MEMBERSHIP HAS ITS PRIVILEGES: U2'S "U22"

I'm not just a fan of U2, I'm a member of the fan club. I was a member back in the day when the fan club was called "Propaganda." My membership has occasionally lapsed over the years, but I always re-sign up when they have something cool, like this: U22. It's a 22 track live collection, taken from U2's 360 tour (which blew my mind).

The tour focused on their latest album, No Line On The Horizon, but by the end it was really leaning on Achtung Baby. I could never understand why they didn't put out a live album after Achtung Baby, it was such a great studio album that really translated live.

So I was glad that this collection has some of the best songs from that album: "Even Better Than The Real Thing" (excellent live), "The Fly" (one of my favorites, it's amazing live) and "Ultra Violet (Light My Way)," which was a highlight of the concert.

On the other hand, Bono mangled one of my favorite songs, "Until The End Of The World," by vamping on Frank Sinatra in the middle of the song, and singing a bit of it like Sinatra. Personally, I don't care about Sinatra (I know, sacrilege, sorry, but I don't).  It just took a really intense song (and one that hasn't had a great live version on CD)  and made it sound corny.

But on the other hand, "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" (which has had a few different live versions) got yet another new one: South African trumpet legend Hugh Madekela (a solo artist in his own right, he also played on The Byrds' "So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star?") joined them on the song, adding a completely different dimension to it.

What are some other highlights? "Magnificent" (similar to the version they did on The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame 25th Anniversary Concert), "Stay (Faraway, So Close)," "One Tree Hill," "Beautiful Day," "All I Want Is You," "The Unforgettable Fire," "Zooropa," "Walk On," and their latest classic song "Moment Of Surrender." "Out Of Control" was a great touch also.

Is it worth the $50 annual subscription price?  Well, I'm not going to try to sell you on it, but I'll just say that the live collection is awesome.  If you're enough of a U2 fan to want to spend the cash, go here to join the fan club.

"(AHK-TOONG BAY-BI) COVERED" REVIEWED

There were so many great releases towards the end of 2011, so if you have missed this gem I'll give you a pass.  But it's time to catch up!  (Ahk-toong Bay-bi) Covered is a tribute to U2's classic Achtung Baby LP from 1991. The original is one of my favorite albums ever, so I was a bit worried about this... but the talent lineup on it is incredible.

By the way, this was originally available only in the UK, it came with an issue of Q magazine. In the US, you can download it at iTunes, with proceeds going towards Concern, an organization dedicated to working with the world's poorest people to improve their lives.

The album starts out with Nine Inch Nails covering "Zoo Station," which is surprising on several levels. One, I thought Trent Reznor was done with NIN.  I guess not?  Second, I thought he didn't like U2, although I guess if he liked any of their albums, it would be this one (when it came out, I thought it sounded like U2 were influenced by NIN's debut, 1989's Pretty Hate Machine). Third, NIN's versions is so different.  It's much more subtle, and a bit creepier than U2's.

Patti Smith, one of U2's biggest influences, honors them with her piano based cover of "Until The End Of The World." Accompanied by her sons on piano and guitar, and a bass player, it's much different and more sober, and maybe more sad, than the original.

Garbage, who opened for U2, makes their return to active duty with "Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses?"  Like U2 during this era, Garbage wrestle with getting soul into the intersection of humans playing instruments and programmed computer music.  Few do it well, but U2 and Garbage both did. I look forward to hearing Garbage's comeback album.

Depeche Mode, a peer of U2's, picked the perfect song for themselves with "So Cruel." It's interesting to hear them cover something from this era, since Achtung Baby (and Zooropa and Pop) are the closest U2 came to Depeche Mode's electronic sound. I've always thought that this is one of U2's most underrated songs (if I remember correctly, it's the only song from the album they didn't play on the tour).  Depeche Mode really put their own spin on it.

Friend of U2 Gavin Friday takes one of my favorites, "The Fly," and makes it sound a bit sneakier.  It's a bit more electronic, and like NIN's "Zoo Station," mostly strips The Edge's badass riff from the song.  It almost sounds like he's covering a remix. It's very cool though.

One of my favorite artists, Jack White closes the album with a very emotional "Love Is Blindness," the closest thing to a blues song U2 has ever done.  The Edge wrote that one when he was going through a divorce, and sadly, Jack just went through one. He brings a lot of sorrow to the song,  it's the highlight of the album for me, and one of the best songs of 2011.

I don't love every song on the album, and of course you can just buy the songs you like, but because the money goes to a worthy cause, I downloaded the whole thing.

TOMORROW ON THE MORNING JOLT: REISSUES! U2, NIRVANA, ROLLING STONES, BEACH BOYS, JETHRO TULL

Tomorrow morning I'll be on SiriusXM OutQ's The Morning Jolt with Larry Flick talking about one of my favorite subjects: box sets and reissues.  It's that time of year, they make great gifts!

