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Column: off the record..., vol. 9-348
@U2,
March 01, 2009
I'm not much of a "green thumb" and have given up on trying to make something nice out of the front corner of our yard. So, we had a landscape guy out to look at it last week. There are two large evergreens standing tall amongst the weeds and rocks, and as Landscape Guy surveys these two trees, he points at the one on the left and says,
Needless to say, I didn't hear a single word the guy said the rest of the time he was here. How freakin' cool!?! We have a Cedar of Lebanon in our front yard? The lady who owned this house before planted some amazingly exotic stuff (including one Persian tree near the evergreens), so I thought anything was possible. Then I went online and found out that what we call Cedars of Lebanon here in the U.S. aren't really cedars, and the Real Thing only exists in a handful of countries halfway around the world. Oh, well. I'll survive. Did you get to watch many of U2's performances last week on TV, rooftops, and other places? I'll say this: "Get On Your Boots" is a much better live song without all the ZOO TV-esque visuals. The video wall, the lyrics on the screen, Bono throwing shapes at the start of the song -- that all seems so forced and unnatural, almost like the band was pandering to the vocal fans who've been wanting a return to Achtung Baby/Zoo TV for years now. I hope they drop that stuff by the time the tour rolls around. In case you were curious, Rattle and Hum is really, really gorgeous on Blu-Ray DVD and an HDTV. And the sound is terrific, too. Now I'm hoping some of the other U2 DVDs get upgraded to Blu-Ray. Pretty please? First, there was Napster Mobile. Second, there was Universal Australia. And then, this weekend in the Boston area, there was Starbucks. Yep, one single Starbucks accidentally put copies of NLOTH out for sale, and they were quickly bought up. A couple readers emailed this week to tell us that Coldplay is using U2's "Magnificent" as the lead-in song before Coldplay took the stage at their concerts in Australia. (Imagine if they used "Winter," instead -- Coldplay fans would spend the first 30 seconds thinking it was a remix of "Viva La Vida." :-) And finally ... to whet your appetite for tour dates and live shows, check out this awesome "Streets" collage put together by Josh Campbell.
See ya next time... © @U2, 2009.
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