some fun playing in the shallows.
There is a moment when you want to read a magazine, not a novel.
You could argue today with cell phones and TikTok and stuff.
People want to watch a 30 second video instead of a movie.
You know what I mean?
Yeah.
It was nice to take some of the more fun bits of rock and roll.
We really needed that playful thing to balance what was at the heart of the album and make
the bitter pill a little sweeter to swallow.
It is a fun song.
It actually has a little lighter feel to it.
It's a danceable song.
You tap your feet.
It actually is a very...
Yeah.
It grabs you right away.
This was, of course, a little bit of a nod to the Coca-Cola at the time.
Their slogan, better than the real thing.
Do you remember that?
Oh, yes.
Yeah.
So it actually was actually a nod to the commercialism.
So they were acknowledging that commercialism of Coke, of course.
Richard Branson, the billionaire at Virgin Airline, he was starting up a cola line called
Virgin Cola.
He asked you too, can I borrow this?
This would be perfect for my brand and you too smartly refused the rights for Virgin Cola brand.
All good.
Take care.
Give me one more chance.
Give me one more chance.
You'll be a lover tonight.
You'll be satisfied.
You won't be denied.
You won't be denied.
It's a song you don't get tired of.
No.
This song was actually the fourth single from the album, but the second track on the album.
Released June 8th, 1992.
I love the way it flows.
You can hear Bono overlaying his vocals on this song, too, very clearly.
It's almost like that subdued approach to singing.
And it works.
And then mixed with more upbeat, brighter guitar work.
For our listeners who might be listening to this for the first time on our show, we picked the worst song.
At the end of the episode, this is one of their best-selling albums.
Best albums of all time, blah, blah, blah, our favorite.
One of our favorites from them in general, if not of all time.
There is a song that Jason and I, independent of each other, we don't know what the other one is going to pick that we feel is the worst song from the album.
Jason said to me the other day, he goes, oh, it's an easy pick for me.
I think it might be the same as me, but we're going to have to be very careful.
I don't think it's happened yet with the first two songs.
I think it's fair to say that neither Zoo Station or Even Bed, The Real Thing will be the worst pick.
I'm just going to guess.
I could be wrong.
But with the ones that are remaining, Jason and I will be very careful as to be as positive as we can when we get to that pick.
So we don't want to reveal, you know, that's kind of the fun of the show is reveal our pick at the end of the show, independent of each other, what we thought was the worst pick.
Sometimes it's harder than others, but this is a near perfect album.
But there is that one song where it's like, oof, I just never listen to it.
I just never do.
I skip it every time.
Okay.
All right.
Well, let's keep.
There's a part of the song I really, well, I love the whole song, but there's a change I really love in the song.
I love this part here.
A bass line by Adam.
And then Ed's just like guitar, like, haunting.
I love this part here.
You mentioned that this was initially started the writing process during Ride On Hum.
Yeah.
Can you hear that slide guitar?
Yeah.
In that piece that you just played.
I can see that if it was more, if you want to say Southwest, Western sound, kind of the approach of Ride On Hum, right?
Kind of the Americana soundscape, them coming to America, them being wrapped up.
Yeah.
So I can see that slide guitar working on Ride On Hum.
Absolutely.
I agree.
Now they changed it all, like the whole atmosphere of the song, but I can see it being very broken if it was stripped down to the Ride On Hum sound.
So this is the start of the album.
The third song, you just think, you know, Zoo Station, hey, this is our new sound, welcome to, even by the real thing.
It's kind of a fun, light song.
Again, keeping that same electric sound that they're going with here.
Now they kick in with one of the greatest songs they ever wrote.
One.
Not to be confused with the Metallica's one.
After listening to it, you'll never be confused.
Yeah, yeah.
You'll never get the two confused, yeah.
One is the third track on the album.
It is also, was released as a single, the third single of the album in February of 92.
The band, when they were recording in Berlin, it was tough.
They were having a tough time.
It wasn't quite the inspiration they were hoping for.
The band was struggling.
They almost literally split as a band.
They almost stopped being a band during the recording of this album.
Okay.
Yeah.