I've written a lot about U2 lately, and I've also written about the Achtung Baby album and the reissue.  It blew me away when I first heard it in 1991, and I've never gotten tired of it.  The super deluxe version of the box set has lots of great extras (although I balked at the $400+ uber box set, which has the same music, but does have magnets, stickers, Bono shades, etc.  Cute, but for me, not worth the money.  Really, all you need is the album itself, but I really wanted some of the extras.


I've written about the Nirvana Nevermind reissue. Well, a lot has been said about the album lately.  It really was a game changer for music. Yeah, it led to a lot of bands deciding that they had to pretend to be angst ridden, but what are you gonna do?  You can't blame all the hair metal bands on Van Halen, and you can't blame the grunge fakers on Nirvana. I bought the super deluxe version of this also.  Again, for the extras, including a live recording and also Butch Vig's original mixes of the album.  But you'd do fine with the deluxe version.  Or really, just the original, it's so powerful and still holds up today.

I've also written about The Rolling Stones Some Girls reissue. I've mentioned that it's probably my favorite Stones album, and that the outtakes are so good, I think they're better than the Stones' next album, Emotional Rescue. And they're better than most band's albums too.  When Ronnie Wood joined the band, it just worked. It was while the band were still powerful and had their swagger.  I like a lot of what they've done since Some Girls, but nothing came close to matching this LP.  I love Tattoo You and I really like Steel Wheels and A Bigger Bang, none of them come are in their neighborhood.

Jon Moskowitz (@JonMoskow) from the blog Vivoscene was nice enough to do a guest review of The Beach Boys' Smile. I don't really get the album, and I Tweeted a request for someone to guest review it for me, and Jon (who I met at a social media seminar hosted by Sree Sreenivasan aka @sree) said he'd do it.  It turns out, he doesn't really get the album either.  It's not any anti-Beach Boys bias though: we both enjoy Pet Sounds.

Finally, Jethro Tull's Aqualung. People kind of make fun of Jethro Tull, but if you think of them in the context of the time, wow, how different they must have sounded.  Fortunately for them, classic rock radio has played their records for decades.  But that can be a double edged sword.  Songs like "Aqualung" and "Locomotive Breath" and "Cross-Eyed Mary" can lose their edge after years of repetition and being played back to back with lots of the soft rockers that classic rock radio plays so much of. But this is a pretty awesome album.

DEAR BONO: I APOLOGIZE (SORT OF)

A couple of weeks ago, I had a post called "Dear Bono: Shut up." I was kind of bummed about a quote of his cited to UK publication The Sun where, in an interview about  the 20th anniversary of U2's Achtung Baby, he said, "We've been on the verge of irrelevance for the last 20 years, dodged, ducked, dived, made some great work, I hope, along the way – and the occasional faux pas."

 I had a problem with that statement, as U2's music from the past twenty years means a lot to me, up to and especially including "Moment Of Surrender" from their latest album, No Line On The Horizon.

But in a cover story with British magazine Q, Bono had a similar quote (maybe The Sun nicked it?). The rest of the quote says "Lots of people have U2 albums -- why they would want another one is a reasonable question.  I don't know if it's possible for us to make something current that is meaningful, not just to our audience but to the times we live in. But that's kind of the job for me and I'm not ready to give it up.  I think it's unlikely that we'll pull it off, but then, so has the last 20 years been unlikely."

For some reason, I feel a little less annoyed by seeing his quote in this context.  I can understand wanting to transcend the fanbase to do something that resonates with everyone.  On the other hand, if Bruce Springsteen retired because he'll (probably) never match the reach of Born In The U.S.A., we would never have gotten The Rising, We Shall Overcome or Magic.  Or look at Bob Dylan: he doesn't care at all what the larger culture likes or doesn't.  If he did, and retired because he didn't have any more songs like "Blowin' In The Wind" or "Like A Rolling Stone" or "The Times They Are A' Changin'" or "Hurricane" or "Subterranean Homesick Blues" in him, we would never have gotten Time Out Of Mind or "Love and Theft" or Modern Times or "Things Have Changed" or Together Through Life. What a shame that would have been.

In the Q feature, the band touch on the different albums they are working on, and I really look forward to hearing what they do with Danger Mouse. Based on the stuff that he has done with The Black Keys, I think he has to potential to craft a great, funky album around some cool songs.  Of course, U2 has to come with the songs.  Hopefully DM will be able to tell them to return to the drawing board if the songs don't measure up.  I have faith that they've got at least another great album in them.  And what is U2 about, if not faith?

P.S. Q put together a great Achtung tribute, Ahk-toong Bay-Bi.  It was available with the magazine in Europe, and is available to buy on iTunes. With artists like Nine Inch Nails, Garbage, Depeche Mode, Patti Smith, Damien Rice and Jack White, it's really worth a listen.

