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All rights reserved.Zooropa - U2 (CD 1993)
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They say they want the Kingdom, but they don't want God in it...Review created: 05/26/03
by: divad23 -- a member of Epinions
Pros:
Most of the electronic tinkering and atypical songwriting pays off.
Most of the electronic tinkering and atypical songwriting pays off.
Cons:
Uneven pacing, a few lyrical duds... and <b>Johnny Cash</b>? WTF???!!!
Uneven pacing, a few lyrical duds... and <b>Johnny Cash</b>? WTF???!!!
As I arrive at my next destination in my trip backwards through the U2 canon, I feel the need to state the obvious before dissecting Zooropa - this is definitely the weirdest thing you can ever expect to hear out of U2. At least, it is if you don't count that weird Passengers project that showed up between this record and Pop. (I decided not to go there.)
Released in the middle of what many considered to be a confused decade for the band, Zooropa might never have been an album under different circumstances. From what I've gathered, the band was working on a follow-up to Achtung Baby, the record that introduced fans to their newfound love of electronic music (in small healthy doses, of course), and they came up with a number of different songs that pushed their creative limits, but were difficult to force to congeal together into an album. Most bands, when presented with an excess of such material, will choose to release an EP or an album of B-sides. But U2 decided to just arrange what they had as best they could, give the album a zany title derived from their previous song "Zoo Station" and the name "Europa" (which might refer to a moon, or more likely, to the continent of Europe, where they were spending quite a bit of their time), and hope for the best.
Needless to say, the "best" didn't quite happen. A lot of people were just plain baffled by the resulting mish-mash of songs, and to these ears, it resembled Rattle and Hum, minus the Americana influences and the live tracks, plus a good dose of whacked-out futuristic noise, plus a few of Bono's most amusingly off-kilter lyrical missteps. Some might say that they were flailing about, trying to find their identity in the midst of a generation that was tempted to forget them and move on to all manner of "alternative" bands. Some might say that they were geniuses for taking this big of a risk - and while I can certainly admire the attempt to challenge themselves, I still can't shake the feeling that at times they tried a bit too hard.
Nevertheless, we have to remember that U2 is hardly the only band to go through such a phase. The Beatles went through it before them, Radiohead went through it after them, and I'd say both of those band retained their greatness even though they probably lost a few fans in the process. The mark of a great band is often not just the willingness to experiment, but the nerve to tough it out and find solid footing even after you've abandoned your comfortable surroundings. In that regard, Zooropa is a record of U2 in the midst of that transition. Having graduated at the top of their high school class in the 80's, they had to struggle a bit to stay afloat during their first few years of college. Consider this a collection of yearbook photos from that time period - some worthy of being framed, some admirable but slightly flawed, and some that likely leave the band wishing they could track down the negatives and burn them.
Zooropa
And I have no religion
And I don't know what's what...
The album starts out with one of my biggest pet peeves about U2 - no, it's not a political rant from Bono, but rather a slow fade-in where you can barely hear anything for the first minute of the song. Aside from that, the album's title track is a great song, and an ideal mood-setter for the album - static, distant piano notes, and whispered voices build a background over which The Edge eventually chimes in with a very cool, spacey guitar part. Larry Mullen clangs around a bit on his drum kit to keep time, and when Bono shows up, his voice slightly distorted, he begins to sing the phrase "Zooropa" followed by all manner of advertising slogans, as if the song is some newfangled form of subliminal advertising. (Make that subliminable.) Somewhere near the middle of the song, the band completely changes things up, increasing the tempo and throwing in more computerized sounds. Bono's vocals get a little more passionate as he starts rambling about going "overground" and getting our heads out of the mud. Though I haven't quite discerned the meaning of the song, I know that the band was heavy into exposing the evils of commercialism (or something like that during this time), and this song may be a strange illustration of how all of the world's attempts to make you believe that buying one particular product will make you happy forever only end up drowning a person in a sea of voices and keeping them from seeking whatever it is that truly will make them happy.
Babyface
Coming home late at night to turn you on
Checking out every frame, I got slow motion on my side...