This was the song, however.
It was this song when they made it and they came together when the band actually, ironically, came together as one.
So it has a lot of meanings.
The Edge said this.
He goes, it was a pivotal song in the recording of the album.
The first breakthrough in what was an extremely difficult set of sessions.
Also, there's some interpretation of the song.
Edge was going through troubles with his wife at the time.
So it's a song about relationships, of course.
It's very obvious when you listen to the lyrics.
Edge ended up divorcing his wife shortly after the recording of the album.
People have said it was also written towards Bondo's good friend, the Irish painter, Guji, who was having girl trouble.
It was also about the band putting aside their differences to come together to make the album.
So it has a lot of different meanings.
It's like any song.
You can bring it to yourself, your own personal life.
After listening and reading the lyrics over the years, there is more than one.
A lot of people will hear the one love, the one life, might initially think, oh, this is a quote, love song.
But it's not a romance love song.
It's a song about love.
Yeah, there's some great love.
I mean, this whole song is incredible.
I don't think this is going to be anyone's worst.
I got to stop saying that because this album is near perfect.
But this is incredible.
This song always makes me feel something.
It just does.
It's not a love song as far as romance goes.
Okay, perfect.
Yeah.
Now, I'm going to play a little bit of the intro, but I'm going to get to other parts of the song.
Because the intro, in and of itself, is good.
But it's just the feels come later.
Of course, we all are familiar with that intro.
At the concerts, Bono often plays the acoustic guitar for this part.
Is it getting better?
Or do you feel the same?
Will it make it easier on you now?
You got someone to blame.
You're the same.
One love, one life.
When it's one need.
There's another bit there.
Of course, Larry and Adam will come in.
The song kicks up.
We get to share it.
Leisure, baby.
If you don't care for it.
The part that I love, I think this is obviously probably everyone's favorite part,
is when Bono sings the lines, you know, love is a temple, love the higher law.
You asked me to enter, then you made me crawl.
We've all been through, you know, tough relationships or what have you.
And both parties can often be guilty of this.
Where I love the idea, you asked me to enter, but then you made me crawl.
I just love that idea of, I've invited you into my life, but now you're going to have to almost beg and prove your worth throughout the rest of the experience.
There you go.
Perfect.
Have you come here for forgiveness?
Have you come to raise the dead? Have you come here to play Jesus? To the lepers in your head?
Did I ask too much? More than a lot? You gave me nothing now is all I got. One, but we're not the same. Well, we hurt each other and we're doing it again.
You say love is a temple, love the higher love. Love is a temple, love the higher love. You ask me to enter, well then you make me crawl. And I can't be holding on to what you got when all you got is hope. One, but we're not the same.
You get the feels, don't you? Yeah. Yeah. Beautiful song, powerful. Yeah. I just love that crescendo part there. It's just great. It's funny. We're talking about Bono singing. Even with that song like one, even there it was. Yeah. It was like, yeah, it's still kind of. Wasn't like the with or without you type drawn out notes. It was still kind of quicker note endings. I noticed that even this ballad type song, the drawn out notes weren't as long.
But he is definitely, this is a more sing. Yeah. This is definitely more sing. You notice a little bit more of that raspy? Did he do that raspy voice a lot before? You know that Bono raspy? He seemed to add a little bit more of this at this time, I think.
He's presenting an emotion all done on purpose. Everything is calculated, I would suspect, to represent the lyrics and the emotion of the song. Done near perfectly here.
All right. Until the end of the world, track four. So, you know, things kind of, I wouldn't say slow down as far as quality, but just say to themselves, okay, we've got to add a track after this one to kind of pick things up again a little bit.
I'll be honest. I was surprised. I was surprised where this song is in the album.
One?
Yeah.
Yeah, it is an interesting placement for the third track. Yeah. But if you think about it, they did it for Joshua Tree. With or Without You was the third one.
Just in my mind, and the way most albums are presented, often it's the slower one.
Right.
Near the end, or if not the closing track.
I love Adam's bass coming up here.
And we should never sleep on Adam and Larry.
Well, I, yeah, I agree. Unsung heroes of the band.
