Grammy countdown: How the awards can stay relevant
December 1, 2009 | 6:49 pm
At the age of 52, the Grammy Awards are set in their ways. As the Oscars and the Emmys made dramatic changes to their galas, upping the number of nominees of major categories, the Grammys waved goodbye to polka.
Changes to the Grammy Awards come slow. On Wednesday night, the Recording Academy will unveil the nominees for its Jan. 31 ceremony in an hour-long special on CBS. The telecast will play out like a mini-Grammy Awards, with performances from the Black Eyed Peas, Nick Jonas and Maxwell, among others. While awards won't be given out Wednesday night, not many are handed out at the actual gala either, with this year's show having been turned into a telecast that featured almost two dozen musical numbers.
The performance-heavy broadcast worked, and there's a reason CBS is interrupting its "Criminal Minds"/"CSI: NY" lineup Wednesday night. The 2009 Grammy telecast brought in 19.4 million viewers, up from 17.5 million in 2008, according to Nielsen Media Research. Last year's prime time Grammy nominee special didn't fare as well, bringing in closer to 7.5 million viewers, but it effectively turned the unveiling of nominations into an event.
Wednesday night's affair will be more intimate than last year's press conference-turned-concert. Tickets this time were not sold to the public, and while it's still taking place at downtown's L.A. Live complex, the Grammy nominee venue has been shifted from the 7,000-plus-seat Nokia Theatre to the more intimate 2,300-capacity Club Nokia.
Additionally, now that the Grammy Awards are a two-pronged television event, don't exactly expect them to suddenly get risky with the nominations. But the gala can't get comfortable, either, as it's reflecting a constantly shifting music industry, and the ratings bump for the 2009 awards was an anomaly rather than the norm.
So, how do the Grammys stay out in front? Pop & Hiss has answers.
And the album of the year should go to ... Kanye West. Heading into this Grammy season, Mr. West was the odds-on-favorite to win this field in 2010. Now there's doubt as to whether or not he'll even be nominated.
Four albums into his career, West has had a profound effect on the latter half of this decade. He's been a loud-mouthed, egotistical brat, but he's also been the face of hip-hop since 2004, be it through his own releases or the abundance of production work he's done for others.
Rather than boast about street cred or jump on the latest fashionable beats, West released a debut album in 2004 in which he rapped about working at the Gap, and did so while showing off a passion for orchestral soul. With lyrics that embraced his middle-class upbringing, he was a unique voice in the pop landscape. Whether questioning his faith or wishing his girlfriend would spend more time at the gym, West was open, brash and relatively normal. When it comes to his music, none of that has changed.
If anything, West has only gotten more musically adventurous, reinventing his sound with each album. He completely threw away the script on last year's "808s & Heartbreak." On the surface it was a cold and mechanical album, with West embracing the Auto-Tune trend, but he came up with something that sounded vulnerable, wounded and surprisingly warm. The electronic manipulation was used as a sort of virtual glue -- a computer stitching together a broken heart. Dealing with loneliness amid fame was a theme. But this was also the sound of an artist making sense of an increasingly technological world, yet one where making a connection isn't getting any easier.
It's a fascinating album, and though it's loaded with vintage electronic sounds, it didn't feel the least bit dated. That's why it would be a downright shame if Recording Academy voters once again punished West for his inability to keep his mouth shut. Three times now West should have won album of the year, and three times now he's lost to inferior works.
Grammy voters love rewarding an artist for a body of work rather than simply a release, and "808s" was Kanye's chance to get his due, especially without a Robert Plant or Ray Charles release to spoil the party. So, while West didn't win any industry fans when he interrupted Taylor Swift's acceptance speech at the MTV Video Music Awards, let's keep this in perspective. It was one ill-advised moment that does nothing to diminish the man's art, and yet every industry voter I've encountered in the last three months has expressed nothing but disgust at the mention's of West's name. That's troublesome.
What West has said and done outside the studio is of no business to Grammy voters. But for what he's done inside it, he has earned this award.
And speaking of West and Swift: Get the two onstage at the same time at the Grammy Awards -- perhaps back-to-back performances. Just no uncomfortable mash-ups (Pop & Hiss just had a flashback to the Jonas Brothers performing with Stevie Wonder -- MAKE IT STOP!). On the other hand, we would not object to Swift joining Beyoncé for the "Singles Ladies" dance. You think Mathew Knowles is going to pass up that moment of YouTube gold? Not a chance. Just make everyone's life easier and give Bee more screen time.
There are these things called independent labels. Please make note of them. Club Grammy is one that's largely kept the indie labels behind the velvet rope, or at least out with the riff-raff during what is the Grammy pre-telecast. Independents dominate a lot of niche Grammy categories -- folk, jazz, etc. But in the big four -- album, record, song and new artist -- an indie is a rare sighting. Even when present, the indie is something of a major indie (see the Robert Plant-bolstered Rounder Records, or a self-released Radiohead album), and that's all well and good, but how about getting a Sub Pop, Warp, Secretly Canadian or Anti- artist among the major nominees? Bon Iver and Grizzly Bear are on the new artist ballot, and are worthy nominee choices. Neko Case's "Middle Cyclone" is in the running for album of the year, and while it has a shot at scoring a nom this year, it's a long shot. The industry has shifted, and independent artists are routinely placing among the top 20 on the album chart. Grammy voters have largely been blind to this shift. The best new artist category is an obvious place to sneak in some indie newcomers, and the Jonas Brothers don't count.
Grammy voters have backed themselves into a corner with U2. The act's 2009 release, "No Line on the Horizon," kind of has to be nominated for album of the year. Voters regularly nominate U2 in the field -- the act won for 1987's "The Joshua Tree" and 2004's "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb" -- and U2's prior two releases were Grammy darlings. Though it didn't win, 2000's "All That You Can't Leave Behind" was also nominated for the top prize. Both "Atomic Bomb" and "Leave Behind" spawned plenty of hits and sold into the millions, and both lacked the atmosphere, the grace and the experimental tendencies of "No Line on the Horizon." The latter hasn't spawned a blockbuster such as "Beautiful Day," and it hasn't sold at the pace of U2's recent releases either. It is, however, an artistic triumph. If Grammy voters pass it up, it reinforces the notion of the gala being little more than a popularity contest.
