My fave era of U2. They had the balls to have a press conference at K-Mart and opened to the media with a deep cut that didn't even make the album... Those reporters had no clue what they were witnessing.
Discotheque was a serious song it was a pre to Vertigo. Bono saw the future Rap and Dance are POP musik in 2024 In a way U2 we’re discovering what music and entertainment as a whole was gonna be like in 2024! Now everyone tours a Popmart show and people see it as the norm u2 really played futuristic music to everyone back in 1997!!!
Love the Pop era... such a shame that is primarily seen as a "failure" - they were a much more interesting band here than they have been for the last 10-12 years. The irony of U2 in the 90s were also misunderstood as there was a lot of sincerity hiding underneath.
+Stereotype23 absolutely agree with you. was just going to write something of the sort. I was in the two concerts they did in spain on that tour, and even realising then that their zootv must have been a bigger and more creative challenge, here they were still playing, taking risks. Imen, even now, just watching this, I can feel the same excitement as when some bits of it before going to the concerts. It´s there, you can feel it. They were alive. To me, they completaly lost with their next album,
hahah c'mon!, it was a very needed "come back to basics" album more acustic, it was a good move a very nice album ... but sadly no more interesting things since then, from 2010 everything has been downhill
It was the moment I started being a U2 fan I had 14 yo Im 37 now. I remember I recorded this Holy Joe in a VHS tape from MTV. I used to paly it loud every morning when I was dressing to go to school. Good times!
I think that the PopMart era was the most underrated period in U2's long history. I can't see why U2 thought that this was a mistake. I considered it a work in progress and it should get the same respect as all of their many phases. I'd rather this version of U2 than the dull version we have right now.
Great to see this again. Thanks for posting it! I was there. Couldn't see from the back so I went upstairs in the K-Mart and bought a small ladder and came back down. Someone offered me 20 USD to have it I said no. Soon there were 10 others that came back with these small step stools. Then mgmt. got wind of it and started taking them away but I argued and showed my sales receipt. Was able to keep it. Still got it in the closet and when i see it, it always brings a smile and memory of this unique U2 moment.
I hate the fact that U2 pretend they don’t like the Pop album,they were totally brow beaten into not liking it by critics and “true fans”,a brilliant album from a band at that peak of their powers.
First Tour and my first concert, Leeds Roundhay in the pissing rain, although ironically it only rained when U2 came on stage. The band passed our coach in white limos on the motorway on the way back to Manchester.
Discotheque was a serious song it was a pre to Vertigo. Bono saw the future Rap and Dance are POP musik in 2024 In a way U2 we’re discovering what music and entertainment as a whole was gonna be like in 2024! Now everyone tours a Popmart show and people see it as the norm u2 really played futuristic music to everyone back in 1997!!!
Popmart was an extraordinary step forward in live concert experiance. I had tickets for rds in dublin but broke my back two days beforehand and couldnt walk so obiously i couldnt go .i was devastated at the time and seeing footage from popmart just rubs it in as it looks amazing .i say zoo tv in dublin and that was impressive but popmart dwarfed that but the music at the heart of all this spectacle was fantastic too .theres no smoke without fire..uv seen footage of the sphere and wow it seems tech finally caught up to zoo tv or actung baby 20 something years later .defo one of the top live acts ever from rattle and hum to songs of innocents experience no other band has had the constant quality and relevance for such a long career. Although winding down with age when they were in their prime they left their mark musically politically visually and not their own cover band ..legends
That exact Kmart still exist in 2020. You can find it at 770 Broadway, East Village NYC. You can googlestreet behind the building on Lafayette St. and see the Kmart signs.
eugene Oregon was a real first ever & the only mega show like that to come there ……...is kinda wild how that one guy from mtv mentions possibly BOISE IDAHO that's just to un real to ever think u2 would turn up there to start a tour as this
I’ve never seen a Bono, Larry and The Edge’s body language look so awkward. They seem unprepared for the questions nor do they know how to explain themselves - probably because for the first time - they were trying not to be themselves and it wasn’t working. They feel like frauds & hoped they could just wing it. It wasn’t convincing
They were imitation copies of ‘80s Diesel Sunglasses. You could buy an all black version back in the ‘90s for a $1. Bono’s Yellow Lense ones I saw went for $5 in Atlantic City in the ‘90s..I have a pair of Red Plastic ones with black lenses I got as a kid in the 80’s.