Some gentle chiming noises are the main backdrop for the album's second track - it's eerily similar to the title track on Radiohead's Kid A (there are a lot of parallels between this album and that one in terms of how both bands threw their usual approach out the window). But rather than being a lullabye about a child who isn't quite human, it's a creepy but seductive ode to a woman who isn't quite human. Perhaps she might be a real person with real thoughts and feelings to someone, but to Bono she's pretty much just a hot babe on his TV screen. And he's smitten with her, to the point where he even has her on tape so that he can capture every sexy little freeze frame. Perhaps she's a porn star, or perhaps she's just a Hollywood celebrity who believes, as most of them do, that she has to prove her worth by showing skin, but either way, it's tempting to view Bono as a very sick man when he propositions her, "Slow down, child, let me untie your lace." The Edge's guitar offers a little bit of an electric jolt to the songs chorus, and the other members of the band throw in a few playful "ba ba ba"s in the background here and there - it's the perfect portrait of how a man's desires can lead him to objectify a woman, and yet it never becomes too explicit or embarrassing to listen to.
Numb
Don't take it on board, don't fall on your sword
Just play another chord if you feel you're getting bored...
A soft programmed beat and some decidedly dissonant guitar fuzz leads off one of my favorite U2 songs of all time. This is one of those you're either going to love or hate on principle - The Edge steals the show here by being the primary songwriter and handling the lead vocal (which is little more than a bizarre spoken monotone). He makes the song purposefully repetitive to the point where it obnoxiously embeds itself in the listener's head, and all the while he lays down rules - don't do this, don't do that, don't do the other. Bono and Larry can be heard in the background, both of them attempting to squeeze through the tuneless mess with their falsetto vocals - "I feel numb, too much is not enough". It's a brilliant piece of work, with The Edge's lyrics taking on a sort of rap-like phrasing. I've heard that what he wrote may refer to how he was feeling about his role in the band at the time - just look cool and play your guitar, but don't try to think or change the way Bono wants to do things. Can't say if that's really true, but if Bono really was running most of the show up to this point, then I have to say it was cool of him to step back and let The Edge churn out the most unorthodox entry in U2's catalogue of hits. (The electronic squirming noise at the end is a nice touch, too - apparently it was the sound of one of the guys rewinding his walkman!)
Lemon
A man captures colour, a man likes to stare
He turns his money into light to look for her...
If "Numb" didn't try your patience enough, then this one oughta do it for you - it's nearly seven minutes of unfiltered dance pop music, with Bono doing his best Prince/Michael Jakson impression throughout the whole thing. It sounded incredibly bizarre to me at first, but once you get past the purposefully dated production and the obnoxious falsetto (man, his vocal cords must've hurt after he finished this one!), you'll find one of U2's most brilliant and mystifying compositions underneath. It seems to be a song about how a man will stop at nothing to find satisfaction in being with the woman he loves (or at least lusts after). Time, money, sanity... these things are of no concern as long as that goal is achieved. It may sound clich , but the way it's phrased makes it sound a lot more noble than it really is - Bono gets in some good (if seemingly unrelated one-liners) here, such as "Midnight is where the day begins". I've heard that the title was inspired by Bono's mother (he seemed to be fixated on her during this era of U2's history), who wore a lemon-colored dress at her wedding. However, I secretly suspect that it also had something to do with Bono waking up sucking on a lemon. (Hey, what's good enough for Thom Yorke is good enough for Bono, right?)
Stay (Faraway, So Close!)
You say when he hits you, you don't mind
Because when he hurts you, you feel alive
Is that what it is?
This song is far and away (pun intended) the most accessible song on the record - the mid-tempo drum-and-guitar intro sounds almost boring after the weird songs that preceded it. Of course, there's a reason for this - the band had written a song for the Wim Wenders film mentioned in the song's subtitle, and like many bands do when they have a good soundtrack song, they decided to just stick it one the album. Knowing that may reinforce the belief that Zooropa is little more than a glorified B-sides disc, but with B-sides good enough to be A-sides (for the most part), I ain't gonna complain. Once again, the song is focused around a woman, but this time around she's a woman who has been used and abused by her husband/lover and is afraid to leave. Bono describes her from the point of view of an innocent bystander - someone either shopping or working at the local 7-11 at some ungodly hour of the morning who notices her stopping in for a pack of cigarettes (even though he knows she doesn't smoke). He makes the sad observation that "you could lip synch to the talk shows", and eventually begins to express a desire for her to ditch her loser boyfriend and run away with him to somewhere safe. While the song is one of U2's more subdued hits, and it arguably wouldn't have been as popular if not for the lack of other "radio-friendly" tunes to release from this album, I think it holds its own as a U2 classic simply to the excellent lyrics. The ending is ingenious - Bono depicts her as an angel hitting the ground, and then a crash of the cymbals, and an unresolved silence.