#20YRSAGO: U2 - ACHTUNG BABY (+ boxset review!)

The first post in my #20yrsago series -- celebrating some classic albums that came out in (or around) 1991 - was Chris Whitley's debut Living With The Law. Now, I'm going to write about an LP that is a little more well known (but both albums have involvement from Daniel Lanois, so there is a common thread).

I don't know that my mind has ever been as blown as it was when I first turned on U2's Achtung Baby. Yeah, I've been knocked out by many artists the first time I heard them... but by an artist who I had been following for years?  I have never been so surprised by a group's "new direction" as I was when I put Achtung Baby into my CD player.

This was, of course, before the web, and I don't think that I knew too much about what U2's "new direction" would be like.  In the years since, The Edge has often talked about performing encores on U2's last '80s tour with opener B.B. King and then going back to his dressing room and listening to KMFDM. But I didn't know about any of that at the time.

There were hints.  On the 12" of Rattle and Hum's "When Love Comes To Town," their collab with B.B. (a song which marked the peak of their explorations into American roots music), the B-side was a cover of Patti Smith's "Dancing Barefoot" as if to remind us of their post punk roots.

But the next new release by the band was a cover of Cole Porter's "Night and Day," from the Red Hot & Blue collection, the first CD compiled by the Red Hot organization.  I saw the video on MTV.  U2 still looked like their Joshua Tree selves - Bono with no shades, no makeup, long hair, The Edge with long hair and the doo-rag.  But they didn't really sound like U2.  It was darker, funkier, and synth-ier.  It reminded me a bit of Depeche Mode.

DEAR BONO: SHUT UP.

Dear Bono:

First off, let me get this out of the way.  I'm not a hater or a U2 detractor.  In fact, I have every U2 album. I went to see you guys on the Unforgettable Fire tour in April of 1985 and it blew my mind.  I've seen every tour since. I've stuck with you and also the band through everything. Lemons on the Popmart tour.  The Million Dollar Hotel. Spider-Man. Your well intended collaboration with Jay-Z and Rihanna. Everything.  Your music has always meant so much to me.

I've always respected the fact that you and the band have try to use your position to make the world a better place. Your reach may exceed your grasp, but still you try, and I love that. I don't mind that you have no problems with enjoying the spoils of your success, either. And I don't think that it makes you a hypocrite when you talk about working to eliminate extreme poverty. I've always been interested to hear what you have to say. I've always read interviews with you, and have been honored to interview U2 twice.

But some of the stuff you've been saying lately is ridiculous and insulting, and I'm calling you on it right now.

Apparently you told The Sun that "We've been on the verge of irrelevance for the last 20 years, dodged, ducked, dived, made some great work, I hope, along the way – and the occasional faux pas."  I'll argue the point that a lot of the music you've made in the past 20 years holds up to your first ten.  "Dirty Day," "Numb," "The Wanderer," "If God Will Send His Angels," "Gone," "Please," "Wake Up Dead Man," "Your Blue Room," "Staring at The Sun," "Beautiful Day," "In A Little While," "Stuck In A Moment," "Walk On," "Electrical Storm," "Vertigo," "Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own," "All Because Of You."  You created a second classic version of "One" with Mary J. Blige and brought "The Saints Are Coming" to a huge audience via your powerful collaboration with Green Day. U2's past 20 years have been more relevant than most bands at their peak.

This quote stings: "Whether we can play music for small speakers of the radio or clubs or where people are living right now, remains to be seen, we have to go to that place again if we are to survive." Yeah, I know you want to be played on the radio. What terrestrial radio channels play new music from a band that's been around for more than 20 years? Terrestrial radio is completely ageist. And of the bands they support, how many are actually good? Bono, what do you mean by "clubs and places where people are living right now?"  Are people who don't go to clubs anymore not "living"? Are they worth writing songs for? Your fans who went to see you on the Unforgettable Fire tour, the Joshua Tree tour, the Achtung Baby tour... and even the Popmart tour.  They're not "living right now?" They're working, and raising families and trying to make their way in the world. Are they really less important than people who pay tons of money to hear David Guetta or Deadmau5 spin records? (I'm not done - click below to see the whole letter.)

U2's 360 TOUR RETURNS TO NJ

Giants still walk the earth, and I'm not talking about a sports team.  Last night, U2's concert at the New Meadowlands Stadium was one of the best concerts I've ever seen. I've seen lots of U2 shows: I've seen every tour since 1985.  This may well have been the best one.

For the past twenty years, I've felt that the band have had a hard time aligning their two sides: the rootsy, earnest Joshua Tree guys and the edgier, darker guys who chopped that tree down with Achtung Baby. Put another way: their '80s material didn't always fit into their shows in the '90s, and then in the '00s, post-All That You Can't Leave Behind, it sometimes felt like the '90s material didn't totally make sense in their sets.  On the 360 Tour, everything seems to work. Their gigantic stage is a visual assault with both heart and mind. I saw the earlier part of the tour, and this time the show was even better.