The Japanese edition of POP has the same song with a different mix (called 'Guilty') as a bonus track. Its real expensive unless you're lucky to find it used on eBay.
Basically the beginning of the end, but we just didn't realise it at the time. A band just running on hype, totally out of ideas, empty, lost, the end.
Couldn't agree more. Here are four extremely wealthy men who had, by then, consumed more than you ever will in your lifetime, ranting about consumerism in a shop where the low-income class can find good bargains, although these same four men will happily sell you their albums and tours. Doesn't get more confusing, hypocritical, condescending and out of touch than this. Why not give away their albums for free (which they later did but for marketing reasons only), or propose solutions against blind consumerism if that was their focus. (As a reminder, Bono later on made advertising for Louis Vuitton bags... Go figure.) Pop was a decent album although it needed more work and Popmart had lots of fun but the message once again was confusing and condescending and lacked a clear focus. It was a mess. Basically, with ZooTV and Zooropa, U2 managed to get the key to artistic freedom and could have gone in so many directions had they wanted to (ie. Passengers,). Yet, they didn't know what to do with this freedom, messed up on pop, and ultimately, went back into their golden cage by 2000 and threw away the key. They lost all relevance to me once ATYCTB came out. A shame.
@@bernardhenin I agree with most of this. I saw them on this tour (popmart) on Halloween in Detroit and it was pretty crazy....gigantic screen.....Bono wearing a Freddy Kreuger glove for the encore (lol), etc. Going from Zooropa, which I still hold as their best album IMO to Passengers, which was filled with interesting music and tangents.....the public interest in what U2 were going to do next was extremely high. Pop had some interesting moments and I did like the Disco-ish slant on some of the songs as I loved Disco when I was a little kid. But, overall....Pop was a swing and miss due to the fact that they had to book the tour a year in advance, so...essentially, they boxed themselves in with a hard deadline that they couldn't push back. They could have used an extra six months or so to flesh out more ideas and another six months to dial in the rehearsals and proper planning of the tour. This is essentially why those first few shows had so many technical difficulties and musical miscues, not enough rehearsal time. I admire their bravery on such a large reach to do nothing but stadiums, pretty ballsy at the time for that band to do. I never went to another U2 show after the Popmart tour, but from what I could see...the 360 Tour was essentially the Popmart tour on steroids. Would have been cool to see that tour. I'm definitely in agreement that the next album and tour in 2001 was a step back to more familiar territory for the band. That trifecta of albums, Achtung Baby, Zooropa, and Passengers should have been the linchpin to greater things, new avenues to explore musically, etc. Some of the best artists (Bowie, Neil Young, etc.) had that level of uncertainty to them, you didn't know where they were going to go next. I loved that about them and U2 definitely had that ability as well. I can hear the argument that U2 figured out what they were best at by the time 2001 came along and decided to stay in their lane going forward, but it's still a shame to me when you listen to their 90's output on what could have been for them in the 2000's and beyond.
@@furnitureconsortium I will never understand the lack of self awareness in this fandom. Imagine talking about Passengers like it's one of the albums, lol. Worst fandom in the world.
that introduction they did for the assembled, bored-as-shit/jet-lagged Press; _bafflingly_ played out in a brightly sunlit, DAYTIME(!??) K-Mart; the whole cheesy CGI presentation -showing that massive, Guinness-record-breaking stage that was way, WAY over-compensating for lousy material - presented on some tiny, _tinny_ TV... *_probably_* off-the-rack from that very store. per_-haps_ it only comes off so *painfully* square and simply... well, BAD 'cause the whole "POP" phase is now seen as such a crushingly lame and _ostentatious_ failure... i mean, WHATEVER it is, it's BAD. VERY, VERY bad.
Only to most of us Americans, who don't appreciate art. But PopMart as a production did get better as time went on. The early part wasn't as good, because of the album, which wasn't ready to be finished, and the mistake of letting their manager at the time book tour dates before the album was finished, which also cut into rehearsal time. But overall the shows were pretty good, and the official tour video "PopMart Live in Mexico City" is something the band are very proud of.