Daddy's Gonna Pay for Your Crashed Car
You've got a head full of traffic, you're a siren's song
You cry for mama, and daddy's right along...
U2 seems to have a penchant for long song titles, but that's about the only U2 tradition upheld on this ridiculously weird song. Seriously, this one trumps everything we've heard on the album so far in terms of strangeness - it opens with a snippet of classical music which collides headlong with a restless, clanging electronic beat a la Nine Inch Nails. In some ways, it's the perfect foreshadowing for the refined techno-rock approach the band would take on Pop. The lyrics seem to describe an irresponsible teenager who has done what all parents dread their kids will do at age 16 - he/she has taken daddy's car out and totaled it. As the title would imply, though, the father simply spoils the child instead of grounding him/her for life. While a lot of U2 fans who were Christians had likely written the band off by this point, the song actually seems to carry an interesting analogy about the concept of grace, how God has entrusted us with so much and we've basically screwed it up, but we don't receive the harsh condemnation that we might expect. However, if you take that analogy and apply it to every line in the song, it might make God seem a little foolish, as if God never cared to actually correct us when we totaled the proverbial car, but it's still a decently clever song even if its reach extends its grasp.
Some Days Are Better than Others
Some days you work, most days you're lazy
Some days you feel like a bit of a baby
Looking for Jesus and His mother...
A lot of U2 fans will immediately single this song out as one of the worst examples of Bono's songwriting ever. I have to admit, I actually liked it quite a bit until I started really paying attention to the lyrics, which are unintentionally humorous in their attempt to make the inane point that is already given away by the song's title. I mean, what was Bono on when he decided to compose the brilliant rhyme "Some days are slippy, other days, sloppy, some days you can't stand the sight of a puppy"? This is followed by the hilarious line "Your skin is white, but you think you're a brother, some days are better than others." Someone was desperately flipping through his rhyming dictionary is a desperate attempt to finish this one. It's a shame, really, because the music is pretty cool - very poppy, but in an unorthodox sort of away. Adam Clayton plays a groovy bass line, and some odd, Asian-sounding noises perk up the chorus quite a bit. It all makes for a song that's fun to listen to when you're not paying attention.
The First Time
I have a brother, when I'm a brother in need
I spend my whole time running, He spends His running after me...
Even though I wouldn't have exalted this song to the point where it was worthy of inclusion on The Best of 1990-2000, I will admit that the album's quietest song is a bit of a hidden gem in the U2 catalogue. It failed to make much of an impression the first few times I listened to Zooropa, mostly because it was so quiet and understated and not weird. Musically, it doesn't fit into the album very well (though few U2 songs would!), since it sounds like a subtler retread of "All I Want Is You" with gentle keyboard/synth tones in place of the strings (that would be Brian Eno's influence). But the lyrics are gripping when you really sit down and listen - Bono describes the Holy Trinity as his sister, brother and father - family members whom he has hurt and run away from - and yet, they still love him and welcome him in. Playing the role of the returning prodigal son, he is able to truly feel and understand their love for him for the first time. The verse about being given a mansion by his father, and leaving through the back door and throwing away the key, should be chilling to any Christians who understand the analogy.
Dirty Day
If you need someone to blame
Throw a rock in the air, you're bound to hit someone guilty...
This gritty little song about deceit and betrayal also takes its sweet time to fade in, but still manages to be somewhat memorable as Bono describes having a "starring role... I was the bad guy who walked out." It almost sounds like he's taken one of his political diatribes from the 80's and turned it against himself. It's hard for me to figure out how most of this song's lyrics fit together, but I like the overall mood that it sets, even if it all gets a bit muddled at times. I kind of consider this one to be a less developed precursor to the "Please" from Pop (perhaps that's partially due to both songs being second to last). A previous U2 song seems to be referenced in the repeating vocal tagline that closes out the song - "These days, days, days run away like horses over the hill" - but then, I could just be imagining things at this point.
The Wanderer
I went out there in search of experience
To taste and to touch, and to feel as much
As a man can before he repents...