Yeah, incredible crushing of these two guys.
I've been listening to you for quite a while. I was down the hole just passing time.
Last time we met with a low-lit room. We were as close together as a riding room.
We ate the food. We drank a wine. Everybody having a good time.
Except you. You were talking about the end of the world.
This song is so cool. I just love it about the, with the percussion, the bass, the edges playing. The way Bono's just like, "You, you were talking like that."
It's very casual, loungy. Yeah.
But the lyrics are so, regarding, you know, everyone's having a good time, but there you are just bitching and moaning about the end of the world. I just love this. Everything about the song is just so cool.
The guitar-ing near the end of the song, or part way through the song here. Edge's guitar-ing. It's actually near the end of the song. If you've ever seen them live, the way that they combat each other, there's a push and a pull between the Edge and Bono.
Sometimes they play like a little bit of a fight or a chase or whatever.
Is that the yang and yang of the song?
There's great things going on, but there's that other side where,
whether it's within yourself or an actual other individual,
where you're complaining or concerned about the end of the world.
I don't think it has to be another individual.
It could actually be within ourselves as well, where we go like, yeah, things are good.
But then we also have this other aspects of ourselves where we kind of get caught up in
the difficulties of our everyday existence.
It's interesting that you caught the, it's very apropos that you picked up on the push and pull.
Is that what you caught from the song?
Because Bono, when he sings this, he's actually singing it through the eyes and voice of Judas
in a biblical setting.
Oh, okay.
So it contains sexual imagery between Judas and Jesus that is open for interpretation.
So there's that push and pull, that conflict between Judas and Jesus' character.
It's a conversation between Jesus and Judas.
It's an actual conversation that Bono had in his mind when he wrote this.
Oh, interesting.
When you read it in that literal sense, if you read the lyrics, of course, art is always interpretive.
You can make it your own.
But this is what Bono had intended when he wrote it.
But yeah, you can talk about any relationship, friendship, but that's the whole idea.
It is that relationship between these two, not blood brothers, but obviously religious brothers
and their anal Jesus is saying we're drinking wine, having a good time.
But there's Judas off in the corner talking about the end of the world.
The character of Judas being.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
But there's a part in the song that I really love.
Well, other than the whole song.
It's amazing.
It's amazing.
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
guitar solo
And I do a little bit, a little bit of tendency to write things.
There you go.
Much of it is based on relationships or loss.
Yeah.
Or hope to hopefully a better future.
Very prominent keyboard sound.
Yeah.
I mean, yeah.
This is a powerful song.
We crossed the line, we pushed you over, it doesn't matter to you, it matters to me.
We're good addressed, it's still floating, I'm only hanging on to watch you go down, my love.
I don't like stopping the song.
It's hard.
This song, yeah.
I hate stopping the song.
It's probably my favorite song on the album.
That's not really a hot take.
And we listened to the album for like the last, I've been listening to it almost like nonstop for like a week while I've been jogging.
And it's just like, oh man, I just can't believe how good this album is.
There's only one song that was skipping.
Anyway, so this song, the reason why it's hard to stop is because what makes it such a great song, though there is a chorus, it's almost a six minute song.
It has this gradual, gradual build.
It just keeps built.
Every next verse has another instrument kicks in.
Others, you know, you hear the keyboard kick in here.
It just overlays sound after sound.
It just keeps building.
The lyrics.
Bono's lyric writing is phenomenal.
His ability to capture thought and feelings and emotions.
And if we think of Edge's relationship and we all can connect if there's a loss in our lives.
His ability to connect with that loss and put it into words is phenomenal.
I'm reading the lyrics as you play the song and I'm just blown away.
It's part of the song.
It's near the end of the song.
Last minute and a half, two minutes of the song.
But it's the best part of the song.
Bono, I don't think he did this, but he does it later, especially in Zuropa and some other songs later on.
He does this very high pitched sound with his vocal that I don't think was introduced until this song.
Correct me if I'm wrong.
You know which part I'm talking about?
Yeah.
Okay.
I could be wrong.
Let us know in our emails.
The funny thing that you brought up Zuropa though, the drum sound at the very beginning of the song reminded me of Zuropa sound.
