Innocence + Experience Dublin 3

From local papers to international magazines, the sentiment has been unanimous: The Innocence + Experience tour has been mind-blowing.
For me and others in the family, it's always a special event and always reignites my love for the songs.

The determination to get the tour to the smaller arena in Dublin can be compared to getting PopMart to Sarajevo: Pull out all the stops to make it happen. I’m not sure how many rock groups feel that strongly, valuing their audience with as much reverence and respect as we give them. It’s a bond that few understand. It defies explanation, as does the idea of showing Cedarwood Road to the world. Simply amazing, the best Friday of the year! 

Bono and David Bowie

"People would not react if I went out and carried on like Elvis Presley or Mick Jagger or David Bowie. People do react if I go out and carry on like Bono. And I like that."

-Bono

And as Bono might say auf Deutsch:

 

"Es sind meine Teenager-Jahre als Bowie-Fan. Ich bin noch immer ein Fan, war aber damals in Herz und Kopf noch erheblich empfänglicher. Und jeder dieser Songs hatte eine unmittelbare Wirkung. U2 schulden ihm viel. Er machte uns mit Berlin und den Hansa-Studios bekannt, er ist der Auslöser dafür, dass wir mit Brian Eno arbeiten. Von ihm stammt die Freiheit, in hohen Lagen zu singen und so der „männlichen“ Stimme eine weibliche Nuance zu geben. Und nicht zuletzt ist da die ästhetische Überhöhung – der Versuch, auf der Bühne neue Wege zu gehen. Bowie hatte keine Angst, in neuen Größenordnungen zu denken und Drama auf die Bühne zu bringen." 

Ich sah ihn zum ersten Mal, als er bei „Top of the Pops“ diese Nummer sang. Es war so, als wäre eine fremde Kreatur vom Himmel gefallen. Die Amerikaner schickten einen Mann zum Mond – wir hatten einen Engländer aus der Tiefe des Raumes. Und obendrein hatte er noch eine irische Großmutter.

 

First Sunday of Advent

"Advent: In the overwhelming commercialism of this time of year, it is easy to forget that the season of Advent that begins on Sunday is not focussed on preparing for Christmas, instead it is a time to remember that it was in “the time of this mortal life” that “Jesus Christ came to us in great humility” and “that on the last day...  he shall come again in his glorious majesty to judge the living and the dead.” To talk of such things can bring odd reactions, people thinking that such thinking is not part of their tradition, that the idea of Jesus returning is only something for those whom they would regard as religious zealots, that it is no more than an optional belief for Christians, yet every time we say the Creed we declare a belief that he will come again to “judge the living and the dead.”

Are the odd people not those who say that they believe what they say they believe every Sunday, but those who say the words every week, but then say that they do not believe them? If we do not believe in the advent of Christ, if we do not believe in the coming of his kingdom, then is our faith purely about the here and now? And if our faith is only about the here and now, then why do we believe at all?"

-Ian Poulton.

Die Armee der Poeten

Von Arthur Horvath.

Liebe Freunde,

am 19.11.2015 starten wir die „Dann geh doch … mal in meinen Schuhen“ Kampagne der YOUNG Stage Kids. Den Film gedreht und geschnitten hat die wundervolle und großartige Anna Mönnich die auch eine Dokumentation über Young Stage dreht. 

Ich teile die Meinung der Kid´s in diesem Video (Passwort: Arthur) und weiß, dass ich nicht machtlos bin sondern auch persönlich mit Euch allen gemeinsam die Macht habe die Dinge zu verändern und zu handeln.

-Well done Silke, nice voice!

And this is my right foot in 2015:

Thanks Reg!

and thank you Ali, Candida and Cynthia. The Innocence & Experience show in Cologne was the best stage show I’ve seen since Pop in Mannheim in 1997. The story told is part of my life story too, just amazing to see it presented this way.

Yes, the new music is autobiography. Yes, that may be self indulgent, but no more so than any biography or memoir. All we have is our stories and our lives, our experiences. And that's what this show is about? Growing up in Finglas as it was in the 1970's. It was the same in the 60's. I just loved it.

Here we are proudly collecting our VIP tickets:

Where the streets now have names ...

There is a song from Eric Church called "Springsteen". That tribute song has prompted a Scottish band called December to write and record a tribute song for U2, and it's quite good. Have a listen (and enjoy the Dublin scenery) in this new video for their song, "Alison Stewart."

To understand my appreciatzion of this video,  for Cedarwood Road think Ballymun Avenue and for Mount Temple think Mountjoy. I was there even before Bono.




December chose the song title when it became apparent that the song had been written from Bono's wife's viewpoint.

Equality in Ireland?

Stephen Donnelly

"It turns out that the wealthiest 20% in Ireland own about 70% of the country's total wealth. And for the less well-off? The least well-off 20% own more or less nothing and actually, it's worse. The best data available on wealth distribution comes from the Central Bank, and it shows this: The least well-off 40pc of Irish households, nearly two million men, women and children, have an almost zero per cent share of Ireland's wealth. We're O.K. with a certain amount of inequality - the 'ideal' situation according to a recent poll was that the wealthiest 20% would own over 30% of all assets, the poorest 20% would own about 17%, and the middle 60% would own the rest.

We don't believe that we're anywhere close to that ideal, however. In fact, we believe the wealthiest own not 30%, but 60%. And we believe the poorest own just a little over 10%. And then there's the reality - 70% of everything for the wealthiest and nothing for four in 10 people.

The Irish have an inherent sense of fairness. If you work harder, it's fair that you get more. If you invest more in your education and skills, it's fair that you get more. But it's clear we're not living in anything remotely close to what we believe to be fair.

Imagine bringing a box of 100 sweets into a primary school with 100 students, and trying to sell the current situation in Ireland to them - 20 of you are getting 70 of the sweets to share between you, another 40 of you are getting 30 sweets to share, and the final 40 of you are getting nothing. And we're going to base this allocation on how much money your parents make.

The negative equity generation don't belong in Ireland's 40pc who have no assets. They are way below that - they are the students in the primary school who were told that they have minus 10 sweets, and if they worked hard, then the total tally against them would be changed to minus 9.

And if they kept it up, year after year, then some day they can be like the 40 kids who have no sweets. For many in the negative equity generation, they'll get back to zero in their 50s. Imagine the damage that's doing right now, and the impact it's having on their children.

So if we're at a level of inequality that's much worse than we want, how did we end up here? Part of the problem is that the 20% at the top have far greater influence over the political system, and so the laws, and the tax regimes, reflect what they want, rather than what's best for the country. Partly it's due to a conspiracy of silence - the data used was only published this year, and so the sort of analysis we're looking at now was difficult to do in the past.

Partly it's due to accepting a 'masters of the universe' orthodoxy - that there's a small number of people who must be paid vast sums of money to create the wealth which will, in time, trickle down to others. In 1980, top CEOs in the US earned about 40 times what the average worker earned. By 1990 it was 80 times. It's now nearly 400 times.

So what can be done? Progressive budgets help, by seeking higher contributions from the wealthiest. Serious investment in, and reform of, education is essential.

Deprived areas need a lot more help, schools need a lot more teachers, colleges need more funding and control over how they spend those funds.
Communities must be planned to ensure a cross section of society live together, rather than the current physical separation of poorer urban communities.

Now we know - Ireland is much less equal than we thought it was. It is much less equal than we want it to be.

And if theory and history are any guide, then without some serious changes, this inequality will get much worse. In America, a country Ireland tends to track socioeconomically, the wealthiest 1% now own a staggering 40% of the country's wealth. It's time we started to move in the opposite direction."
-Stephen Donnelly.