Herbie Hancock seems like a swell guy and all ... but are jazz covers of Joni Mitchell songs really the mark of an era-defining album? To be fair, jazz rarely makes an appearance in the album of the year field, and Hancock's "River: The Joni Letters" is a fine release, but album of the year it was not. That being said, Allen Toussaint's "The Bright Mississippi" is a jazz album that voters hopefully didn't overlook when making their album of the year picks. It's a release that offers elegant renditions of the songs that framed Toussaint's youth in New Orleans, reworking Thelonious Monk's "Bright Mississippi" and Duke Ellington's "Solitude," among others, and makes a grand attempt at preserving a culture. Should it win? No, but it deserves the recognition.
The eligibility period. Change it. It's a shame that some of the year's most talked-about albums won't be represented at this year's Grammy telecast. Jay-Z's "The Blueprint 3," Miranda Lambert's "Revolution," Rihanna's "Rated R" and Pearl Jam's "Backspacer," among many others, won't be considered until the 2011 Grammys, as the 2010 eligibility period closed on Aug. 31 (on the plus side, the outdated eligibility window hopefully gives voters enough time to not get any Grammy ideas about Susan Boyle). This is an old topic, but the Recording Academy needs to shift to a straight calendar year. Album cycles are shorter these days, and there's no reason to have late 2008 albums being awarded on a 2010 show. We know it's not simple, as there are broadcast dates and business calendars to shift. Additionally, voters may have to deal with a shorter window to vote on the 109 categories. But there's one way to ease the later strain . . .
Cutting polka was a good start. Now trim more categories. If we learned anything from Beyoncé and Taylor Swift at the MTV Video Music Awards, it's that genre lines matter little in 2009, and the Grammys split things to near-ridiculous specificity. Really, no one truly knows the difference between best R&B album and best contemporary R&B album (Mary J. Blige seems to waft between both without any rhyme or reason), so let's just cut the contemporary R&B field. In fact, cut most of the genre categories. Follow the Oscars and increase the album of the year contenders to 10 or more, bring the total categories to a manageable 20, and call it a day.
The Country Music Assn. Awards took Grammy voters off the hook. Swift is going to clean up Wednesday. She may even lead all nominees when all is said and done. She has plenty of supporters, including a number of my colleagues, and as one of the biggest music stories of the last two years, she's deserving of the Grammy acknowledgment she'll receive Wednesday night. If her "Fearless" wins best country album, no one will argue, but as the CMAs, AMAs, VMAs and ACMs all went and gave Swift top accolades in 2009, Grammy voters shouldn't feel obligated to follow suit. She's dominated the country landscape, and has become arguably the biggest crossover Nashville act since Shania Twain. But Shania never won album of the year, and Swift doesn't deserve it in 2010. That is in no way a take-down of the artist -- simply the recognition that "Fearless" was not the best album released over the last year and a half. As Pop & Hiss noted earlier this year, she's pitched as an ol'-fashioned singer-songwriter, and one with upstanding moral values who relates to her fans by filtering teen issues through an adult prism. Her music does, however, walk a line between honest and calculated, and voters would be right to let her get one or two more albums under her crystal-emblazoned belt before giving her the top prize.
And the same sentiment, without the thing about the morals, goes for ... Lady Gaga. The out-sized personality on display in her live presentations hasn't yet translated to her music.
Finally, for fun, our final predix for album of the year:
Album of the year best bets:
Maxwell's "BLACKsummers'night"
Taylor Swift's "Fearless"
Lady Gaga's "The Fame"
Kanye West's "808s & Heartbreak"
Green Day's "21st Century Breakdown"
Possibilities:
U2's "No Line on the Horizon"
Beyoncé's "I Am ... Sasha Fierce"
Whitney Houston's "I Look to You"
Allen Toussaint's "The Bright Mississippi"
Black Eyed Peas' "The E.N.D."
Deserving long shots:
Phoenix's "Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix"
Yeah Yeah Yeahs' "It's Blitz!"
Neko Case's "Middle Cyclone"
The Decemberists' “The Hazards of Love”
-- Todd Martens
latimes
6.12.09
Jim Sheridan's 'Brothers' looks deeply at family ties
The Irish director's new film is about a war veteran, his wife and his ex-convict brother.
By Geoff Boucher
December 3, 2009
No one does a better impression of Irish filmmaker Jim Sheridan than his old friend Bono. On a recent crystal-blue afternoon in L.A., the rock star, who was in town for a concert at the Rose Bowl, lifted his shoulders, dropped his chin and scowled like Popeye. He slapped a palm to his forehead and began rubbing hard, like a man trying to sandpaper off an eyebrow. Then in a growled brogue, he muttered: "Do you want to have a look at the pitch-chur? It's a ting about brud-ders."
Yes, the new Sheridan picture is "Brothers," and it's a thing about family, the nature of duty, war, guilt and calamity of the human heart. Bono and his mates in U2 saw a rough cut of the film, which hits theaters Friday, and jumped at the chance to contribute original music to the project. They recognized many familiar themes from Sheridan's illustrious body of past work (which includes films such as "My Left Foot," "In the Name of the Father," "The Boxer") but saw something new too in this tale about the wounds suffered by not only those on the battlefield, but by the loved ones left at home as well.
"Jim's stories have a kind of simplicity, usually, at the plot level and the complexities are in the drawing of the relationships," Bono said. "This one though is actually quite a complex plot line. He really went for this one. There are very strong feelings in this. It's a powerful, powerful film."
Sheridan, who does indeed rub his face and hairline with alarming and frequent gusto, has the aura these days of a man who knows he has something special on his hands. During two interviews, one in New York and the other in Los Angeles, the 60-year-old filmmaker spoke of "Brothers" as a new direction of sorts, and he was clearly enthused about the performances of his three stars, Tobey Maguire, Jake Gyllenhaal and Natalie Portman.
"I think it's successful as a film, although it's not for me to judge," Sheridan said. "It's very accurate. It's elegant. It's a Cain and Abel story of sort. It's not a movie about the war in Afghanistan, it's a movie about a family that has a component in Afghanistan. It's not a liberal, antiwar film, either. It could be any war. As for it being antiwar, does anyone make pro-war movies?"