Yeah, absolutely.
It was just a fleeting thought as the song began.
And then I love this little high sing that he does here.
And now is it him or is it the Edge?
Because I know the Edge can sing very high.
No, it's Paul.
Yeah, that was bottom.
That's bottom.
Yeah, it is.
Well, listen to that guitar, that very subtle guitar in the background.
I love that sound.
I love that sound.
Yeah.
The Edge of the Drunk that takes you higher.
Heaven, heaven, fingers at the mire.
The heart is racing, yet you can't keep up.
The night is bleeding like a cup.
Between the horses of love and love.
The steel of trumpet.
Underfoot.
Oh, this is a great transition right there.
Oh, yes. Oh.
That phrasing.
Yeah, the underfoot part with the pauses, the underfoot.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Trampled.
Underfoot.
Also listening to Adam's bass playing.
Just a little, if you can really tap into his bass lines.
It's got a bit of a bounce.
It's such a soft, painful song.
His bass in the background is so, it's got a bounce to it that really carries.
It's in the background, it's subtle.
The whole structure of the song is amazing.
So that would end if you bought this in an LP, side one or side A.
And then side two starts with the fly, which we'll get into.
I just wanted to mention about Adam and Larry, the percussion part of the band.
It should be noted that the reason why it's a lot of Edge talk and a lot of Bono talk too,
is this was the first time, the first album where Bono and the Edge, they wrote a lot of this together.
Without Larry and Adam really being involved, this is Bono and the Edge.
I don't know, for whatever reason, I don't know the whole details.
But they didn't, in a mean way, exclude Larry and Adam.
But this was a real Bono, Edge type album.
They really wanted the sound.
Larry, in particular, he wanted more of just stay to the punk roots.
And there was a real clash, speaking of the punk clash, between Adam and Larry and Bono and the Edge.
This is why they almost broke up.
So again, it was the song one that brought it together.
It was, hey, we can make something work here.
But it was a very intentional change.
But not just for fans, the band themselves were divided on the sound.
So just keep that in mind.
I suspect Edge going through his divorce probably confided a lot in Bono.
Bono took inspiration from his friend's experience, put those feelings and emotions,
and I'm sure with Edge's help, onto paper.
That's probably why it went the way that it did.
He probably didn't confide or have those type of deep conversations with three other people.
It probably ended up being with Bono.
They collaborated over the Edge's marriage, the demise of his marriage.
Flip the LP over, track seven, The Fly, the first single on the album.
Bono had this to say regarding the song's musical departure from U2's wildly successful 1987 album.
He said, quote, the sound of four men chopping down the Joshua tree.
Very well said.
The whole departure from what we have experienced the last, you know, specifically their last,
well, their whole career up to this point, really.
It's an extreme departure, a reinvention.
Oh, baby, too.
Oh, baby.
I just paused it here because we're gonna get that high vocal and I believe this high vocal coming in here is the edge is my understanding. This is the edge scene.
I swear he does at the shows then. He helps. He helps the vocals at the shows. Play it again. I mean I've heard it a thousand times.
The big YouTube fans like don't at us don't let us too hard. If it's Bono in the studio it's just edge then does it so well at the shows mimicking Bono at the shows because I know he does it live at the shows because Bono sings over it because obviously you can't do both parts at the same time.
Yeah I'm not quite sure right. It very well could be either one. Well you look at a band like Alice in Chains we know that Jerry and Lee Stanley they did a lot of the they shared a lot of the same vocal work. It's like almost one sounds like the other time.
So I think if it's not Bono in the studio it's definitely I know the edge sings the high parts. Well he did that song did a couple of songs high singing on Zeropo like Numb.
I know he did some of the vocal work on that that was higher vocal so. Well he did that is he sang that whole song. Yeah but I think he did some of that. Anyways let us know. Send us an email. Tell us where we're not where we're wrong. We're just you know we love the album but like Jason and I said at the beginning we're not the Wikipedia for this album.
This is more just how the album makes us feel and what it does to us and makes us tap our feet what have you. The next song is track eight on the album. It is also the second song on the on side two and the second single Mysterious Ways.