Clearly, Achtung Baby was on the band's collective mind: they are about to release a 20th anniversary edition of that album, and they opened up with four songs in a row from the LP: "Even Better Than The Real Thing," "The Fly," "Mysterious Ways" and "Until The End Of The World." The songs sounded better live than they ever have: they've lost some of their techno sheen, replaced by a roaring garage rock sound. When those songs first came out, they sounded like a real departure from "rock" music, but last night they all sounded like stadium anthems.

Speaking of anthems: from there they went into "I Will Follow," which still sounds so fresh. I've never gotten tired of this song. It struck me that this must be so much fun on "Rock Band," especially on drums. Listen to this song, you'll understand why U2 should have been called The Larry Mullen Band. His playing is so cool, but he doesn't try and call attention to himself.  You notice it if you're paying attention.  Larry and Adam Clayton really held it down last night: Adam sounded more funky and aggressive than ever.  He's probably getting more girls than ever (Bono remarked that he still thinks that being in the band is a "great way to meet girls"). You can hear it in his playing.

It's the end of the tour, and they've dropped a few songs from No Line On The Horizon. But they did play "Get On Your Boots" (which doesn't really work for me, it always struck me as an attempt to repeat the similar but cooler "Vertigo," which they also played), the remix of "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" (also didn't really work, but they segued into "Discotheque," which is a much better dance jam), and "Magnificent," which is a classic.

There were some of the colossal hits: "Pride (In The Name Of Love)," "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," "One," "With Or Without You" and "Where The Streets Have No Name." All were incredible as always.

On this tour, they've brought back "Walk On," one of my favorites.  They have Amnesty International volunteers on stage with candles in honor of recently freed Burmese leader Aung San Suu Kyi, (read more about her here). Aung San Suu Kyi addressed the audience via video after the song.  It's one of those powerful moments that U2 pull off so well.  Another moment was astronaut Mark Kelly's video intro to "Beautiful Day," where he floated flash cards with the lyrics before the song, and then quoted Bowie: "Tell my wife I love her very much: she knows." How could you not get a lump in your throat! Kelly read some of the lyrics during the song also. He is already home from his space mission, but still, wow. That moment could have overwhelmed the song, but it didn't.  "Beautiful Day" is that rare rock song about, well, beauty... but played with Zeppelin-esque power.  And last night's performance was righteous, as was the performance of its album-mate, "Elevation," which followed.  I know The Edge isn't a typical "guitar hero," his playing is so rocking while also being zen. Like Larry's drumming, you never feel like The Edge is trying to call all the attention to himself.

Some surprising '90s moments: "Miss Sarajevo" and "Zooropa," both of which were excellent. Bono even sang Pavarotti's part of "Sarajevo," and pretty much pulled it off.  He was in amazing vocal form, and of course, was incredible as a frontman (a great moment came when he read a setlist from a U2 show from The Fastlane, 30 years earlier).  Also, "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me" from the Batman soundtrack was great, proving that not all of U2's superhero collaborations aren't disasters.  Although the folks at Marvel Comics probably weren't psyched that "Hold Me" made the playlist ("How about 'Rise Above 1?').

The show ended with No Line On The Horizon's "Moment Of Surrender." My opinion: it holds up with the band's best songs.  Check it out if you haven't.  It's a soul music classic.

And that's the way the show was supposed to end. But Bono says "One more!" And so it was that they launched into "Out Of Control." A song I've always loved and have never seen them perform in the 26 years I've been attending U2 concerts. It's amazing that they are still surprising me after all that time, both with old classics and with their ability to continuously add to their catalog, already bursting at the seam with an embarrassment of riches.

(a few other notes: the show was opened by Interpol, a very Joy Division sounding band, who are no match for Muse, who opened last time. The top photo here was taken by my lovely wife, and the second photo is by my dear friend Ashmi, follow her on Twitter.)

MY FAVORITE JULY 4TH SONG - BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN "AMERICAN LAND"

(this image is from Wikipedia commons, anyone is allowed to use it, so I'm using it!)

It's hard to write about America and do a good job at it.  Obviously, it's easier to rebel about things that you don't like than it is to celebrate America, and that's often the rub with art. Rebelling is easier than celebrating. But I think that July 4 is a good time to be thankful to live in the U.S.A., without getting too flag-wavvy about it.

In recent years, there's been a few attempts at writing what could be referred to as "The Great American Song." U2 wrote "The Hands That Built America" for Martin Scorsese's 2002 film Gangs Of New York. Good song, but not a great one.  Bruce Springsteen took a few whacks at it: "This Hard Land" from his 1995 Greatest Hits album felt like an attempt, as did "Land Of Hope And Dreams" which he started playing on the 1999 reunion tour with The E Street Band. The latter stayed in Bruce's setlists for a long time, but I didn't feel the song was as good as he seemed to think it was.