A primitive setting
In the most simple terms, the Sheridan film is about the Cahill brothers; one who returns from prison (Gyllenhaal's Tommy) and one who goes off to war (Maguire's Sam), and the woman (Portman's Grace) who comes to love both of them.
The war scenes were filmed in the hard shadows and craggy pits of the New Mexico desert. "It's like you're in a prehistoric place, a place that once existed and teemed with life," Sheridan said. "If you stood there in the past the life would be swimming past your face but now it's fossilized. It brings up these emotions that are primitive and, I suppose, have to be kept below the surface."
While fighting in Afghanistan, Sam is forced to make a moral decision that carries with it lasting and irrevocable consequences. "There is an act in the story that is beyond tragedy, beyond normal, beyond the expected," Sheridan said. "[Sam] is shattered by that act and he comes back home looking for his soul, which is represented by his wife. But she has now discovered love with his brother."
"Brothers" is Sheridan's seventh film and arrives less than a month after the 20th anniversary of his first feature, "My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown," which earned him an Oscar nomination for best director and another for the screenplay. (The film won acting Oscars for Daniel Day-Lewis and Brenda Fricker.) Sheridan, a six-time Oscar nominee, arguably now stands as Ireland's most important filmmaker.
After mapping Ireland in the late '80s and '90s, Sheridan crossed the Atlantic for the setting of "In America" in 2002, but the acclaimed movie was still steeped in Irish experience. Not so with his most recently released film, 2005's "Get Rich or Die Tryin'," which starred 50 Cent in a crime film that borrowed its beats from the rapper's own life.
For "Brothers," Sheridan found his story in an unexpected place in "Brødre," the highly regarded 2004 Danish film about two brothers -- one who goes to war, one fresh from prison -- and the woman who becomes the hypotenuse in the triangle. David Benioff ("The Kite Runner," "Troy") wrote the script. The original film and Sheridan's take on the material are removed by vast distances in their details and rhythms, but the director confesses to some discomfort in revisiting ground that has been mined in the past.
"I had intended to make a different movie, a story about two brothers growing up in Dublin," he said, "and I got into a weird place with it on a financial and personal level."
The financial situation was in part the difficulty of moviemaking in Ireland, and the personal, perhaps, was the idea of going home once again as a filmmaker. For Sheridan, memories of a complicated childhood are never far from him.
"When I was 12 my dad suddenly went from a little cottage to a big huge house with lodgers," Sheridan said. "I would study these characters sitting there. The cast was always changing, these men coming into our house. It was in Dublin near a place that's now called Sheriff Street . . . up the street was a neighborhood that was like the projects of Ireland. You had to deal with these kids that would come down and have a fight. It toughened me up as a kid."
His father started a theater group and that set Sheridan on his career path. It also led, in 1977, to his meeting with a youngster named Paul Hewson who came to the group for mime lessons; Hewson was already going by the nickname Bono. For Sheridan, the theater eventually led to film. For the young Bono, well, the mime thing didn't quite work out. But not to worry -- he found other outlets for his creative talents.
Nothing flashy
Like all of his movies, Sheridan's "Brothers" is austere and patient; the director is not a likely candidate to inundate audiences with flashy special effects or narrative slight of hand.
"Cinematically, it's not trying to be 'Memento' or a Christopher Nolan movie, it's just not in that way and neither am I," Sheridan said. "I love Christopher Nolan, don't get me wrong. It's a jealous statement. I wish I could be like that. Sometimes I wish I could let go of the words in my head. The Irish condition is primarily schizophrenic. When you get a great Irish writer -- the best are Joyce or Beckett -- and they tend toward madness. The verbal mind . . . our culture is visually deprived."
Sheridan was impressed with the discipline of Maguire, the polish of Portman and, perhaps most of all, the easy authenticity of Gyllenhaal, whose somewhat scattered on-set demeanor is a search for clues, not a symptom of cluelessness.
"Jake is very good at that, searching for something in a scene," Sheridan said. With a chuckle he added: "It's not that he doesn't know his lines. He's always looking for something in the scene. It makes it feel real."
In some early reviews, critics have been fixated on comparing "Brothers" to its Danish relative ("A more polished but less effective twin," is how Variety put it, for instance) but the cast (which also includes Sam Shepard and Mare Winningham) and subject matter have made the movie a recurring topic of awards-season chatter.
Sheridan has his ear on that, of course, but is already gearing up for his next project. In his hotel room in L.A., Sheridan ripped open a parcel that had just been delivered. Inside were head shots and bios of actors; the director is now casting "Dream House," a thriller which will star Daniel Craig as a New York publishing executive who moves his family to New England but learns that their new home has a bloody past.
"It's a genre movie . . . and I'm trying to get it to be something else," Sheridan said. "I think I'm getting there. It's about a man who knows who he is, spiritually, and in the start of the film he's insane but by the end of the film he kind of regains his sanity."
Filming is set to start early next year, and while Sheridan may be no Christopher Nolan, he is pushing more into a Hollywood mode -- in his unglamorous and Irish way.
"I was watching the [electronic press kit] for the movie and the actors and how professional they are with the stillness in their face and their eyes and then it comes to me and I look like a person from a lunatic asylum," Sheridan said with a mock moan. "My face is squinting up, my eyes, I'm scratching my head. I look at it and go, 'Who is that?' We never see ourselves the way others do, I suppose. Good thing."
geoff.boucher@latimes.com
latimes
The Irish director's new film is about a war veteran, his wife and his ex-convict brother.
By Geoff Boucher
December 3, 2009
No one does a better impression of Irish filmmaker Jim Sheridan than his old friend Bono. On a recent crystal-blue afternoon in L.A., the rock star, who was in town for a concert at the Rose Bowl, lifted his shoulders, dropped his chin and scowled like Popeye. He slapped a palm to his forehead and began rubbing hard, like a man trying to sandpaper off an eyebrow. Then in a growled brogue, he muttered: "Do you want to have a look at the pitch-chur? It's a ting about brud-ders."