Now the famous thing about this video or sorry this song is the music video of course because it has that belly dancing going on. Remember that?
Oh of course. They would bring her out on stage a belly dancer on stage.
And the edge married the belly dancer during that tour. That's who he ended up being with.
Oh oh okay.
I don't know if it's the belly dancer but it was one of the belly dancers from the tour that he married.
Okay.
While recording this in Berlin you two came up with the basis for the song One but then in a rush of creativity they put together one and finished Mysterious Ways. So One kind of gave them this hey we can work together as a band and they ended up finalizing the song Mysterious Ways. This was very refreshing for the band because they were having a hard time coming up with anything and they again considered breaking up at this point. One and Mysterious Ways were the two first songs that they recorded for this album.
They both became singles.
Yeah.
From the album. Mysterious Ways is not about a particular woman. It's about women in general and the way they entrance and often dominate men.
Bono says at times I do tend to idolize women. It's easy to fall into the trap of separating them into angels and devils for the sake of drama.
But there's no way that there's ever anything anti-woman involved. Our songs are not politically correct. They are written from a man's point of view. He's wrestling with different things. There's a flash of anger and hurt here and there.
But I don't think women come out badly. That's what he had to say about this song.
Okay.
music plays
music plays
For me, it's the bass playing and
Bono sings this song a little bit more singing than the talk singing that he's done throughout
the most of the album so far. The vocals are quite a bit more front and center in the song,
in the mix. It's a fairly stripped down sound versus much of the album as well.
Yeah, there's not a lot of that background synth sound or sound effects. We forgot to mention
Brian Eno's, of course, influence on this album and his work that he's done with the band. But he's the one that kind of introduced this electronic themes in the background, this wall of sound that kind of runs in the background. Yeah. It makes the songs busier. I don't know. They're not bad, but the songs are certainly busier than they were from a, say, Joshua Tree.
I very much appreciate his impact. Yeah. He revitalized the band. Yeah. For sure. He's the fifth member. He's like the Bob Rock.
Well, I was going to say, who's the guy that worked at the Beatles? Who's the fifth Beatle again? Paul Martin? Is that who it was? Yeah, I can't remember. He was the producer engineer that worked on all the Beatles, often referred to as the fifth Beatle because of his influence with the band. Yeah. Okay. All right. Track nine.
So, there you go. I love that. I love that. Just the metaphor of how that looks. Bono had this to say. He goes, it was a drinking song. And of course, we weren't a band known for our use of alcohol. Although that was changing fast. Things other people had done at 18 or 19, like getting loaded and being irresponsible. I didn't get around until I was in my late 20s living in LA. It's a song about getting drunk ambition, but in the funniest sense. Not in such a megalomania way, but just the ambition of to get home in one piece.
So, there you go. It's a little bit about drinking and trying to get home in one piece. Simple as that. Interesting.
I really love Bono's vocal work in this song.
That's the edge of the background.
Yeah, Bonnell's vocal work in the song is really something.
What I find amazing, I mean, you gave the background, and I suspect it's metaphorical, right?
You're drunk, and you're trying to get yourself home, and you're in one piece, etc., etc.
You have that in your mind, and then you turn the song on, and you listen to it.
You're not expecting to hear this sound.
Right. It's a soft song.
It's a soft, introspective.
It's deeper than just the surface of a drunk person getting home.
There's deeper meaning to all of it.
As with all art, especially songs, there's like a genesis of why the song was written,
and then the character of the song or the images of the song could be used for so many different things, of course.
Yeah.
Metaphorically.
I know there's a part I just love in the song.
I can't explain it.
Bonnell gets...
His vocal work gets so high.
It's just incredible, you know, what he can do here.
And I just love the way it builds.
Give it about 90 seconds there, folks.
Bonnell does a little bit of, again, very much so like a talk sing here.
It's almost like a rapping, but it's just like the soft slam poetry type speaking.
And then he crescendos at the end.
Around the girl
It took an open tap needle
Through the island
He was trying to throw his arms around the world
I'm gonna run to you, run to you, run to you
Won't be still
This part right here.