Just when you thought U2 couldn't possibly catch you off-guard again comes the album's outlandish closing number, which can't seem to decide whether it wants to belong to the soundtrack for a sci-fi movie or a Western. They do a great job of not sounding like U2 here, simply because they managed to bring in country music legend Johnny Cash to sing lead vocals, and Bono can barely be heard other than the occasional backup vocal. There's no denying that Bono's fingerprints are all over the lyrics, though - his description of a toxic wasteland being patrolled by an out-of-place cowboy is rather chilling. It's unfortunate that (a) the music is nothing but a bunch of cheesy-sounding synthesizers, and (b) Jonny Cash's voice irritates the living crud out of me (sorry, Johnny, you're a classic and I respect you for your contribution to music history and all), because this song could have been one of U2's most memorable if performed as more of a style-merging duet akin to "When Love Comes to Town" and played with a few organic instruments in the mix to balance out the synths, but as it stands, it's one of the most annoying songs U2 has ever recorded in the studio. When Johnny stops singing and begins talking in the middle of the song, it's not dramatic, it's just plain silly, and it really hurts what should be some of the most effective lyrics in the song. I guess I'd rather just read this one than listen to it.
As if to add insult to injury, U2 went ahead and added on a "hidden track", because that's what everyone was starting to do around that time, but it's nothing more than a siren that goes off for a few seconds, and then the CD ends. I guess they wanted to try out a bit of "British humor" there, even though they're Irish. Whatever.
While it's a shame that Zooropa is so inconsistent, I still think it contains a lot more memorable songs than your average B-sides collection, so looked at from the perspective of something that might have been little more than an odds and ends disc, the album is quite an accomplishment. On top of all that, more careful examination of that album does seem to reveal repeated themes of sin, lust, and walking away from God resulting in a good deal of chaos confusion - being lost in the sea of voices that makes up this creepy futuristic place called "Zooropa" and not being able to hear the voice of God amidst all of the impostors. That theme doesn't quite congeal as well as a similar theme manages to on Pop, but if you consider Zooropa the training ground for that album, and if you generally don't mind a band you thought you knew taking a total side trip into Weirdville, then you'll probably enjoy this album. But unless you're a die-hard U2 fan, I wouldn't recommend paying full price for it.
We'll call this one a 3.5-star album, rounded up to 4 just because they survived its aftermath and learned from their mistakes.
ALBUM WORTH:
Zooropa $1.50
Babyface $1
Numb $2
Lemon $1.50
Stay (Faraway, So Close!) $1.50
Daddy's Gonna Pay for Your Crashed Car $1
Some Days Are Better than Others $0
The First Time $.50
Dirty Day $.50
The Wanderer $.50
TOTAL: $10
Band Members:
Bono: Vocals, guitar
The Edge: Guitar, keyboards, vocals
Adam Clayton: Bass
Larry Mullen, Jr.: Drums, percussion
Website: http://www.u2.com
Released in the middle of what many considered to be a confused decade for the band, Zooropa might never have been an album under different circumstances. From what I've gathered, the band was working on a follow-up to Achtung Baby, the record that introduced fans to their newfound love of electronic music (in small healthy doses, of course), and they came up with a number of different songs that pushed their creative limits, but were difficult to force to congeal together into an album. Most bands, when presented with an excess of such material, will choose to release an EP or an album of B-sides. But U2 decided to just arrange what they had as best they could, give the album a zany title derived from their previous song "Zoo Station" and the name "Europa" (which might refer to a moon, or more likely, to the continent of Europe, where they were spending quite a bit of their time), and hope for the best.
Needless to say, the "best" didn't quite happen. A lot of people were just plain baffled by the resulting mish-mash of songs, and to these ears, it resembled Rattle and Hum, minus the Americana influences and the live tracks, plus a good dose of whacked-out futuristic noise, plus a few of Bono's most amusingly off-kilter lyrical missteps. Some might say that they were flailing about, trying to find their identity in the midst of a generation that was tempted to forget them and move on to all manner of "alternative" bands. Some might say that they were geniuses for taking this big of a risk - and while I can certainly admire the attempt to challenge themselves, I still can't shake the feeling that at times they tried a bit too hard.
Nevertheless, we have to remember that U2 is hardly the only band to go through such a phase. The Beatles went through it before them, Radiohead went through it after them, and I'd say both of those band retained their greatness even though they probably lost a few fans in the process. The mark of a great band is often not just the willingness to experiment, but the nerve to tough it out and find solid footing even after you've abandoned your comfortable surroundings. In that regard, Zooropa is a record of U2 in the midst of that transition. Having graduated at the top of their high school class in the 80's, they had to struggle a bit to stay afloat during their first few years of college. Consider this a collection of yearbook photos from that time period - some worthy of being framed, some admirable but slightly flawed, and some that likely leave the band wishing they could track down the negatives and burn them.
