Zooropa - U2 (1993)

Ideated from: a favorite album that starts with “Z”.

It was inevitable that I’d eventually get around to writing up U2. I have a difficult relationship with U2. I was a super-fan in the late 80s and all through the 90s. I loved that they were basically music nerds, exploring their own evolving interests even while they had the attention of the whole world. They were willing to make missteps and learn from them. Then, somewhere at the turn of the century, things changed. Now I know I changed and that’s part of it. But also U2 lost track of the fact that the slick pop sound they’d been doing had originally been ironic comment on aging rock stars, and now they were just actual aging rock stars. In Bono’s terminology from the Zoo TV days, they’d mistaken the artiface for the art.

So now I think of them mostly like you might think of an ex. I can’t deny the good times we had together, but I also won’t pretend that I have the slightest interest in them today. For me, the last U2 record I really enjoyed was 1997’s Pop, and there are enough pleasant memories up through 1997 that I’m not going to be bitter about it.

Written and recorded during soundchecks and downtime while the band were travelling the world for their 2 year Zoo TV tour, Zooropa is an unconventional, disconnected record about being unconventional and disconnected. The band fused a lot of electronic and club music into their sound. There are themes that range from sci-fi to spirituality to humor, while exploring how a person might live sanely in the oncoming century.

The songs generally run where they want, and depend on the band’s skills (and Eno, Lanois, and Flood’s production expertise) to keep them contained.

The results are weird, but undeniably catchy and… maybe not exactly thought-provoking, but at least not your typical pop love songs.

Tracks I Liked

Numb - Vocals by guitarist The Edge. Brilliant on so many levels.

Some Days Are Better Than Others - a fun, poppy little package, with Bono’s knack for selling cheesy lyrics as profound

Dirty Day - a grim, nasty little tune evoking Charles Bukowski and the confusion of being alive.