![1997 U2 [A Grand Madness]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/vUhWFiAUEzI/mqdefault.jpg)
![1997 U2 [A Grand Madness]](/img/tr.png)
My fave era of U2. They had the balls to have a press conference at K-Mart and opened to the media with a deep cut that didn't even make the album... Those reporters had no clue what they were witnessing.
It’s a joke folks still dob’t get 25 years later. They thought Discotheque was a serious song 😂
Discotheque was a serious song it was a pre to Vertigo. Bono saw the future Rap and Dance are POP musik in 2024
In a way U2 we’re discovering what music and entertainment as a whole was gonna be like in 2024! Now everyone tours a Popmart show and people see it as the norm u2 really played futuristic music to everyone back in 1997!!!
Love the Pop era... such a shame that is primarily seen as a "failure" - they were a much more interesting band here than they have been for the last 10-12 years. The irony of U2 in the 90s were also misunderstood as there was a lot of sincerity hiding underneath.
+Stereotype23 absolutely agree with you. was just going to write something of the sort. I was in the two concerts they did in spain on that tour, and even realising then that their zootv must have been a bigger and more creative challenge, here they were still playing, taking risks. Imen, even now, just watching this, I can feel the same excitement as when some bits of it before going to the concerts. It´s there, you can feel it. They were alive. To me, they completaly lost with their next album,
Thé 90’s were my favorite too, I love zooropa and Pop very much
It’s called being in your 30s when your on top of the world, U2 now are nearly 60 and are family men , get your shit together dude
hahah c'mon!, it was a very needed "come back to basics" album more acustic, it was a good move a very nice album ... but sadly no more interesting things since then, from 2010 everything has been downhill
Yeah, very sincere; that's why they were pimping K-Mart and McDonalds on this tour.
It was the moment I started being a U2 fan I had 14 yo Im 37 now. I remember I recorded this Holy Joe in a VHS tape from MTV. I used to paly it loud every morning when I was dressing to go to school. Good times!
This KMart announcement was and still is LEGENDARY. Brilliant move.
Nothing beats ZOOTV
Agreed and never will
I think that the PopMart era was the most underrated period in U2's long history. I can't see why U2 thought that this was a mistake. I considered it a work in progress and it should get the same respect as all of their many phases. I'd rather this version of U2 than the dull version we have right now.
Great to see this again. Thanks for posting it! I was there. Couldn't see from the back so I went upstairs in the K-Mart and bought a small ladder and came back down. Someone offered me 20 USD to have it I said no. Soon there were 10 others that came back with these small step stools. Then mgmt. got wind of it and started taking them away but I argued and showed my sales receipt. Was able to keep it. Still got it in the closet and when i see it, it always brings a smile and memory of this unique U2 moment.
Holy Joe such a under rated song!!!!!!
B side to discotheque 🎊
Sounds very Verve-ish
21:29 Love how Bono just shuts down negativity in a manner most people wouldn't, on such a platform.
Best tour i ever saw
biggest mega show by far was in SARAJEVO & is just impressive how they pulled that off only they could do it!!!
Hum... I remembered this feeling more epic when it aired 23 years ago... Still cool to revisit it.
Missed them in Toronto that year and seen them 4 times since but this to me was U2 at their absolute crescendo😍
I hate the fact that U2 pretend they don’t like the Pop album,they were totally brow beaten into not liking it by critics and “true fans”,a brilliant album from a band at that peak of their powers.
First Tour and my first concert, Leeds Roundhay in the pissing rain, although ironically it only rained when U2 came on stage. The band passed our coach in white limos on the motorway on the way back to Manchester.
Discotheque was a serious song it was a pre to Vertigo. Bono saw the future Rap and Dance are POP musik in 2024
In a way U2 we’re discovering what music and entertainment as a whole was gonna be like in 2024! Now everyone tours a Popmart show and people see it as the norm u2 really played futuristic music to everyone back in 1997!!!
I love the baffled look on all the media and press people’s faces 😂
Poor Edge tried no hat for about 2 weeks, then said, "yeah...no."