Zooropa
And I have no religion
And I don't know what's what...
The album starts out with one of my biggest pet peeves about U2 - no, it's not a political rant from Bono, but rather a slow fade-in where you can barely hear anything for the first minute of the song. Aside from that, the album's title track is a great song, and an ideal mood-setter for the album - static, distant piano notes, and whispered voices build a background over which The Edge eventually chimes in with a very cool, spacey guitar part. Larry Mullen clangs around a bit on his drum kit to keep time, and when Bono shows up, his voice slightly distorted, he begins to sing the phrase "Zooropa" followed by all manner of advertising slogans, as if the song is some newfangled form of subliminal advertising. (Make that subliminable.) Somewhere near the middle of the song, the band completely changes things up, increasing the tempo and throwing in more computerized sounds. Bono's vocals get a little more passionate as he starts rambling about going "overground" and getting our heads out of the mud. Though I haven't quite discerned the meaning of the song, I know that the band was heavy into exposing the evils of commercialism (or something like that during this time), and this song may be a strange illustration of how all of the world's attempts to make you believe that buying one particular product will make you happy forever only end up drowning a person in a sea of voices and keeping them from seeking whatever it is that truly will make them happy.
Babyface
Coming home late at night to turn you on
Checking out every frame, I got slow motion on my side...
Some gentle chiming noises are the main backdrop for the album's second track - it's eerily similar to the title track on Radiohead's Kid A (there are a lot of parallels between this album and that one in terms of how both bands threw their usual approach out the window). But rather than being a lullabye about a child who isn't quite human, it's a creepy but seductive ode to a woman who isn't quite human. Perhaps she might be a real person with real thoughts and feelings to someone, but to Bono she's pretty much just a hot babe on his TV screen. And he's smitten with her, to the point where he even has her on tape so that he can capture every sexy little freeze frame. Perhaps she's a porn star, or perhaps she's just a Hollywood celebrity who believes, as most of them do, that she has to prove her worth by showing skin, but either way, it's tempting to view Bono as a very sick man when he propositions her, "Slow down, child, let me untie your lace." The Edge's guitar offers a little bit of an electric jolt to the songs chorus, and the other members of the band throw in a few playful "ba ba ba"s in the background here and there - it's the perfect portrait of how a man's desires can lead him to objectify a woman, and yet it never becomes too explicit or embarrassing to listen to.
Numb
Don't take it on board, don't fall on your sword
Just play another chord if you feel you're getting bored...
A soft programmed beat and some decidedly dissonant guitar fuzz leads off one of my favorite U2 songs of all time. This is one of those you're either going to love or hate on principle - The Edge steals the show here by being the primary songwriter and handling the lead vocal (which is little more than a bizarre spoken monotone). He makes the song purposefully repetitive to the point where it obnoxiously embeds itself in the listener's head, and all the while he lays down rules - don't do this, don't do that, don't do the other. Bono and Larry can be heard in the background, both of them attempting to squeeze through the tuneless mess with their falsetto vocals - "I feel numb, too much is not enough". It's a brilliant piece of work, with The Edge's lyrics taking on a sort of rap-like phrasing. I've heard that what he wrote may refer to how he was feeling about his role in the band at the time - just look cool and play your guitar, but don't try to think or change the way Bono wants to do things. Can't say if that's really true, but if Bono really was running most of the show up to this point, then I have to say it was cool of him to step back and let The Edge churn out the most unorthodox entry in U2's catalogue of hits. (The electronic squirming noise at the end is a nice touch, too - apparently it was the sound of one of the guys rewinding his walkman!)
Lemon
A man captures colour, a man likes to stare
He turns his money into light to look for her...
If "Numb" didn't try your patience enough, then this one oughta do it for you - it's nearly seven minutes of unfiltered dance pop music, with Bono doing his best Prince/Michael Jakson impression throughout the whole thing. It sounded incredibly bizarre to me at first, but once you get past the purposefully dated production and the obnoxious falsetto (man, his vocal cords must've hurt after he finished this one!), you'll find one of U2's most brilliant and mystifying compositions underneath. It seems to be a song about how a man will stop at nothing to find satisfaction in being with the woman he loves (or at least lusts after). Time, money, sanity... these things are of no concern as long as that goal is achieved. It may sound clich , but the way it's phrased makes it sound a lot more noble than it really is - Bono gets in some good (if seemingly unrelated one-liners) here, such as "Midnight is where the day begins". I've heard that the title was inspired by Bono's mother (he seemed to be fixated on her during this era of U2's history), who wore a lemon-colored dress at her wedding. However, I secretly suspect that it also had something to do with Bono waking up sucking on a lemon. (Hey, what's good enough for Thom Yorke is good enough for Bono, right?)
