Fanboy Court: The People Vs U2’s “Get On Your Boots”
I know you’ve been sworn, sir, and I have read your complaint. Let’s call this case to order. Docket #01202009: The People VS “Get On Your Boots.”
I’ve spent some time with the song now, listening to it on repeat for a couple long stretches and I’m ready to commit some thoughts to web page. “Get On Your Boots” has allayed some of my fears about the upcoming album but I’m not sure I feel a whole lot better. I feared the band was out of ideas. “Get On Your Boots” proves otherwise.
“Get On Your Boots” is a traffic jam of ideas all going off at the same time. Some of those ideas are really cool. The best part of this song is repeated twice, showing up approximately 50 seconds in. I’ve never heard U2 layer backing vocals like this, and I love it. I also love the minor key, Middle Eastern flavor of the melody during this segment of the song.
Bono’s vocal, countering and answering the layered vocal, is great here as well. As a wall of voices sing “you don’t know how beautiful you are,” Bono counters with “You don’t know, and you don’t get it, do you? You don’t know how beautiful you are.” I realize it loses something in the 2-D, written, but trust me when I say they pull this off really well. This is where the song lives.
Unfortunately, some of the ideas aren’t so good and few of them are new. It took awhile but now even U2 is borrowing from Led Zeppelin, courtesy of Larry Mullen Jr’s dumbed down version of John Bonham’s “When The Levee Breaks” backbeat during the the “let me in the sound” segment. I’m not exactly sure why, but Bono does some weird Robert Smith-like croak during this as well. He shouldn’t have.
Two holdovers from U2’s last record are readily evident on “Get On Your Boots.” The first is the effect pedal The Edge used on “Vertigo.” “Boots” has some guitar sounds that are reminiscent of “Vertigo,” although they also have a bit of the “Zoo Station” vibe from Achtung Baby. The second is the more troubling stowaway: loudness. How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb was one of the worst “sounding” records (from a loudness, dynamic range, compression, mastering perspective) of the last 20 years. Rock and roll should be loud, but it shouldn’t sound like this. Adam Clayton’s bassline is distorted twice, once because of a cool effect plug in, once because the volume level is cranked to 11.
Let’s talk lyrics for a minute: what the fuck does “sexy boots” or “get on your boots” have to do with this song? Where’s the tie in? I don’t get it. This would be more of a problem if “get on your boots” and “sexy boots” were repeated in the chorus of this song, but Bono outsmarted us all on that one by simply not giving the song a chorus. I’m not sure that was the best approach, but it’s what they came up with.
This is a lot of random Bono scat and the amazing thing is he manages not to namedrop any nuns, world leaders, AIDS vaccines, or African nations. That must be why they kept the song to 3:30 minutes. I’ll bet you everything in your wallet there’s a seven minute version of this where Desmond Tutu orders chili fries while Francois Mitterrand and Kofi Annan do the tango in Harare. Unfortunately, 3:30 was long enough to throw in an “I-scream-you-scream-we=all-scream-for-ice-cream” blast and some hooey about Satan and bomb scare.
After 3:30, it becomes clear U2 are throwing too many things at the wall for one song and too few of those ideas stick. The ones that do are really cool. For me, they’re strong enough to save the song even if you do hear the strain of burgeoning ideas try to collapse it under its own weight.
The People rest. Let’s hear what you’ve got to say…
Filed under: Tags: Fanboy Court, No Line On The Horizon, U2
That’s a fair assessment. The chorus — or lack thereof — is the weakest part of the song.
To me, it sounds like a cross between ‘Vertigo’ and ‘Miami,’ the latter being the first time LMJ ripped off ‘When the Levee Breaks.’
Overall, it’s a solid song, and it has me hopeful for the record.
Good assessment. However, I stand by my initial impression of “Escape Club” when I hear this. I fear U2 have reached that part of the career where they try to either sound like a U2 song or sound so different from their previous incarnations it is hardly recognizable. That said, I won’t fault these guys for at least trying to be creative once again.
Say what you will about the chorus or lack thereof, but I’m a fan of the hook. Always have been…
This song is a little lacking in the “hooks” department, too, although that “you don’t know how beautiful you are” bit is really awesome.
Didn’t U2 already cover some of this song’s lyric ground — “You don’t know how beautiful you are” — in “City of Blinding Lights” (“Oh, you look so beautiful tonight”)? It’s not so much a criticism here but just a mention of a recurrent theme.
That said, I’m not bowled over by the track. For a first single, it doesn’t hold a candle to “Vertigo” (good song) or “Beautiful Day” (really good song).
“Vertigo” was average. “Beautiful Day” is a classic.