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At Last, Rockers Shut Up and Sing

Really, it's about time rockers made concerts all about the music

By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff

Posted Oct 27, 2009 12:30 PM CDT

(Newser) – Bono—he of the eons-long concert diatribes about everything from Burma to the whales—has done the unthinkable. "Bono has started editing himself," Virginia M. Moncrieff realized during U2's Rose Bowl concert. And it's about time: Though Moncrieff admires their causes, she has reached the age where the nicest thing rock stars can do is "just shut up and get on with the set," she writes on the Huffington Post.

And the world seems to be with her, as the "tin pot half-baked undergraduate political ramblings of some bloke who just happens to have the mic" are slowly ebbing—maybe because "we are just too grown up to get our political education from some numbskull with a guitar." Either way, Moncrieff has some advice for any musicians who haven't yet gotten the memo: "Start with your first song and don't stop playing until the final bar of your last. Thank you, money well spent."

In this photo provided by the Las Vegas News Bureau, Bono of U2 performs at Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas Friday, Oct. 23, 2009.
In this photo provided by the Las Vegas News Bureau, Bono of U2 performs at Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas Friday, Oct. 23, 2009.   (AP Photo/Las Vegas News Bureau, Brian Jones)
Lead singer Bono of the rock band U2 performs with the band during their 360 world tour stop at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, NJ, on Thursday, Sept. 24, 2009.
Lead singer Bono of the rock band U2 performs with the band during their 360 world tour stop at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, NJ, on Thursday, Sept. 24, 2009.   (AP Photo/Evan Agostini)
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I remember U2 concerts when you could retire to the back stalls for a bit of a snooze between songs while Bono rabbited on about Burma, or Mandela, or whales, or the memory of Martin Luther King or the Troubles......whatever.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/virginia-moncrieff/look-whos-not-talking-bon_b_334799.html - Virginia M. Moncrieff

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COMMENTS
Showing 3 of 6 comments
cognitivefilter
Oct 28, 2009 9:28 AM CDT
tin pot half-baked undergraduate political ramblings. that is EXCELLENT
gabo
Oct 27, 2009 6:58 AM CDT
U2 = Three chords and a prayer
tc909
Oct 27, 2009 6:52 AM CDT
Charley Reese said it best - that you don't need to look overseas for terrible poverty and awful living conditions. Guess the Mississippi Delta region, or some of the neighborhoods in Memphis are too good bfor Bono. Bono, time to retire to your (3rd? 4th? 5th) home in Monaco, Bahamas, etc. Edge, finish those super fancy homes in Malibu. By the way, the one song I heard off this album, on XM radio Deep Tracks station (why?), was simply awful.

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