Stay (Faraway, So Close!)
You say when he hits you, you don't mind
Because when he hurts you, you feel alive
Is that what it is?
This song is far and away (pun intended) the most accessible song on the record - the mid-tempo drum-and-guitar intro sounds almost boring after the weird songs that preceded it. Of course, there's a reason for this - the band had written a song for the Wim Wenders film mentioned in the song's subtitle, and like many bands do when they have a good soundtrack song, they decided to just stick it one the album. Knowing that may reinforce the belief that Zooropa is little more than a glorified B-sides disc, but with B-sides good enough to be A-sides (for the most part), I ain't gonna complain. Once again, the song is focused around a woman, but this time around she's a woman who has been used and abused by her husband/lover and is afraid to leave. Bono describes her from the point of view of an innocent bystander - someone either shopping or working at the local 7-11 at some ungodly hour of the morning who notices her stopping in for a pack of cigarettes (even though he knows she doesn't smoke). He makes the sad observation that "you could lip synch to the talk shows", and eventually begins to express a desire for her to ditch her loser boyfriend and run away with him to somewhere safe. While the song is one of U2's more subdued hits, and it arguably wouldn't have been as popular if not for the lack of other "radio-friendly" tunes to release from this album, I think it holds its own as a U2 classic simply to the excellent lyrics. The ending is ingenious - Bono depicts her as an angel hitting the ground, and then a crash of the cymbals, and an unresolved silence.
Daddy's Gonna Pay for Your Crashed Car
You've got a head full of traffic, you're a siren's song
You cry for mama, and daddy's right along...
U2 seems to have a penchant for long song titles, but that's about the only U2 tradition upheld on this ridiculously weird song. Seriously, this one trumps everything we've heard on the album so far in terms of strangeness - it opens with a snippet of classical music which collides headlong with a restless, clanging electronic beat a la Nine Inch Nails. In some ways, it's the perfect foreshadowing for the refined techno-rock approach the band would take on Pop. The lyrics seem to describe an irresponsible teenager who has done what all parents dread their kids will do at age 16 - he/she has taken daddy's car out and totaled it. As the title would imply, though, the father simply spoils the child instead of grounding him/her for life. While a lot of U2 fans who were Christians had likely written the band off by this point, the song actually seems to carry an interesting analogy about the concept of grace, how God has entrusted us with so much and we've basically screwed it up, but we don't receive the harsh condemnation that we might expect. However, if you take that analogy and apply it to every line in the song, it might make God seem a little foolish, as if God never cared to actually correct us when we totaled the proverbial car, but it's still a decently clever song even if its reach extends its grasp.
Some Days Are Better than Others
Some days you work, most days you're lazy
Some days you feel like a bit of a baby
Looking for Jesus and His mother...
A lot of U2 fans will immediately single this song out as one of the worst examples of Bono's songwriting ever. I have to admit, I actually liked it quite a bit until I started really paying attention to the lyrics, which are unintentionally humorous in their attempt to make the inane point that is already given away by the song's title. I mean, what was Bono on when he decided to compose the brilliant rhyme "Some days are slippy, other days, sloppy, some days you can't stand the sight of a puppy"? This is followed by the hilarious line "Your skin is white, but you think you're a brother, some days are better than others." Someone was desperately flipping through his rhyming dictionary is a desperate attempt to finish this one. It's a shame, really, because the music is pretty cool - very poppy, but in an unorthodox sort of away. Adam Clayton plays a groovy bass line, and some odd, Asian-sounding noises perk up the chorus quite a bit. It all makes for a song that's fun to listen to when you're not paying attention.
The First Time
I have a brother, when I'm a brother in need
I spend my whole time running, He spends His running after me...