No-Beanie Edge was left in the POP era of U2, along with “actually being cool”
Popmart was an extraordinary step forward in live concert experiance. I had tickets for rds in dublin but broke my back two days beforehand and couldnt walk so obiously i couldnt go .i was devastated at the time and seeing footage from popmart just rubs it in as it looks amazing .i say zoo tv in dublin and that was impressive but popmart dwarfed that but the music at the heart of all this spectacle was fantastic too .theres no smoke without fire..uv seen footage of the sphere and wow it seems tech finally caught up to zoo tv or actung baby 20 something years later .defo one of the top live acts ever from rattle and hum to songs of innocents experience no other band has had the constant quality and relevance for such a long career. Although winding down with age when they were in their prime they left their mark musically politically visually and not their own cover band ..legends
Two words. Holy Joe!
Watching this 22 years later
the music they put out as passengers is some of my favorite put out by them.
Back when Larry Mullen was still the drummer in U2....
Hmm, Kmart had both a lingerie and "pop group" section in the store.
Bono looks like Elvis Costello on the thumbnail
The magic of the effin’ internet
Bono looks like Costello
Pop was great but they bottled it when the critics complained.
I mean thereafter . Everything after pop was pandering to the critics. They lost their true selves.
They had the same reaction to rattle and hum in 1988
Holy Joe...
And to think that today KMART is now extinct...wonder whatever happened to this location
It's possible closed
I'm assuming like myself that you were born on the year this was broadcast?
That exact Kmart still exist in 2020. You can find it at 770 Broadway, East Village NYC. You can googlestreet behind the building on Lafayette St. and see the Kmart signs.
2:59 I remember him saying why he wears those glasses. He has some eye issue. Can't remember if it was glaucoma or something else.
I think you mean guacamole
I forget the name of the actual affliction. But, basically.....his eyes are extremely sensitive to light
eugene Oregon was a real first ever & the only mega show like that to come there ……...is kinda wild how that one guy from mtv mentions possibly BOISE IDAHO that's just to un real to ever think u2 would turn up there to start a tour as this
I’ve never seen a Bono, Larry and The Edge’s body language look so awkward. They seem unprepared for the questions nor do they know how to explain themselves - probably because for the first time - they were trying not to be themselves and it wasn’t working. They feel like frauds & hoped they could just wing it. It wasn’t convincing
3:40 "There's Bono kissing everyone." He kissed one f'ing person. smgdh
anybody know what type of glasses Bono is wearing?
maybe it was Romeo Gigli glasses at that time
They were imitation copies of ‘80s Diesel Sunglasses. You could buy an all black version back in the ‘90s for a $1. Bono’s Yellow Lense ones I saw went for $5 in Atlantic City in the ‘90s..I have a pair of Red Plastic ones with black lenses I got as a kid in the 80’s.
Bono had aged a lot between Zooropa and Pop.
Ed Glenn except Pop wasn’t his prime, silly man
shame this was just a remix b-side to discotechque, was a great song would have loved to hear a proper studio version!!
The Japanese edition of POP has the same song with a different mix (called 'Guilty') as a bonus track. Its real expensive unless you're lucky to find it used on eBay.
On the discotheque single CD, there is a studio recorded version. Must be vary rare but I do have one.
Shame they never played holy Joe on the tour
Cashier for 4 years at The big K !!!
27:50 LOL that gesture :)
Pour one out tonite for the astor place kmart
me lembro quando passou isso no fantástico.
“Larry and Adam are doing mission impossible 7 “ oh how so 2023 😅
they didn’t know why he wore glasses glaucoma!
3:38 Carl Wilson?
The average is 45 $ (tickets)... Now the average is 250 😬
U2 would not be caught dead in a Kmart in 2021
yeah especially since they are all out of business
12:14 which song they play?
The fly
15:00 Very interesting. Bono said back then they didn't need to kiss ass to sponsors. Times they are changing.
Actually, he said if they found a sponsor they didn't need to kiss ass to, they'd gladly take their money. So I guess they did. That's smart business.
Fucking AWKWARD. All those bored, silent journalists watching the screen.
🌸 10:14
Hier ziet bono er cool uit
Sounds like Oasis.