During Bruce's tour with The Seeger Sessions Band for the 2006 album We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions, he started playing a new song "American Land."  I felt he nailed it. Bono has talked about how America isn't just a place, it's an idea. I don't think the idea of America has ever been better expressed in a rock song than in "American Land." He romanticizes the idea from the perspective of immigrants ("There's diamonds in the sidewalk the's gutters lined in song/Dear I hear that beer flows through the faucets all night long/ There's treasure for the taking, for any hard working man /Who will make his home in the American Land?") in a way that can make all of us proud that we do call this place home.  It also points out that a fair immigration policy is one of the things that made us great. At the same time, he expresses some of his core values: the plight of blue collar workers ("They died building the railroads worked to bones and skin/They died in the fields and factories names scattered in the wind/They died to get here a hundred years ago they're still dyin now/The hands that built the country were always trying to keep down").  And also the fact that everyone deserves a shot, no matter their race or color ("The McNicholas, the Posalski's, the Smiths, Zerillis, too/The Blacks, the Irish, Italians, the Germans and the Jews /Come across the water a thousand miles from home/With nothin in their bellies but the fire down below").

That's why I choose the above photo for this post.  No matter what you think of The President, when Bruce was growing up, or even when *I* was growing up (I'm much younger than Bruce), the idea of an African American president seemed unlikely to say the least.  The fact that Bruce worked so hard for President Obama - who campaigned on a platform of hope and change, some of which has arguably been fulfilled - makes this photo really powerful.

Bruce has nothing to prove anymore. The fact that he still works so hard to fulfill what he sees is his responsibility to himself, his audience, and his country, is inspiring.  Like any other great artist, sometimes his reach exceeds his grasp, but on "American Land" he hit a grand slam.  It's not just a classic that stands up next to his catalog, it also stands next to Woody Gurthrie's.

("American Land" was the only song from The Seeger Sessions that Bruce played with The E Street Band, and you can see their version - played in Hyde Park, in England, here. )

TOMORROW NIGHT ON THE CATHOLIC CHANNEL: U2 "ALL THAT YOU CAN'T LEAVE BEHIND"

For those of you who are new to No Expiration, about once a month I go on SIRIUS XM’s The Catholic Channel’s Busted Halo show to talk about music. Tune in at about 7:20 pm ET on SIRIUS channel 159 and XM channel 117. Thursday nights are “Faith & Culture Thursdays” and we usually talk about a certain artist. We've talked about Bruce Springsteen, Jimmy Cliff and even Black Sabbath before. Tonight, we're revisiting U2, who we've talked about once.

There are lots of other artists who I want to discuss on the show... so why am I going back to U2? Well, this week, Team Busted Halo is celebrating Father Dave Dwyer's ten year anniversary as a Man of The Cloth, and many of the topics that they are discussing this week are on that topic.  So, in 2000 when a (very) young Dave Dwyer was ordained -- obviously a huge transition in his life -- U2 released an album that marked a transition for them, the classic (and in my opinion, their last classic), All That You Can't Leave Behind. After the busy sounding, dark, disco-y, decadent, dense, cynical albums of the '90s (all of which, I must say, I loved), ATYCLB marked a return, musically and philosophically, to the U2 of yore, circa Unforgettable Fire, Rattle and Hum and especially The Joshua Tree. It's an album that resonates with me in a big way, a decade later, and I hope it does with you as well.  It meant a lot to me the day it came out, and seemed eerily prescient post-9/11.

I'll "dedicate" my appearance on this show to my good friend, fellow U2 fan, singer-songwriter and documentary maker, Benjamin Wagner, who will become a Dad any day now (to clarify, He will be A Father Named Ben, but not "Father Ben") .  He's gone through some decadence in his day too. But if there's anything in these dark days to inspire optimism, it's the fact that such a great guy and his lovely wife are bringing a new life to this troubled planet. Or as Bono might say, an "original of the species." While I'm on the "shout out tip," I'll also send this one out to Bono himself: as most people now know, U2 is postponing their US tour to 2011 due to Bono's back surgery. As (I thnk) Questlove once said, I'd rather have it right than right now. I want Bono to be at 100% when I see U2! Anyway, this should give Ben and Abbi time to book a babysitter!

U2 TO RELEASE "360" DVD

U2 announced that they are releasing a DVD from their current tour, 360 At The Rose Bowl. Supposedly there were 97,000 people at the concert, which was streamed live on YouTube where 10 million people watched it over about a week.

I saw the tour, and as always, it was awesome. I have tickets to see them next time they return to NJ (unfortunately with Interpol opening, I doubt they will be anywhere as good as Muse).

Find out more about the DVD at U2.com.