Yes, the new Sheridan picture is "Brothers," and it's a thing about family, the nature of duty, war, guilt and calamity of the human heart. Bono and his mates in U2 saw a rough cut of the film, which hits theaters Friday, and jumped at the chance to contribute original music to the project. They recognized many familiar themes from Sheridan's illustrious body of past work (which includes films such as "My Left Foot," "In the Name of the Father," "The Boxer") but saw something new too in this tale about the wounds suffered by not only those on the battlefield, but by the loved ones left at home as well.
"Jim's stories have a kind of simplicity, usually, at the plot level and the complexities are in the drawing of the relationships," Bono said. "This one though is actually quite a complex plot line. He really went for this one. There are very strong feelings in this. It's a powerful, powerful film."
Sheridan, who does indeed rub his face and hairline with alarming and frequent gusto, has the aura these days of a man who knows he has something special on his hands. During two interviews, one in New York and the other in Los Angeles, the 60-year-old filmmaker spoke of "Brothers" as a new direction of sorts, and he was clearly enthused about the performances of his three stars, Tobey Maguire, Jake Gyllenhaal and Natalie Portman.
"I think it's successful as a film, although it's not for me to judge," Sheridan said. "It's very accurate. It's elegant. It's a Cain and Abel story of sort. It's not a movie about the war in Afghanistan, it's a movie about a family that has a component in Afghanistan. It's not a liberal, antiwar film, either. It could be any war. As for it being antiwar, does anyone make pro-war movies?"
A primitive setting
In the most simple terms, the Sheridan film is about the Cahill brothers; one who returns from prison (Gyllenhaal's Tommy) and one who goes off to war (Maguire's Sam), and the woman (Portman's Grace) who comes to love both of them.
The war scenes were filmed in the hard shadows and craggy pits of the New Mexico desert. "It's like you're in a prehistoric place, a place that once existed and teemed with life," Sheridan said. "If you stood there in the past the life would be swimming past your face but now it's fossilized. It brings up these emotions that are primitive and, I suppose, have to be kept below the surface."
While fighting in Afghanistan, Sam is forced to make a moral decision that carries with it lasting and irrevocable consequences. "There is an act in the story that is beyond tragedy, beyond normal, beyond the expected," Sheridan said. "[Sam] is shattered by that act and he comes back home looking for his soul, which is represented by his wife. But she has now discovered love with his brother."
"Brothers" is Sheridan's seventh film and arrives less than a month after the 20th anniversary of his first feature, "My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown," which earned him an Oscar nomination for best director and another for the screenplay. (The film won acting Oscars for Daniel Day-Lewis and Brenda Fricker.) Sheridan, a six-time Oscar nominee, arguably now stands as Ireland's most important filmmaker.
After mapping Ireland in the late '80s and '90s, Sheridan crossed the Atlantic for the setting of "In America" in 2002, but the acclaimed movie was still steeped in Irish experience. Not so with his most recently released film, 2005's "Get Rich or Die Tryin'," which starred 50 Cent in a crime film that borrowed its beats from the rapper's own life.
For "Brothers," Sheridan found his story in an unexpected place in "Brødre," the highly regarded 2004 Danish film about two brothers -- one who goes to war, one fresh from prison -- and the woman who becomes the hypotenuse in the triangle. David Benioff ("The Kite Runner," "Troy") wrote the script. The original film and Sheridan's take on the material are removed by vast distances in their details and rhythms, but the director confesses to some discomfort in revisiting ground that has been mined in the past.
"I had intended to make a different movie, a story about two brothers growing up in Dublin," he said, "and I got into a weird place with it on a financial and personal level."
The financial situation was in part the difficulty of moviemaking in Ireland, and the personal, perhaps, was the idea of going home once again as a filmmaker. For Sheridan, memories of a complicated childhood are never far from him.
"When I was 12 my dad suddenly went from a little cottage to a big huge house with lodgers," Sheridan said. "I would study these characters sitting there. The cast was always changing, these men coming into our house. It was in Dublin near a place that's now called Sheriff Street . . . up the street was a neighborhood that was like the projects of Ireland. You had to deal with these kids that would come down and have a fight. It toughened me up as a kid."
His father started a theater group and that set Sheridan on his career path. It also led, in 1977, to his meeting with a youngster named Paul Hewson who came to the group for mime lessons; Hewson was already going by the nickname Bono. For Sheridan, the theater eventually led to film. For the young Bono, well, the mime thing didn't quite work out. But not to worry -- he found other outlets for his creative talents.
Nothing flashy
Like all of his movies, Sheridan's "Brothers" is austere and patient; the director is not a likely candidate to inundate audiences with flashy special effects or narrative slight of hand.
"Cinematically, it's not trying to be 'Memento' or a Christopher Nolan movie, it's just not in that way and neither am I," Sheridan said. "I love Christopher Nolan, don't get me wrong. It's a jealous statement. I wish I could be like that. Sometimes I wish I could let go of the words in my head. The Irish condition is primarily schizophrenic. When you get a great Irish writer -- the best are Joyce or Beckett -- and they tend toward madness. The verbal mind . . . our culture is visually deprived."
Sheridan was impressed with the discipline of Maguire, the polish of Portman and, perhaps most of all, the easy authenticity of Gyllenhaal, whose somewhat scattered on-set demeanor is a search for clues, not a symptom of cluelessness.
"Jake is very good at that, searching for something in a scene," Sheridan said. With a chuckle he added: "It's not that he doesn't know his lines. He's always looking for something in the scene. It makes it feel real."
In some early reviews, critics have been fixated on comparing "Brothers" to its Danish relative ("A more polished but less effective twin," is how Variety put it, for instance) but the cast (which also includes Sam Shepard and Mare Winningham) and subject matter have made the movie a recurring topic of awards-season chatter.
Sheridan has his ear on that, of course, but is already gearing up for his next project. In his hotel room in L.A., Sheridan ripped open a parcel that had just been delivered. Inside were head shots and bios of actors; the director is now casting "Dream House," a thriller which will star Daniel Craig as a New York publishing executive who moves his family to New England but learns that their new home has a bloody past.