9:20 well actually it’s a b side they will never play again lol
This is the beginning of the end
That's not why he wears those glasses!
Nihal Shetty 5
Bigger than a biden rally
There’s a fair few unimpressed faces there
Basically the beginning of the end, but we just didn't realise it at the time. A band just running on hype, totally out of ideas, empty, lost, the end.
Couldn't agree more. Here are four extremely wealthy men who had, by then, consumed more than you ever will in your lifetime, ranting about consumerism in a shop where the low-income class can find good bargains, although these same four men will happily sell you their albums and tours. Doesn't get more confusing, hypocritical, condescending and out of touch than this. Why not give away their albums for free (which they later did but for marketing reasons only), or propose solutions against blind consumerism if that was their focus.
(As a reminder, Bono later on made advertising for Louis Vuitton bags... Go figure.)
Pop was a decent album although it needed more work and Popmart had lots of fun but the message once again was confusing and condescending and lacked a clear focus. It was a mess.
Basically, with ZooTV and Zooropa, U2 managed to get the key to artistic freedom and could have gone in so many directions had they wanted to (ie. Passengers,). Yet, they didn't know what to do with this freedom, messed up on pop, and ultimately, went back into their golden cage by 2000 and threw away the key.
They lost all relevance to me once ATYCTB came out. A shame.
@@bernardhenin I agree with most of this. I saw them on this tour (popmart) on Halloween in Detroit and it was pretty crazy....gigantic screen.....Bono wearing a Freddy Kreuger glove for the encore (lol), etc.
Going from Zooropa, which I still hold as their best album IMO to Passengers, which was filled with interesting music and tangents.....the public interest in what U2 were going to do next was extremely high. Pop had some interesting moments and I did like the Disco-ish slant on some of the songs as I loved Disco when I was a little kid. But, overall....Pop was a swing and miss due to the fact that they had to book the tour a year in advance, so...essentially, they boxed themselves in with a hard deadline that they couldn't push back. They could have used an extra six months or so to flesh out more ideas and another six months to dial in the rehearsals and proper planning of the tour. This is essentially why those first few shows had so many technical difficulties and musical miscues, not enough rehearsal time.
I admire their bravery on such a large reach to do nothing but stadiums, pretty ballsy at the time for that band to do. I never went to another U2 show after the Popmart tour, but from what I could see...the 360 Tour was essentially the Popmart tour on steroids. Would have been cool to see that tour.
I'm definitely in agreement that the next album and tour in 2001 was a step back to more familiar territory for the band. That trifecta of albums, Achtung Baby, Zooropa, and Passengers should have been the linchpin to greater things, new avenues to explore musically, etc. Some of the best artists (Bowie, Neil Young, etc.) had that level of uncertainty to them, you didn't know where they were going to go next. I loved that about them and U2 definitely had that ability as well.
I can hear the argument that U2 figured out what they were best at by the time 2001 came along and decided to stay in their lane going forward, but it's still a shame to me when you listen to their 90's output on what could have been for them in the 2000's and beyond.
@@furnitureconsortium I will never understand the lack of self awareness in this fandom. Imagine talking about Passengers like it's one of the albums, lol. Worst fandom in the world.
that introduction they did for the assembled, bored-as-shit/jet-lagged Press; _bafflingly_ played out in a brightly sunlit, DAYTIME(!??) K-Mart; the whole cheesy CGI presentation -showing that massive, Guinness-record-breaking stage that was way, WAY over-compensating for lousy material - presented on some tiny, _tinny_ TV... *_probably_* off-the-rack from that very store. per_-haps_ it only comes off so *painfully* square and simply... well, BAD 'cause the whole "POP" phase is now seen as such a crushingly lame and _ostentatious_ failure... i mean, WHATEVER it is, it's BAD. VERY, VERY bad.
Only to most of us Americans, who don't appreciate art. But PopMart as a production did get better as time went on. The early part wasn't as good, because of the album, which wasn't ready to be finished, and the mistake of letting their manager at the time book tour dates before the album was finished, which also cut into rehearsal time. But overall the shows were pretty good, and the official tour video "PopMart Live in Mexico City" is something the band are very proud of.
Not their best period, sorry