U2 NAMES OPENING ACTS FOR SUMMER TOUR

Unfortunately, those acts are Lenny Kravitz, Interpol and The Fray. Actually, Lenny Kravitz is pretty good live, I've seen him once or twice. Interpol, I think I saw them open for The Pixies, I can't even remember, and The Fray, I've never seen them.  I guess it would be hard to follow up having Muse open for them. U2 have had some pretty great opening acts over the years: I saw Primus, PJ Harvey and No Doubt open also, I usually like the bands that they choose.

LARRY MULLEN (SLIGHTLY) ONE-UPS BONO AND THE EDGE

I'm not a big fan of the Seth McFarlane TV shows: Family Guy, American Dad or The Cleveland Show. I watched the first two minutes of the first episode of Family Guy and thought it was a Simpsons knock off. I realize that that isn't totally the case, and a lot of people who I respect watch it, but it just isn't my thing, and neither or his other shows.

But I may have to check out The Cleveland Show: Larry Mullen has recorded two seperate characters for upcoming episodes: a mobster and a bad Elvis impersonator. Apparently, he is such a big fan that he reached out and asked to be involved. The BBC reports that besides Mullen, Kanye West, Will.I.Am and David Lynch (!) have also recorded guest spots for the show.

So, even though I'm not a huge Cleveland Show fan, it sure beats the Spider-Man musical that Bono and The Edge are involved with!

THIS MORNING ON OUTQ: OSCAR MUSIC

As per my last post, this morning on OutQ, I'll be talking about songs that have been nominated for Oscars this year, by Ryan Bingham, Randy Newman and others. I'm also bringing some songs from films that were not nominated, including songs by Paul McCartney, U2, Mary J. Blige and Jack White.

DOWNLOAD TO DONATE FOR HAITI

By now, everyone knows that you can download all the performances from Friday night's Hope For Haiti telethon on iTunes. There were truly great performances by Bruce Springsteen ("We Shall Overcome" with members of The Sessions Band, all of whom were on the last E Street Band tour as well), Stevie Wonder ("A Time To Love" which went inot Simon & Garfunkel's "Bridge Over Troubled Water"), Sting (The Police's "Driven To Tears"), Justin Timberlake (Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah") and Dave Matthews and Neil Young (Hank Williams' "Alone and Foresaken"). But the two best performances of the night were by Mary J. Blige ("Hard Times") and Jennifer Hudson ("Let It Be"). It also includes the collaboration between Jay-Z, Rihanna, Bono and The Edge ("Stranded") written just for the occasion.

I've also mentioned that you can get Eddie Vedder's cover of Bruce Springsteen's "My City Of Ruins" from The Kennedy Center Honors ceremony on iTunes which also raises money for Haiti. Rihanna performed "Redemption Song" on Oprah this week, that's also at iTunes.

There's also this online album, Download To Donate For Haiti. It features songs by Peter Gabriel (his cover of David Bowie's "Heroes" from his upcoming album Scratch My Back), a song by Slash with Beth Hart (she had a hit in 2000 with "L.A. Song," she still does her thing and has also toured as Jeff Beck's singer), The Dave Matthews Band and Alanis Morissette, as well as Linkin Park, The All-American Rejects and a few others. Find out more at Music For Relief. And you can donate more here.

I HOPE RYAN BINGHAM WINS A GOLDEN GLOBE TONIGHT

Yes, two of my favorite artists ever are up for the "Best Original Song - Motiton Picture" Golden Globe tonight, U2 and Paul McCartney. I've heard U2's song "Winter" from Brothers, it was cool. I really liked Paul's "I Want To Come Home" from Everybody's Fine. But I would really love to see Ryan Bingham's "The Weary Kind" from Crazy Heart win. I haven't seen the other two films, and "The Weary Kind" is pretty central to Crazy Heart. Also, Ryan is a great artist (you can hear him on SIRIUS XM Outlaw Country) who would get a big career boost from the award.

I won't be watching the Globes - 24 debuts tonight! Also, the Globes are kind of bogus.  As opposed to the Oscars, which are voted on by over 6000 people (making it difficult to "campaign"), the Globes have 82 voters, and their only criteria for maintaining voting status is to have two articles a year published.  It could be in the smallest publication. Plus, with that few voters, lots of movie stars are able to effectively campaign. There are often events where a movie star will pose for photos with all of the voters. These are probably the types of people who feel "completed" by the presence of celebs, and I'm sure that's an effective method of getting people to vote for you.  Read more about it here.

Anyway, this past week, Ryan Bingham came to perform on Mojo Nixon 's show on Outlaw Country, here's his performance of "The Weary Kind." Stunning.

The 82 voting members of this organization (the Academy has 6000) have had their credentials challenged year after year. Very few members are full-time journalists. The skinny is that they’re in it for the parties and the movie stars and, of course, the annual network TV show which nets them a tasty $6 million.