"It's a genre movie . . . and I'm trying to get it to be something else," Sheridan said. "I think I'm getting there. It's about a man who knows who he is, spiritually, and in the start of the film he's insane but by the end of the film he kind of regains his sanity."
Filming is set to start early next year, and while Sheridan may be no Christopher Nolan, he is pushing more into a Hollywood mode -- in his unglamorous and Irish way.
"I was watching the [electronic press kit] for the movie and the actors and how professional they are with the stillness in their face and their eyes and then it comes to me and I look like a person from a lunatic asylum," Sheridan said with a mock moan. "My face is squinting up, my eyes, I'm scratching my head. I look at it and go, 'Who is that?' We never see ourselves the way others do, I suppose. Good thing."
geoff.boucher@latimes.com
latimes
Behind the Scenes of U2 3D
December 3, 2009
Jon and Peter Shapiro
This week, guest writer Jon Shapiro, Producer of the U2 3D movie (along with his brother, Peter Shapiro, John Modell and Director Catherine Owens) shares thoughts on the making of the groundbreaking movie, working with U2 and experiencing the movie in all its digital 3D glory– this time at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s new Foster Theater.
Through January 2, 2010, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is showing a film unlike any you’ve ever experienced (unless of course you’ve seen U2 3D before). I traveled to Cleveland to unveil it last month and was absolutely blown away by the technology and viewing experience in the Museum’s incredible new Foster Theater.
The first-ever live-action digital 3-D film, U2 3D places viewers within the pulsing energy of a U2 stadium concert. Combining innovative digital 3-D imagery and multi-channel surround sound with the excitement of a live U2 concert – shot in South America during the final leg of their “Vertigo” tour – it creates an immersive theatrical experience unlike any 3-D or concert film that has come before. Ushering in a new dimension of filmmaking, U2 3D takes viewers on an extraordinary journey they will never forget.
I’ve watched this movie more times than I can even recall (several dozen times to be sure…), and this was the best I’ve seen it.
Photo © 3ality Digital Entertainment
Here’s a behind the scenes look at the film:
Says director Catherine Owens, “Bono wanted to go somewhere magical with the creation of U2 3D,” seeking to intensify the already ecstatic feelings evoked by U2’s live concerts.
U2 3D came to life through the passion and production savvy of 3ality Digital, one of the world’s leading live-action, full service production companies specializing in advanced 3-D technology of which I am a proud co-founder. After shooting a single-camera test during an early “Vertigo” tour concert at the Anaheim Pond, we ultimately received the thumbs-up from U2 to have our huge production crew travel and shoot on the road with the band in South America, with Owens as director. “Bono felt that if we were going to do this right, we had to do it in South America, since the band’s presence after an eight-year hiatus from the continent was certain to draw vibrant and enthusiastic crowds” explained Peter Shapiro.
Photo © 3ality Digital Entertainment
With what became the largest collection of 3-D camera technology ever used on a single project, the production crew joined up with U2’s globe-trotting caravan for a month and shot the huge outdoor stadium shows (not seen in North America) at cities in four countries including Mexico City, Mexico; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Santiago, Chile; and Buenos Aires, Argentina.
After five days of shooting, however, what the production had was still not enough to create the experience that everyone envisioned.
I felt that this film should be a love letter to U2’s fans and that what we needed, ideally, was to set cameras onstage for intimate close-ups. What we needed was to shoot without an audience. That need was fulfilled by Bono who, along with the entire band, agreed to perform 10 songs in a cameras-only show the night before two public concerts in Buenos Aires. “It was an incredibly generous gesture, but not surprising,” said Owens. “U2 is about passion, politics and love; in addition, there is an overriding aspect which is their creative generosity. It’s a generosity I’ve personally experienced for as long as I’ve worked with them.”
During the March 1-2 concerts in Buenos Aires, Argentina (River Plate Stadium), the production team set up unobtrusively for mid- to long-distance shots, capturing the performances onstage and the passionate reactions of 80,000 fans from nine digital 3-D camera systems.
“The challenge of working with U2 and digital 3-D technology on this film has been very exciting. When collaborating with U2 you walk a fine line between making art and reflecting the honesty of their performance,” said Owens. “The band has been involved in each step of the process and having this kind of commitment from them has been very encouraging for everyone working on the film. Between their passion for the project and our extraordinary team, I feel that together we have carved out a delicate and exquisite piece of film history.”
Photo © 3ality Digital Entertainment
SET LIST:
VERTIGO
BEAUTIFUL DAY
NEW YEAR’S DAY
SOMETIMES YOU CAN’T MAKE IT ON YOUR OWN
LOVE AND PEACE
SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY
BULLET THE BLUE SKY
MISS SARAJEVO
U.N. DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS
PRIDE (IN THE NAME OF LOVE)
WHERE THE STREETS HAVE NO NAME
ONE
THE FLY
WITH OR WITHOUT YOU
YAHWEH
rockhall
December 3, 2009
Jon and Peter Shapiro
This week, guest writer Jon Shapiro, Producer of the U2 3D movie (along with his brother, Peter Shapiro, John Modell and Director Catherine Owens) shares thoughts on the making of the groundbreaking movie, working with U2 and experiencing the movie in all its digital 3D glory– this time at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s new Foster Theater.
Through January 2, 2010, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is showing a film unlike any you’ve ever experienced (unless of course you’ve seen U2 3D before). I traveled to Cleveland to unveil it last month and was absolutely blown away by the technology and viewing experience in the Museum’s incredible new Foster Theater.
The first-ever live-action digital 3-D film, U2 3D places viewers within the pulsing energy of a U2 stadium concert. Combining innovative digital 3-D imagery and multi-channel surround sound with the excitement of a live U2 concert – shot in South America during the final leg of their “Vertigo” tour – it creates an immersive theatrical experience unlike any 3-D or concert film that has come before. Ushering in a new dimension of filmmaking, U2 3D takes viewers on an extraordinary journey they will never forget.
I’ve watched this movie more times than I can even recall (several dozen times to be sure…), and this was the best I’ve seen it.
Photo © 3ality Digital Entertainment
Here’s a behind the scenes look at the film:
Says director Catherine Owens, “Bono wanted to go somewhere magical with the creation of U2 3D,” seeking to intensify the already ecstatic feelings evoked by U2’s live concerts.
