Melon

by Matt McGee

U2 fans practically came out of the woodwork to join "Propaganda," the band's official fan club, in late 1994/early 1995. U2 wasn't on tour, so it had nothing to do with the promise of getting great seats at an upcoming gig. It had everything to do with Melon, a fan club-only CD filled with nine remixes of U2 tracks. The CD was issued in conjunction with Issue #21 of the official fan club magazine. According to a later issue of the magazine, "Melon was prompted by the Edge's concern that fans were being forced to stump up increasingly large sums to keep their collections complete."

Some of the remixes had never before seen the light of day, and others had only been available before on rare promo-only releases. The nine tracks on the CD included remixes done by seven different artists including David Morales, Paul Oakenfold, Massive Attack, and the Soul Assassins.

Melon Tracklist

• Lemon (The Perfecto Mix), remixed by Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne
• Salome (Zooromancer remix), remixed by Pete Heller and Terry Farley
• Numb (Gimme Some More Dignity Mix), remixed by Rollo and Rob D
• Mysterious Ways (The Perfecto Mix), remixed by Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne
• Stay (Underdog Mix), remixed by Underdog
• Numb (The Soul Assassins Mix), remixed by The Soul Assassins
• Mysterious Ways, remixed by Massive Attack
• Even Better Than the Real Thing (The Perfecto Mix), remixed by Paul Oakenfold and Steve Osborne
• Lemon (Bad Yard Club Mix), remixed by David Morales

The Melon CD was limited to 20,000 copies worldwide, more than the typical "limited edition" release. But due to the nature of the release -- fan club-only, and not available in any regular retail outlet -- Melon became an instant collectible.

Bootleg producers picked up on the momentum of the release, quickly churning out a bootleg version of Melon. How can you tell the difference? It should be easy: The official CD is ONLY available in a yellow cardboard sleeve; the bootleg Melon was typically found in a standard plastic jewel case.

Bootleg producers also picked up on the growing interest in remixes and dance music, throwing just about any and every U2 remix and rare track they could find onto a series of bootleg CDs that shared their names with various other fruits. New "fruitlegs" (as they're known) are coming out all the time it seems; the latest list we're aware of is:

• Melon
• More Melon
• Pineapple
• Grapes
• Orange
• Mango
• Kiwi
• Banana
• Papaya

Each of these CDs is labeled to look as official as possible (of course), and include the same tagline used on the real Melon CD: "Remixes for Propaganda". Don't be fooled; none of them are even remotely official.

The official and legitimate version of Melon is a nice collectible, but what hurts the value of this item is that it's all studio work by other remixers ... so the casual collector or casual U2 fan is likely to be more than happy with just the bootleg version.

One last note: in conjunction with the Melon CD sent to the fan club, Island also distributed 800 promo 12" singles to DJs. This vinyl release included four mixes from the fan club CD, and is more difficult to find -- and slightly more valuable!