Under A Blood Red Sky
Live At Red Rocks
Review
The Setting
Recorded in Red Rocks Ampitheater, a medium-sized outdoor
stage carved into the mountains just outside Denver, this video
documents U2 in their early years, just after they began to gain
popularity in the US with the realease of their 1983 album, War.
The filming of this concert was almost ruined by a rainy day
at Red Rocks. The entire concert was a very wet and steamy
affair: wet fans, wet cameras, wet band members. It makes for a
very atypical concert video.
The Band
The whole band is in typical 80's garb. Bono is wearing tight
black jeans (the screaming female fans in the front rows seem to
approve) and a pair of leather boots. Larry, true to form, is
dressed conservatively and looks very much like the Larry of the
90's. Adam, whose look changes even more often than Bono's, plays
the role of the nondescript bass player. Edge sports what I think
is one of his best looks: a red and black plaid sleeveless vest,
a white t-shirt, and no hat! And let's not forget that black
fender stratocaster with a black pick-guard and a maple neck and
finger-board. The shot from Larry's perspective Edge playing to a
seething mass of wet fans is just classic.
Who Will Like It?
Unless you're familiar with the songs or you're a U2 fan
looking to learn what U2 was like in the early 80's, you may be
disappointed that there are no special effects or explosions a la
ZooTV. It's just four guys playing music. Of course, as most any
diehard U2 fan will agree, that's plenty when those four guys are
Bono, Edge, Larry, and Adam.
Individual Tracks
- Edge plays slide-guitar on this one (showing the
Americans that it's not just a country music instrument).
The band takes a complex studio song and does a good job
of bringing it to the stage. It loses a little something
due to the lack of looped backing effects and such, but
all in all it's a good performance.
- Yes, it's true. Edge does indeed sing this one...at least
in the beginning. Bono takes over after the first verse
or so. On the album, Edge's voice sounds almost exactly
like Bono's, so it's difficult to tell if he hands off
the song on the Album. I think Bono takes over in concert
only because he'd have nothing to do if Edge sang the
whole song!
- A classic rendition of a classic song, U2 rips this one
out with the white flag flying high (with the help of
some over-enthusiastic audience members who Bono has to
repeatededly remind not to wave the flag). And of course,
Bono devotes some time to his standard political mid-song
speech. The audience loves it.
- A very spare rendition of a simple piece of music. It
makes for an interesting change of pace.
- Another rocker from U2's then-small set of
"popular" songs. Edge does double duty on
keyboards and guitar...and doesn't even drop a pick! What
a guy.
- I think that the band does a fantastic job with this
song. Good team-work by the band turns this lesser-known
song into a powerful number.
- The echo-box on Edge's guitar is in full effect for this
one. But it pales in comparison to the studio version, in
my opinion. Apparently U2 had not yet perfected the art
of making guitar-effects sound good in live settings.
- Otherwise known as "the number where they introduce
the band." For obvious reasons, they no longer do
this. To my ear, live performances of Gloria seem slower
than the studio track on Boy, and this one is no
exception.
- This is the lighter side of U2. It's a cutesey litte tune
played by a young band. (I'd love to see a Zoo-ified
version of this one!)
- The performance of this song is so good that it makes me
wonder if it wasn't touched up in post-production! Edge
is absolutely scorching on guitar. Of course, I'm
probably biased. This is one of my personal favorite
early U2 songs.
- A real crowd pleaser. It's the first song off their first
album, and everyone there (including the band) loves it,
it seems.
- Edge on bass!??! That's right. Apparently Adam couldn't
hack it at this stage in the game. Instead, he picks up
Edge's guitar and makes funny noises. This song was U2's
traditional closing number right up through the Joshua
Tree tour. The tradition of the audience singing after
the bad has left the stage is "subtly"
encouraged by a young Bono.
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