U2 3D came to life through the passion and production savvy of 3ality Digital, one of the world’s leading live-action, full service production companies specializing in advanced 3-D technology of which I am a proud co-founder. After shooting a single-camera test during an early “Vertigo” tour concert at the Anaheim Pond, we ultimately received the thumbs-up from U2 to have our huge production crew travel and shoot on the road with the band in South America, with Owens as director. “Bono felt that if we were going to do this right, we had to do it in South America, since the band’s presence after an eight-year hiatus from the continent was certain to draw vibrant and enthusiastic crowds” explained Peter Shapiro.
Photo © 3ality Digital Entertainment
With what became the largest collection of 3-D camera technology ever used on a single project, the production crew joined up with U2’s globe-trotting caravan for a month and shot the huge outdoor stadium shows (not seen in North America) at cities in four countries including Mexico City, Mexico; Sao Paulo, Brazil; Santiago, Chile; and Buenos Aires, Argentina.
After five days of shooting, however, what the production had was still not enough to create the experience that everyone envisioned.
I felt that this film should be a love letter to U2’s fans and that what we needed, ideally, was to set cameras onstage for intimate close-ups. What we needed was to shoot without an audience. That need was fulfilled by Bono who, along with the entire band, agreed to perform 10 songs in a cameras-only show the night before two public concerts in Buenos Aires. “It was an incredibly generous gesture, but not surprising,” said Owens. “U2 is about passion, politics and love; in addition, there is an overriding aspect which is their creative generosity. It’s a generosity I’ve personally experienced for as long as I’ve worked with them.”
During the March 1-2 concerts in Buenos Aires, Argentina (River Plate Stadium), the production team set up unobtrusively for mid- to long-distance shots, capturing the performances onstage and the passionate reactions of 80,000 fans from nine digital 3-D camera systems.
“The challenge of working with U2 and digital 3-D technology on this film has been very exciting. When collaborating with U2 you walk a fine line between making art and reflecting the honesty of their performance,” said Owens. “The band has been involved in each step of the process and having this kind of commitment from them has been very encouraging for everyone working on the film. Between their passion for the project and our extraordinary team, I feel that together we have carved out a delicate and exquisite piece of film history.”
Photo © 3ality Digital Entertainment
SET LIST:
VERTIGO
BEAUTIFUL DAY
NEW YEAR’S DAY
SOMETIMES YOU CAN’T MAKE IT ON YOUR OWN
LOVE AND PEACE
SUNDAY BLOODY SUNDAY
BULLET THE BLUE SKY
MISS SARAJEVO
U.N. DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS
PRIDE (IN THE NAME OF LOVE)
WHERE THE STREETS HAVE NO NAME
ONE
THE FLY
WITH OR WITHOUT YOU
YAHWEH
rockhall
Lunch with the FT: Paul McGuinness
By Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson
Published: December 4 2009 15:28 | Last updated: December 4 2009 15:28
“I figured out bad wine costs the same as good wine, so why not learn about it,” says Paul McGuinness as he orders a $69 bottle of Oregon pinot noir. “I probably imposed that on the young U2. We had a practice when we were first touring. We’d economise on hotels but go to good restaurants.”
More than three decades and 140m records after McGuinness, now 58, started managing four Dublin teenagers, the world’s most successful band stay in rather better hotels and he has been able to put his money where his mouth is, as an early investor in the Michelin-starred Manhattan restaurant where we now sit.
It has taken us three hours to get to our corner table in the Spotted Pig, which feels more of a village inn than the London gastropubs it is supposed to resemble. McGuinness had suggested we meet first at Madison Square Garden to watch U2 rehearse for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s 25th anniversary show.
In an almost empty arena, I have been granted a private concert and a glimpse of why McGuinness is one of the few people in the miserable modern music industry to be noted for their business acumen.
EDITOR’S CHOICE
More from Lunch with the FT - Jun-12Jon Landau, Bruce Springsteen’s manager since 1974, approaches as we watch U2 warm up. “The thing I dislike about Paul is, before he came along, I liked to think I was the best manager in the world,” he jokes. “Now Bruce likes to say, ‘I call my manager the American Paul McGuinness.’”
Elvis had Colonel Tom Parker, and John, Paul, George and Ringo had Brian Epstein. McGuinness is U2’s fifth Beatle. He claims no creative role but can take credit for a series of eye-catching deals that have led to U2-branded iPods, 3D concert films, a 12-year touring deal with Live Nation, sponsorship from BlackBerry and, just before we meet, the first concert streamed live on YouTube, which was seen by 10m people around the world. Most importantly, Landau adds, McGuinness locked down the band’s master recordings and lucrative publishing rights.
On stage, I have watched Bono, the Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen run through a lengthy set with guests including Springsteen and Patti Smith. Mick Jagger, the only man who competes with U2’s stadium-filling ability, has prowled about the stage with Fergie, the lead singer with the Black Eyed Peas. She has floored everybody with a scorching assault on the opening bars of “Gimme Shelter”.
“Holy cow, Batgirl!” Bono says when she’s finished gyrating. The Black Eyed Peas supported U2 at the end of the tour that has wrapped up days before we meet, and McGuinness calls out, “Nailed it!” as the leather-clad vocalist walks past, earning a grin from behind her shades. “She’s notorious and scary and a lot of fun,” he tells me approvingly before we leave.
It is almost 3pm when our car draws up outside the small creeper-clad corner site in the West Village. The Spotted Pig is packed, we are famished, and McGuinness wastes little time in steering me to the best-known dish. “The gnudi!” He pronounces it – the “g” is silent – with naughty relish. In his striped wool tie, black shirt and corduroy jacket, McGuinness doesn’t look as if he hangs out with rock stars but he does look as if he enjoys his food.
There is a chill in the air, and the pumpkin and serrano ham salad sounds comforting, so I order that followed by the gnudi – plump dumplings stuffed with ricotta. McGuinness picks smoked haddock chowder and gnudi.
Like most of his deals, his involvement with the restaurant has paid off. “It has long since repaid its syndicate of investors,” he says. “It’s a combination of the atmosphere, the decor, the pricing, which is low for a Michelin-starred restaurant, and the very straightforward, English approach to the food.”