Everything leading up to that too.
There's like multiple, like he's talking and he's got a layer of talk, singing, a little bit of singing.
You know, like those lyrics are all layered with different ways in which he would say the same line.
Yeah.
And then his higher notes there at the very end of that for such a, again, the imagery of a drunk person to the power.
And how they're able to switch that energy or the imagery into this through this music.
They chose to sing that.
I'm not sure if I'm explaining this.
Yeah, I think you're just saying.
You know what I mean?
Like they switched by adding this emotional approach to singing and the way that the instrumentation is put together.
Just fast.
To me, as somebody who can't write music or whatever, but I appreciate music.
I love how they can manipulate all these different thoughts and emotions based on how they put it together.
I totally agree.
All right.
The next song, track 10, is Ultraviolet, parentheses, Light My Way.
Bono had this to say about the song.
He calls it a little disturbed.
He explained, there's a silence that comes to a house when no one can sleep.
It's a great line.
And I can say that with all modesty, because I stole it from the fiction writer Raymond Carver.
My apologies, he says.
It is an epic U2 song, but again, the key of it left my voice in a conversational place and allowed a different kind of lyric writing.
It has almost a Motown chorus, baby, baby, baby, light my way.
This was the peak, the mountain top of babies, but it disguises a very dark content.
Your love is a secret that's been passed around.
Jealousy, infidelity, love rears its ugly head again.
This is, for me, by far, the best song on the album.
Oh, wow.
It has, yeah, by far, the music, the lyrics.
Yeah, from day one, for me.
And his performances of this song live.
Oh, nice.
It's always a highlight.
Sometimes I feel like I don't know.
Sometimes I feel like checking out.
I want to get it wrong.
Can't always be strong.
And love, it won't be long.
I love the balance.
Yeah, it was.
I feel.
Yeah, Edge is on point again with his guitar.
Oh, sugar, don't you cry.
Oh, child, wipe the tears from your eyes.
You know I need you to be strong.
The day is as dark as the night is long.
Feel like trash.
You make me feel clean.
I'm in the black.
Can't see or be seen.
Baby, baby, baby, light my way.
The guitar, that subtle strumming, but the bass makes you feel this pickup and a bit of a
balance to it.
And yeah.
Probably this part for you as well for me, Jay.
That I, again, the crescendo, Bono's vocal change, and that emotional crescendo that I love.
And it's probably your favorite part too, maybe.
Baby, light my way.
I remember when we could sleep on stars
Now we lie together in whispers and moans
When I was so messed up and I had my ear crying
You're losing like no hanging over my bed
Again with that raspy, you know.
Yeah. Love it.
This is not your worst pick, is it?
That'd be an amazing, amazing album if this was my worst pick.
Yeah, I can't imagine that was the worst song.
Now remember, the worst song on any of our picks, we say this on all our albums.
Some albums could be so great that it's just hard to pick a worst song per se.
But yeah, we'll talk about our worst pick later.
Again, I don't know if it's the same one, but we'll see.
But yeah, imagine if this was the worst song.
How good that album would be.
The next song on the album is track 11.
It's called Acrobat.
And I love this song too.
Me too.
Yeah, me too.
How I take the song without reading any background on anything.
It's just about relationships.
Mental gymnastics ones have to do sometimes.
Like, I'm doing everything I can to make this relationship work.
I have to be an Acrobat to think like this and act like that.
Like, what do you want me to do?
It's just, I'm like twisting myself into a pretzel to make things work for you.
Yeah.
Bonnell, of course, said this is a song about your own spleen, your own hypocrisy, your own ability to change shape and take on the colors of whatever environment you're in like a chameleon.
So that could be like in a relationship.
This is Brian now talking.
It's also about dark romance.
The Edge had this to say in amongst the dark romance, Acrobat has a bit of venom about it.
It's in the bitter John Lennon tradition of working class hero, slightly snarling and cynical.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
I'm reading the lyrics as you're talking here and I can kind of see the kind of shape shifting.
You can swallow or you can spit.
Oh, yeah.
You can throw it up or you can choke on it.