SPIDER-MAN UPDATE

The Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark official website (for those of you who don't know, this is the Broadway production featuring music by Bono and The Edge that is the bane of my existance and probably Larry Mullen's as well) says that the show starts previews on February 25. But Alan Cummings, who was so great as Nightcrawler in X-Men 2 and who is playing The Green Goblin in this mess, tells The New York Times that that is not the case. You want to see a cool music production on Broadway? Try Fela, about the life of Fela Kuti, or the upcoming Green Day inspired American Idiot. I say this as a huge U2 fan, this Spider-Man thing is just corny!

BEST OF THE 00's: GREEN DAY

In the '90s, I liked Green Day, but found them a bit overexposed and annoying. I became a fan at the exact moment where it seemed that people had lost interest: their 2000 album, Warning. I saw the video for "Minority" (which inspired my posting name on this very blog) and I was sold. Even if you are white, suburban and middle class, you can feel like you don't fit in, and "Minority" is all about that. Warning had some other great songs, like "Warning" (although how they avoided getting the crap sued out of them by The Kinks - the song sounds exactly like "Picture Book" - I don't know).

I saw them on that tour - they had scaled down from arenas to large theaters and it was a bit more intimate.  There were probably less fair weather fans at the show, it was great. But after that, they went on a "co-headlining" tour with blink-182, who had clearly copped some of their schtick from Green Day, and did it in a more safe and less punk way. Green Day played before blink. Green Day seemed to be going the way of lots of other Lollapalooza vets: even though they were just in their thirties, they were going to be '90s nostalgia.

And then: American Idiot.

In a democracy, questioning your government is a duty, and even a patriotic one if you do it without malice. American Idiot, recorded and released during bush's reign, is an against-all-odds classic. In the age where no one was making very political statements, it was a big one. In an era where "the album" was dead, it was a concept album in the spirit of Tommy. And when very few rock bands were getting hit singles, American Idiot was all over the radio. The tour started out in clubs and ended in stadiums.  Green Day was the most relevant band in the land. The band who used to sing about being stoned and being bored. They ended up collaborating with no less than U2 (on "The Saints Are Coming") and with The Simpsons (covering the show's theme for the film, which they appeared in, animated style).

Following it up must have been a bitch, so the band came up with a new identity, The Foxboro Hot Tubs and released my favorite album of 2008, Stop Drop and Roll, a classic garage rock album.

21st Century Breakdown has been one of my favorite rock albums of 2009, although something of a letdown after American Idiot and The Foxboro Hot Tubs. Still, this is a band that will remain relevant for years to come.

BEST ROCK ALBUM? GREEN DAY OR U2?

No Expiration is a NARAS member and Grammy voter, and this weekend, I've spent time on my ballot. One category I'm stuck in is Best Rock Album. My favorite albums that would be considered for this category were unsuprisingly not nominated: The Cocktail Slippers' Saint Valentine's Day Massacre, Rancid's Let The Dominioes Fall, The Dead Weather's Horehound and Muse's The Resistance. 

The nominees in the category, though, are AC/DC's Black Ice, Eric Clapton & Steve Winwood's Live From Madison Square Garden (which is disqualified from my ballot, many of the songs on the album are as old as I am, and some are older, you can't compare albums that came out this year to Blind Faith and Traffic), The Dave Matthews Band's Big Whiskey and the Groogrux King, Green Day's 21st Century Breakdown and U2 's No Line On The Horizon.

So, Clapton/Winwood is disqualified. While I respect DMB, I'm not a huge fan and their album didn't seem to make any kind of impact. I really dig Black Ice, but I really think the best of the bunch are the Green Day and U2 albums.

Green Day's album was a bit disappointing to me: it comes on the heels of my favorite album of 2008, Foxboro Hot Tubs' Stop Drop and Roll (Foxboro Hot Tubs are actually Green Day playing old school garage rock). And before that was Green Day's greatest album, American Idiot. But there are a lot of classics here, I love "Know Your Enemy," "21st Century Breakdown," "Peacemaker," "21 Guns" and especially "Horseshoes and Hand Grenades" which sounds like a Foxboro Hot Tubs song.

U2's album, as always comes with huge expectations, and at first I felt a bit let down. It has definitely been growing on me, and I now realize that "Moment Of Surrender" is one of their greatest songs. And there are other great songs: "No Line On The Horizon," "Magnificent," "Breathe," "Stand Up Comedy" and "White As Snow." One of the problems with the album is that they led off with a kind of weak single, "Get On Your Boots," which was like a second rate version of "Vertigo." And their performance at last year's Grammy Awards wasn't great (the live version they've been doing on tour is much better), and the second single, "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" is also weak (the "remix" version that they were playing live was also better).

Tough decision: but a few years ago when I was doing interviews for VH1 at the 2004 Grammys, Bono himself told me that he was glad that they had won a bunch of Grammys (for "Vertigo") but that U2 would gladly step out of the way for another band -- he mentioned Green Day -- to get more acclaim.  There's room for everyone of course. Hmm, this is gonna be a touch choice.

