20 Watts

U2 are looking more and more like aging Irish Porn Stars

PREVIEW: LISTEN to U2’s “No Line on the Horizon”

Just when you thought aging, self-absorbed rock stars couldn’t be more agonizingly full of themselves as displayed in the upcoming TV special of the 25^th Annual Rock Hall of Fame Awards/concerts — U2 strikes again in destroying everything that’s halfway decent about popular Rock music by headlining England’s Glastonbury 2010 Music Festival.

Despite the poor sales of this once-great band’s most recent album No Line on the Horizon, U2 still don’t know when to quit. Since playing on top of buildings in London and causing a carefully orchestrated and televised stir earlier this year didn’t work, perhaps Bono figures that their spanking new songs will resonate with an audience whose only relation to the band is that their parents had Joshua Tree playing in the background during their conception.

In the past few decades Glastonbury has had many classic and relatively younger bands headline at the main, “Pyramid” stage. The honor to perform such a slot is one which hot bands like Radiohead and Coldplay to Arctic Monkeys and Kings of Leon have thrived on. Aged and classic acts have played as well, but not as the focus of attention. Thanks to this usual past setup, it is clear that music festivals are for the young people and their newer music — a tradition that can be traced back to Monterey and Woodstock.

One would imagine that having a stage that looks like an alien weapon from the Halo video games might have suggested Bono and company were joining their outer space brethren after their current tour; however, to many a-one’s dismay they are headed to Glasto-organizer, Michael Eavis’ Worthy Farm. Either way, perhaps this is Bono and The Edge’s final attempt to communicate with aliens through crop-circles — or perhaps just a belated reference to the remake of the crap miniseries V.

– Charlie Weeks