He sniffs the wine unfussily as he tells me how he got involved through the Spotted Pig’s co-owner, Ken Friedman, a one-time manager of the Smiths and a close friend. McGuinness, it turns out, is a man of many useful friends. (As he runs me through the story of how he came to U2 he loses me in a list of names as long as the cast of an Irish Russian novel).
McGuinness met U2 at a Dublin gig in 1978 – they were supporting a band his sister managed. “They were doing quite badly what they now do well,” he says. “Edge was playing notes rather than chords – this was punk and it was almost frowned upon to be playing individual melodies. Bono was very keen to make eye contact, and physical contact sometimes, with the audience. He was very hungry for making them look at him. He was then and is now an exhibitionist, as all great performers ought to be. It was just quite exceptional.”
McGuinness, who was managing a now forgotten folk rock band named Spud, signed them up in the pub next door, over pints the band members were too young to be drinking, and laid down some business rules. “I recommended very strongly that they split everything because I’d read about other bands where there were officers and men – the Rolling Stones being a classic example, and the Beatles – where the songwriting members of the group earned significantly more than the others.”
From their first deal, all four were credited as writers. “It has stood them in very good stead because it backs up the democracy of a decision if everyone’s making the same amount of money,” McGuinness says.
Unusually, McGuinness negotiated an equal share for himself. Do you still get 20 per cent, I ask? Apparently not. “That was, in fact, reviewed later,” he says. “I had to build the management company, and they had to build the production organisation that makes the records and does the tours. If our overheads were going to be intertwined, that would be to ignore the reality. There should always be a division between client and manager.”
Those rights McGuinness did not secure for the band at the start, he doggedly clawed back as deals came up for renewal, using the band’s strengthened negotiating position.
“It was partly a moral thing,” he says, sounding for the first time a little like Bono. “You’d see a writer complain helplessly when his work was used in an inappropriate way, and we were determined that would never happen to us.”
Our first course arrives, and he invites me to try his rich chowder, decorated with crackers and shredded rocket. I offer a forkful from my plate – the roasted pumpkin is warm, the ham salty and the toasted pumpkin seeds appealingly nutty.
McGuinness has emerged as a vocal campaigner for internet service providers to pay up for the music consumed over their networks, an idea that has gained support since he raised it in a speech two years ago. Publishers’ drive to be paid for their content, symbolised by Rupert Murdoch’s talk of online subscriptions, has helped, he notes, although he says it is a pity that the News Corp chairman’s “road to Damascus conversion” did not take place sooner.
So why give away valuable content, such as a concert, online? “We don’t quite give it away,” he corrects me. YouTube will pay royalties to Universal Music, U2’s record label and publisher, and share advertising revenues. It is pointless to try to stop fans posting concert clips online, he argues. What is possible, he says, is to expect ISPs to pay rights holders their dues.
McGuinness, who was born in Germany to a military family and lived in Malta, Aden and England before going to Ireland’s Clongowes Wood College, is unsparing in his criticism of how the clashing agendas of Europe’s member states have delayed changes sought by his industry.
“As the EU expands, it is clearly the case that these small, peripheral nations have no significant cultural heritage to protect in an international context, whereas Germany, France, Britain and Ireland certainly do,” he says bluntly, in an accent more English than Irish. “When the Czech Republic held the EU presidency, for example, simply by not tabling a motion on [copyright] term extension, they were able to defeat it. The Czechs!”
Our plates are cleared away and McGuinness snaffles a stray piece of rocket stranded on the table between us. The soup has made him hot and he wipes a hand across his brow.
I ask about U2’s latest album, No Line on the Horizon, which was released in February this year and has sold fewer copies than any album by the band for a decade. “We were not anticipating that we would not have a hit single to drive the record,” McGuinness admits. “That was an unpleasant surprise.”
Our gnudi arrive in a brown butter sauce with a few crisp sage leaves on top. “Isn’t that wonderful – the gnudi?” he asks, enjoying the word again. The album has still sold more than 4m copies, he says, but he doesn’t hide his disappointment. “It didn’t work in the marketplace. It worked creatively, I think. If people give themselves the treat of sitting down with big speakers, playing it properly and giving it the time that an album needs, I think it’s a magnificent record.”
Few people now listen that way, he laments, but they will pay an average of $100 a ticket to see U2 in concert, even in an uncertain economy. In 44 sold-out dates since June, the band played to 3.2m people, for a gross of about $320m. Running the numbers aloud, McGuinness calculates that with a similar number of dates planned for next year, the tour should gross about $750m including merchandise sales, smashing the $389m record set by U2’s Vertigo tour in 2005 and 2006.
It has done so in part by using a 360º stage to increase each venue’s capacity by a fifth. Partly because of the custom-built, claw-shaped set, the tour costs are about $750,000 a day, “whether we play or not”. The tour should still be “highly profitable ... but very often that gross figure is carelessly written about as having gone straight into Bono’s pocket”. Our clean plates are taken away. It is after 4pm and it seems no table has emptied since we arrived. McGuinness orders a double espresso and I ask for an Earl Grey tea; his appearance may be rumpled but there is ruthlessness in his eye as he tells me about the importance of attention to detail when auditing the band’s payments from record companies and publishers: “On not one of those occasions did we fail to uncover an underpayment.”
Don’t such tricks help explain why people feel labels are just getting their comeuppance? “All right, it’s been the law of the jungle many times,” McGuinness says as our drinks arrive. “But what dismays me a little about the online universe is that these corporations, like Google and MySpace and Apple, don’t have anything that’s the equivalent of artist relations.”
One day, tech groups will have their own talent scouts and digital versions of record labels, he predicts. For now, the “great cultural collisions” taking place worry him. “I find I’m often dealing with [technology] executives who are really quite careless and frequently arrogant about the cultural impact of what they’re doing. I wish there were an atmosphere of nurturing and respect, which I really don’t see.”
Our waitress brings a candle. It’s late autumn in New York, and starting to get dark. McGuinness, who is married with two adult children, will soon fly back to his homes in Dublin and London and I ask what he has planned before the tour starts again in May. A stalled Spiderman musical, written by Bono and Edge, backed by McGuinness, should open on Broadway in the spring, and the band is talking about delivering another album very soon. “If they pull it off, that would be great, but I’ve learnt over the years to plan for all eventualities,” he says.
