A rock band setting out to prove it’s not pretentious is a little like former President Richard Nixon declaring “I am not a crook” — the harder you protest, the tougher it is to shake the charge.
For U2, a band whose reputation has been based as much on lofty principles as it has been on its ringing guitar chords, the attempt to reduce the pretension level as both musicians and personalities is at the crux of their latest album, Achtung Baby, and on the concert tour that came to Nassau Coliseum Monday night. It was a grand success. Though the show was elaborately conceived, it was often a high-spirited, self-deprecating funfest.
U2 has learned to put across its messages with a graceful touch, and the stage set was an integral part of the presentation. Artistically customized Trabants (tiny East German automobiles that the band became fond of while recording much of Achtung Baby in Berlin) were hung around the stage. There was a clear subtext of AIDS awareness — the automobiles were painted by Catherine Owens in the form of homages to other artists, like Keith Haring and artist/AIDS activist David Wojnarowicz — and the design was beautiful.
Video monitors were scattered around the stage as well as other parts of the arena. While Bono sang the opening song, “Zoo Station,” words and phrases flashed by on the screens, inspired by the work of visual artist/sloganeer Jenny Holzer. There were flashing, seemingly unconnected words like Rampant Pig Wife Phlegm Individual Urge Illness School, and aphorisms like “Cry More Often” and “Ambition Bites The Nail of Success,” and “Watch More TV.” The effect though amusing in an enigmatic way, was overfamiliar: Laurie Anderson writing fortune cookies.
Bono, the once-aloof and drab-seeming frontman, displayed a new, playful attitude towards fashion; his garb became increasingly theatrical as the night wore on. He began the show wearing sleek black sunglasses and a designer black leather suit, James Dean meets Armani. Later, the band proceeded down a runway to small auxiliary stage about 30 rows into the audience. As U2 performed an acoustic version of “Angel of Harlem,” from its ambitious 1988 album Rattle and Hum, Bono wore a sequined smoking jacket in the mode of a Vegas rocker. But musically, U2 conveyed the earnest nonchalance of street musicians. The audience got the drift, as some tossed coins at their feet.
Musically, the concert was notable for the absence of the kind of anthems that made U2 rock’s most polemical marching band. There was no “I Will Follow,” no “New Year’s Day,” no “Sunday Bloody Sunday.” Some of the familiar rousers from the recent past, which were included in the second part of the show, were stripped of their anthem-like quality. “Where the Streets Have No Name” was performed with such a fierce, driving bottom that it sounded like an industrial club mix. “With or Without You” was sung with the surging dramatic tone that Elvis Presley brought to “Suspicious Minds” — a touch underscored once again by Bono’s outfit, which was now a silver lam� suit.
The first part of the concert was dominated by material from Achtung Baby, which sounds more spirited and direct than it does on the album. “Even Better Than the Real Thing” featured the stun-gun buzz of The Edge’s lead guitar, while “Mysterious Ways,” accompanied by cutting sheaths of laser lights, had a special vibrancy.
Bono dedicated “One,” from the new album, to the Russian cosmonaut who has been in orbit so long that he no longer has a home country. (Bono said the band had attempted to contact the cosmonaut by satellite during a performance in Florida last week.) “One” had such a grandiose orchestral feel that it sounded like a Phil Spector production. It seemed evident that Bono, the Edge, bassist Adam Clayton and drummer Larry Mullen were being aided by some kind of supplementary tracks.
If Achtung Baby signals a refinement of U2’s gestalt — or maybe a reduction of the weltschmerz in their zeitgeist — the proof was “Tryin’ to Throw Your Arms Around the World.” Once, the song would imply the range and ambitions of U2’s crusading spirit. The song, bassist Clayton said from the stage, is about a guy who comes home from a night of carousing too inebriated to fit his key into the lock.
One of the aphorisms on the screen earlier read “Rock and roll is entertainment,” and U2 is now totally down with the program. They seem to have learned that rock and roll can deal with issues without being ponderous; that it can be pleasurable without being mindless. It seems to have taken the singer, in particular, a while to lighten up and stop taking rock stardom so seriously. You could even call that cheerful guy onstage sunny Bono.
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