BEST OF THE '00s: U2

At the start of the '00s, U2 were in a weird place.  In the early '90s, they reinvented themselves in as radical a way as any other rock band ever had. Going from the Americana-influenced ernestness of Joshua Tree and Rattle & Hum, they returned as jaded techno-fuelled rock stars who didn't take much seriously with Achthung Baby. On paper, it would seen like a disaster, but as we all know, it worked incredibly well.  (For a pretty amazing analysis of the album, check out the 33 1/3 series book that features the album).

Some may argue that they took that approach too far on Zooropa and especially Pop. Actually, I felt that Pop was a bit misunderstood: the lyrical matter of the album is actually pretty heavy, it's just that they led with the single "Discotheque" and the tour was kind of a kitch-fest.  Moving in the millenium (everyone used to use that word all the time), they stripped down and went back to basics.

Actually, before they released their new album, they did a few new songs on the soundtrack to The Million Dollar Hotel, which was produced by Bono (and who did a few solo tracks on it). That film was a bit of a mess, and was Bono's first and last real foray as a filmmaker (unfortunately it didn't deter him from being involved in what may be Broadway's biggest ever flop, Spider-Man). The songs were stripped down and a good sign of where the band was going.

When they released All That You Can't Leave Behind in 2000, they were back. Four classic singles, "Beautiful Day," "Walk On," "Elevation" and "Stuck In A Moment That You Can't Get Out Of." Plus great album tracks like "Kite" and "In A Little While." It was a classic. When they hit the road, it was on a simple stage, with a heart-shaped track that went into the audience, allowing some fans to actually watch the show from inside the stage. After 9/11, they seemed to be one of the only bands, if not the only band, that mattered. Their performance of "Walk On" at the America: A Tribute To Heroes telethon was classic, and their halftime show at the Super Bowl that year was the best ever.

The follow-up, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, wasn't quite so powerful, but was still a great album, and "Vertigo" was an undeniably great single. And "Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own," which Bono wrote for his father, was one of their most emotional moments. There was another great tour, which was shot for the concert film U23D. That era also saw two cool U2 collaborations: they recorded an incredible version of their classic "One" with Mary J. Blige, and also with Green Day on a cover of punk rock band The Skids' "The Saints Are Coming" (which they performed at the New Orleans Saints' first game back in New Orleans aftre Katrina). They also did a great cover of John Lennon's Instant Karma for a Lennon tribute by the same name (a benefit for Amnesty International), a single released only in Ireland and featuring lots of Irish stars, "The Ballad Of Ronnie Drew." And they did a great Christmas single, a cover of Greg Lake's "I Believe In Father Christmas."

Their latest album, No Line On The Horizon, is good but not great - but the tour has been mindblowing. And U2 are one of the only bands -- if not the only band -- who I feel like can still crank out a classic after more than thirty years together.  I think they've been disappointed by their favorite bands, and they don't want to be the band that does that. On the other hand, as Neil Young sings in "Thrasher," "they had the best selection, they were poisoned by protection," and when you have multiple homes, millions in the band, etc., it's hard to grab that hunger that you sometimes need to create a classic. It's even harder when you are in a band (as opposed to a solo artist).

Some people have a problem with rock stars as activists: I don't. I respect Bono for being involved in the One campaign or Project (Red), or The Edge 's involvement in Music Rising. I think it is a logical extension of the music, and  I also think it fuels them in some way.  I mean, if all you do is make music and enjoy your millions, I don't know if you still have that fire. At least with U2, they have the audacity (of hope?) to try and make the world a better place through their music. Not many bands still do that - and not many bands still can.

More Best Of The '00s: Bob Dylan
Willie Nelson
Aimee Mann
Jeff Tweedy
David Johansen
Levon Helm
The Beatles
Jim James

PAUL MCCARTNEY AND U2 GET GOLDEN GLOBE NODS

Earlier this week, the semi-bogus but semi-legit movie awards, The Golden Globes, announced the nominees for this year's ceremony (although on the music tip, The Globes rightly awarded Bruce Springsteen's "The Wrestler" with a trophy last year, while The Oscars didn't even nominate him).

This year's Golden Globe nominees include a U2 song that I hadn't even heard of: "Winter," from the film Brothers.  Also on the ballot is Paul McCartney's "I Want To Come Home" from Everybody's Fine. And finally, a song written by O Brother music supervisor (and awesome producer) T-Bone Burnett and singer-songwriter Ryan Bingham, "The Weary Kind," from Crazy Heart. That song is performed in the film by the star, Jeff Bridges (aka "The Dude") who apparently plays a Kristofferson/Jennings type character. So far, I've heard U2's song which is nice but didn't knock me out, and Paul's song which I really do like. I haven't heard the Crazy Heart song, but I am definitely going to see that movie, and I can't wait.

In honor of U2 and Sir Paul being nominated, here's a video of them together from Live8, performing "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band."