I love that part.
You can do this or you can do that just to make things work or maybe in some ways be self-sabotaging as well.
Yeah.
Well, that's the, yeah, you're chameleon.
Whatever it is you need to do to make things work or not work to your advantage.
Yeah.
It starts off in a way where you're like, I don't know if the song's going to be very good.
It has a weird start where you're like, I don't think the song's going to be very good.
You're like, oh, this is kind of a blah.
I'm not sure if, yeah, I'm not sure if I even like the sound.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But then it just, it's one of those songs where it doesn't have a very good beginning,
but then it just starts.
And it's right here.
Yeah.
Don't believe what you say.
Don't believe what you say.
You just close your eyes.
You can feel the enemy.
When I first met you girl, you had fire in your soul. What happened to your face of melting snow? Now it looks like this.
And you can swallow, or you can spit, you can throw it up, or choke on it. And you can dream, so dream my life. You know that your time is coming loud. So don't let the back stretch grind you down.
Did you know, Jason, this song had never been played live before until 2018?
I know, I would not have thought of that.
Yep. It was actually during the first night of their Experience and Innocence tour, Tulsa, Oklahoma, May 2nd, 2018 was the first time it was played live.
Every other song from Mock Toon Baby had gotten at least one live performance. This was the last one at that time.
Wow. I wonder why.
Who knows? That's a good question. Maybe the way Bono has to sing it? I don't know, but you wouldn't want to wait too long.
You wouldn't want to wait too long. We all get older, right?
Enough good stuff can be said about this album, about everyone in the album. The Edge's guitar work is just something special on this album, and his sound here that I just love.
And act like that
And you can dream
So dream around
And you can find
Your own way out
And you can feel
And I can will
And you can call
Can't wait until
And you can smash
And you can cease
And dreams begin
Responsive than leaves
And I can love
And I can love
And know that the tide
Is turning round
So don't let the bastards
Grab you down
Oh, this is a great ending.
Yeah, it is a great ending.
I'm glad you played that.
All right, track 12.
Final track on the album.
This one is a very unique song, I think.
What do you think of Love is Blindness?
Beautiful.
It's a beautiful song.
Talk about Edge's guitar work.
Something very unique and different
about the sound of this song.
Of course, it's a very haunting
type sound beginning.
I love that bass.
Yeah.
It's a very Eno-inspired sound.
It's a very Eno-inspired sound.
I don't want to sing...
Now, here we have Botto singing
longer notes for the final song.
Yes.
Yes.
Right there.
Maybe that was intentional for the last song.
They kind of investigated the sound of the theme on Joshua Tree, if you remember, with the mothers of the disappeared.
And that was, I think, I think that was the last song on the album.
That haunting, very quiet, has that loud outro.
His singing on this song is amazing.
Yeah, because we talked about, he changes his vocals a little bit for this album compared to the previous ones.
But this song definitely has no vocal effect, really.
No distortion or anything like that.
It's just...
But it still has that subdued, kind of quiet...
It's a quiet whisper, but still held notes, like longer held notes.
Yeah.
It's a beautiful song, but it doesn't feel like a love song.
There's no good love songs?
It's like, there's nothing happy love songs?
Yeah.
No.
Beautiful, a little bit, not as far as beautiful as in a love song, but beautiful as in...
The artwork.
The artistry.
Yeah, the artwork and the deepness of the lyrics and the messaging, however you want to take it.
That almost makes sense.
I just love an edge of sound here.
It's very bluesy.
Yes.
It's like a tease.
So it's like a tease of something to come and then it...
It's amazing.
I mean, he could shred if he wanted to.
Sure, of course.
But his ability to have impact on the song by being just so subtle and it's like addition
by subtraction.
Very good.
Right?
Like he adds so much to the song by just barely doing anything.
Yeah.
Then at the end, he does that quote unquote shred.
We don't hear this very often from the edge.
This type of...
And I would almost...
If I was going to read into the album, its messages, themes, what have you, especially
regarding the edge.
This is the edge.
Just...
You can almost like him screaming into a pillow.
You know what I mean?
Like...
This part right here.
