I don't like U2, never did and probably never will. I laughed at a drummer back in the early 80ies who had joined our then band and was clamoring to adjust our sound to "this new band" - he played something off the first U2 album and the rest of the band looked incredulously at him and started laughing in a mean way, the bass player, a particularly nasty person named Uwe, even quipped: "Do they ever play riffs at all or is it all just strumming with lots of echo? What a hopeless bunch, they will never go anywhere."
Fast forward 35 years and I venture the statement that Herr Clayton and his fellow Catholics have proven me wrong. All that huddle-praying before concerts must have goaded great parts of the general public into believing that guitar riffs are not mandatory to be megastars, eat your hearts out, Jimmy Page, Tony Iommi and Ritchie Blackmore!
You may or may not like U2, they are a hugely influential band, all the Jimmy Eat Worlds, Coldplays and Snow Patrols wouldn't be there without them. Even a lot of New Country these days has a strong U2 imprint. I don't even agree that U2 had an original sound - a lot of post-punk new wavers had a similar style, at least in Europe where we didn't think that all music has to sound like Foghat! -, but via their mass accessability and sheer success they bludgeoned their sound recipe over an unsuspecting world.
So what makes them so popular and gave them so much - thoroughly respectable - longevity? I think it's Bono's tone of voice which touches many people (not me, I find its messianic fervor hard to bear) and the fact that the music underneath it is unobstrusive (no riffs that get in the way of you munching your food while you're listening to a U2 CD over dinner) and harmonically easy to latch onto, serving predominantly the singer of the song. Add the hymnic quality of a lot of their melodies to that (Coldplay's recipe too). It's rock (I use the term in a roundabout way) music
even girls like. And that means having slightly more than half the world population on your side. Ask Rush how it feels if you only play to the other half.
As regards their board memberships: I'm sure they are flattered by Fender's invitation, but I don't think either needs the money, half a million is small fry for both of them, they give more than that to charity regularly. But I see no basis to deny them their status as professional musicians and as therefore experienced users of all kinds of instruments over decades. And if The Edge hasn't given thought to his playing and his effects-drenched sound then I don't know who has. Saying that Bono and The Edge are not fit to serve on an instrument maker's board is a bit like saying that the Pope has no place in the board of a publishing house printing the Bible because he hasn't worked in the print business before. Digest that. And the Pope is a Catholic too, so there!
That's my take. Still, I like what Journey - bell bottoms or not - did with the same four chords on "Don't Stop Believing" better than what the Irishmen did on "With or Without You" - even though there is no "South Detroit" as such! And this posting
could of course not be complete without the universal question for our in-and-out-of-the-closet U2 lovers lurking everywhere (Tom, how I crave for your just punishment, hit me with the Echoplex!!!):
"
Couldn't Herr Clayton be a bit more adventurous in his playing, given that the other two instrumentalists don't do much either?" Plus it needs a
Led Zeppelin , better still Deep Purple ending, U2 never wrote and never will write riffs like this, try singing your psalms over that, Bono boy!!!
You could invent a hundred new Stratocasters for The E-E-E-E-E-E-E-E-Edge-ge-ge-ge-ge-ge-ge-ge-ge and he still wouldn't be able to set his delay to write such a riff. Nuff said. Now where's my bell bottom?