Even though I wouldn't have exalted this song to the point where it was worthy of inclusion on The Best of 1990-2000, I will admit that the album's quietest song is a bit of a hidden gem in the U2 catalogue. It failed to make much of an impression the first few times I listened to Zooropa, mostly because it was so quiet and understated and not weird. Musically, it doesn't fit into the album very well (though few U2 songs would!), since it sounds like a subtler retread of "All I Want Is You" with gentle keyboard/synth tones in place of the strings (that would be Brian Eno's influence). But the lyrics are gripping when you really sit down and listen - Bono describes the Holy Trinity as his sister, brother and father - family members whom he has hurt and run away from - and yet, they still love him and welcome him in. Playing the role of the returning prodigal son, he is able to truly feel and understand their love for him for the first time. The verse about being given a mansion by his father, and leaving through the back door and throwing away the key, should be chilling to any Christians who understand the analogy.
Dirty Day
If you need someone to blame
Throw a rock in the air, you're bound to hit someone guilty...
This gritty little song about deceit and betrayal also takes its sweet time to fade in, but still manages to be somewhat memorable as Bono describes having a "starring role... I was the bad guy who walked out." It almost sounds like he's taken one of his political diatribes from the 80's and turned it against himself. It's hard for me to figure out how most of this song's lyrics fit together, but I like the overall mood that it sets, even if it all gets a bit muddled at times. I kind of consider this one to be a less developed precursor to the "Please" from Pop (perhaps that's partially due to both songs being second to last). A previous U2 song seems to be referenced in the repeating vocal tagline that closes out the song - "These days, days, days run away like horses over the hill" - but then, I could just be imagining things at this point.
The Wanderer
I went out there in search of experience
To taste and to touch, and to feel as much
As a man can before he repents...
Just when you thought U2 couldn't possibly catch you off-guard again comes the album's outlandish closing number, which can't seem to decide whether it wants to belong to the soundtrack for a sci-fi movie or a Western. They do a great job of not sounding like U2 here, simply because they managed to bring in country music legend Johnny Cash to sing lead vocals, and Bono can barely be heard other than the occasional backup vocal. There's no denying that Bono's fingerprints are all over the lyrics, though - his description of a toxic wasteland being patrolled by an out-of-place cowboy is rather chilling. It's unfortunate that (a) the music is nothing but a bunch of cheesy-sounding synthesizers, and (b) Jonny Cash's voice irritates the living crud out of me (sorry, Johnny, you're a classic and I respect you for your contribution to music history and all), because this song could have been one of U2's most memorable if performed as more of a style-merging duet akin to "When Love Comes to Town" and played with a few organic instruments in the mix to balance out the synths, but as it stands, it's one of the most annoying songs U2 has ever recorded in the studio. When Johnny stops singing and begins talking in the middle of the song, it's not dramatic, it's just plain silly, and it really hurts what should be some of the most effective lyrics in the song. I guess I'd rather just read this one than listen to it.
As if to add insult to injury, U2 went ahead and added on a "hidden track", because that's what everyone was starting to do around that time, but it's nothing more than a siren that goes off for a few seconds, and then the CD ends. I guess they wanted to try out a bit of "British humor" there, even though they're Irish. Whatever.
While it's a shame that Zooropa is so inconsistent, I still think it contains a lot more memorable songs than your average B-sides collection, so looked at from the perspective of something that might have been little more than an odds and ends disc, the album is quite an accomplishment. On top of all that, more careful examination of that album does seem to reveal repeated themes of sin, lust, and walking away from God resulting in a good deal of chaos confusion - being lost in the sea of voices that makes up this creepy futuristic place called "Zooropa" and not being able to hear the voice of God amidst all of the impostors. That theme doesn't quite congeal as well as a similar theme manages to on Pop, but if you consider Zooropa the training ground for that album, and if you generally don't mind a band you thought you knew taking a total side trip into Weirdville, then you'll probably enjoy this album. But unless you're a die-hard U2 fan, I wouldn't recommend paying full price for it.
We'll call this one a 3.5-star album, rounded up to 4 just because they survived its aftermath and learned from their mistakes.
ALBUM WORTH:
Zooropa $1.50
Babyface $1
Numb $2
Lemon $1.50
Stay (Faraway, So Close!) $1.50
Daddy's Gonna Pay for Your Crashed Car $1
Some Days Are Better than Others $0
The First Time $.50
Dirty Day $.50
The Wanderer $.50
TOTAL: $10
Band Members:
Bono: Vocals, guitar
The Edge: Guitar, keyboards, vocals
Adam Clayton: Bass
Larry Mullen, Jr.: Drums, percussion
Website: http://www.u2.com
Review ID: 10000000000236643
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