This is him just like letting it out at the end of the album.
*music*
*music*
Well, that is the album closer. That is the 12 tracks from the Octoon Baby, which I believe in German means "Attention!"
I think it's warning or caution.
That obviously flies in the face of the fans. They're saying, "Hey guys, be warned, this sound is different than all the other albums we've done."
Great album, incredible album. It has aged to the point where you can't label this, this doesn't sound like 91.
It's not stuck in any timeline or timeframe. It's literally a timeless album. That's why I think it's one of the best produced albums of all time, because of its ability to stand the test of time.
Yeah, I totally agree.
Yeah, I love it. I mean, this was great going down memory lane with you. This tour or the Zouropa tour, it was either this tour or the Zouropa was much like the ZouTV tour. Like you said, they were combined. It was like back to back.
I've seen them live just two times. You've seen them much more than me. I've only seen them live three times. I saw Zouropa, Pop Mart tour and Elevation tour. Those are the ones I've seen. You have seen, I think you saw the most recent one, the Joshua Tree tour.
I saw Joshua Tree.
The 30th anniversary one.
And the experience.
Oh, so you saw the last tour.
I think, yeah, I've seen every tour except for Zouropa. So what happens, they did the ZouTV, which is this album. Then they took a six month break, recorded it.
Six month break, recorded Zouropa, released it and then toured after that. So it was like a back to back and it just seemed to kind of combine the two tours and two albums sort of meshed in together. So I've seen every tour. So for every album.
Got Pop Mart, Elevation, Vertigo, U2 360, Innocence and the Experience tour, the Joshua Tree tour, and then Experience and the Innocence tour and then the Joshua tour 2019.
So I've seen all those and I saw the 360 tour. I saw that show twice.
Oh, there you go. Okay. Now they haven't gone on tour in three years. Thank you, COVID, for part of that, I'm sure. But they also haven't released any new music since Songs of Experience in 2017. So they actually haven't...
They're doing a residency. They're doing a residency in Vegas. There's a new, I believe at the Venetian, there's a new massive technologically advanced stadium. And they're going to be the opening act when that becomes open. I think in 2023 or red.
It's been five years since the new album. Hope we get a new album because the new album usually means a new tour. Look, they're only getting older and there's no shame in that, but I would like to see them one more time. They're kind of at that age and stage in their life where it's like, give us another album, not a residency, which is great that they're doing that, but I'm kind of hoping for a world tour. Something I would like to see them do again.
Did you just fly to Vegas cheap, man?
That's true. Good point. Good point.
And whatever they put together in this new tech, it's apparently an amazing technologically advanced.
All right. Well, Jason, what do you got here? What's your worst pick?
Perfect as this album is.
Are we going to say at the same time?
This song should never have been on the album.
Are we going to say at the same time? Because I actually don't know your pick, but I'm going to guess.
Okay. The count of three. One, two, three. Mysterious Ways.
Mysterious Ways.
Yeah. Okay. I was pretty confident that that was yours as well.
It's all right.
I have to say what I listen to.
It's all right.
I know. It's very unfortunate.
Well, it's funny because they did one. They united after that and they kind of finalized this song,
but thankfully they moved on from it. Imagine that they kind of built the sound of this album from this song.
So anyways, there you go. I hope everyone enjoyed our YouTube coverage of the album, Octoon Baby.
It's a big album. It's a big episode. We really enjoyed doing this. This is what we mean.
So give us suggestions. It doesn't have to just be bands, topics that you'd like us to cover.
Go look at our library on this podcast, what we've covered so far. So you get an idea that we cover a variety of topics. So give us some suggestions.
Maybe I'd recommend that if you were to give us a music suggestion or an album, look back at what we've done, understanding what's in our wheelhouse,
or pick an album from a band that we've done that we haven't reviewed yet, or just give us a topic that you think would be fun for us to review and talk about.
Check out our show notes to see our email address and how to get a hold of us. And thank you everyone for listening.
Remember, in front of every silver lining, there's a cloud. And today, for both Jason and I, was Mysterious Ways.
GammaGator Productions.
GammaGator Productions.
I'll see you next time.