I ask for the bill, as McGuinness tells me his own musical tastes run from the Rollling Stones’ Exile on Main Street to the sung Latin mass at London’s Brompton Oratory. “There is no check,” the waitress tells her investor, and considerable confusion ensues. “No, I’m afraid that’s no good. Do you ever see that column in the Financial Times called Lunch with the FT? They have to pay. Oh that is funny.” He is still chuckling as I hand my card over (just the tea and coffee end up being free) and ask whether he’ll ever retire.
“Oh, I’d hate to. People used to think that rock and roll was music for teenagers. But we’ve just come from Madison Square Garden where Sir Mick was performing aged 66. I’m always delighted when Mick makes a record or does a tour because he makes U2 look so much younger.”
Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson is the FT’s media editor
ft
By Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson
Published: December 4 2009 15:28 | Last updated: December 4 2009 15:28
“I figured out bad wine costs the same as good wine, so why not learn about it,” says Paul McGuinness as he orders a $69 bottle of Oregon pinot noir. “I probably imposed that on the young U2. We had a practice when we were first touring. We’d economise on hotels but go to good restaurants.”
More than three decades and 140m records after McGuinness, now 58, started managing four Dublin teenagers, the world’s most successful band stay in rather better hotels and he has been able to put his money where his mouth is, as an early investor in the Michelin-starred Manhattan restaurant where we now sit.
It has taken us three hours to get to our corner table in the Spotted Pig, which feels more of a village inn than the London gastropubs it is supposed to resemble. McGuinness had suggested we meet first at Madison Square Garden to watch U2 rehearse for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s 25th anniversary show.
In an almost empty arena, I have been granted a private concert and a glimpse of why McGuinness is one of the few people in the miserable modern music industry to be noted for their business acumen.
EDITOR’S CHOICE
More from Lunch with the FT - Jun-12Jon Landau, Bruce Springsteen’s manager since 1974, approaches as we watch U2 warm up. “The thing I dislike about Paul is, before he came along, I liked to think I was the best manager in the world,” he jokes. “Now Bruce likes to say, ‘I call my manager the American Paul McGuinness.’”
Elvis had Colonel Tom Parker, and John, Paul, George and Ringo had Brian Epstein. McGuinness is U2’s fifth Beatle. He claims no creative role but can take credit for a series of eye-catching deals that have led to U2-branded iPods, 3D concert films, a 12-year touring deal with Live Nation, sponsorship from BlackBerry and, just before we meet, the first concert streamed live on YouTube, which was seen by 10m people around the world. Most importantly, Landau adds, McGuinness locked down the band’s master recordings and lucrative publishing rights.
On stage, I have watched Bono, the Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen run through a lengthy set with guests including Springsteen and Patti Smith. Mick Jagger, the only man who competes with U2’s stadium-filling ability, has prowled about the stage with Fergie, the lead singer with the Black Eyed Peas. She has floored everybody with a scorching assault on the opening bars of “Gimme Shelter”.
“Holy cow, Batgirl!” Bono says when she’s finished gyrating. The Black Eyed Peas supported U2 at the end of the tour that has wrapped up days before we meet, and McGuinness calls out, “Nailed it!” as the leather-clad vocalist walks past, earning a grin from behind her shades. “She’s notorious and scary and a lot of fun,” he tells me approvingly before we leave.
It is almost 3pm when our car draws up outside the small creeper-clad corner site in the West Village. The Spotted Pig is packed, we are famished, and McGuinness wastes little time in steering me to the best-known dish. “The gnudi!” He pronounces it – the “g” is silent – with naughty relish. In his striped wool tie, black shirt and corduroy jacket, McGuinness doesn’t look as if he hangs out with rock stars but he does look as if he enjoys his food.
There is a chill in the air, and the pumpkin and serrano ham salad sounds comforting, so I order that followed by the gnudi – plump dumplings stuffed with ricotta. McGuinness picks smoked haddock chowder and gnudi.
Like most of his deals, his involvement with the restaurant has paid off. “It has long since repaid its syndicate of investors,” he says. “It’s a combination of the atmosphere, the decor, the pricing, which is low for a Michelin-starred restaurant, and the very straightforward, English approach to the food.”
He sniffs the wine unfussily as he tells me how he got involved through the Spotted Pig’s co-owner, Ken Friedman, a one-time manager of the Smiths and a close friend. McGuinness, it turns out, is a man of many useful friends. (As he runs me through the story of how he came to U2 he loses me in a list of names as long as the cast of an Irish Russian novel).
McGuinness met U2 at a Dublin gig in 1978 – they were supporting a band his sister managed. “They were doing quite badly what they now do well,” he says. “Edge was playing notes rather than chords – this was punk and it was almost frowned upon to be playing individual melodies. Bono was very keen to make eye contact, and physical contact sometimes, with the audience. He was very hungry for making them look at him. He was then and is now an exhibitionist, as all great performers ought to be. It was just quite exceptional.”
McGuinness, who was managing a now forgotten folk rock band named Spud, signed them up in the pub next door, over pints the band members were too young to be drinking, and laid down some business rules. “I recommended very strongly that they split everything because I’d read about other bands where there were officers and men – the Rolling Stones being a classic example, and the Beatles – where the songwriting members of the group earned significantly more than the others.”
From their first deal, all four were credited as writers. “It has stood them in very good stead because it backs up the democracy of a decision if everyone’s making the same amount of money,” McGuinness says.
Unusually, McGuinness negotiated an equal share for himself. Do you still get 20 per cent, I ask? Apparently not. “That was, in fact, reviewed later,” he says. “I had to build the management company, and they had to build the production organisation that makes the records and does the tours. If our overheads were going to be intertwined, that would be to ignore the reality. There should always be a division between client and manager.”
Those rights McGuinness did not secure for the band at the start, he doggedly clawed back as deals came up for renewal, using the band’s strengthened negotiating position.
“It was partly a moral thing,” he says, sounding for the first time a little like Bono. “You’d see a writer complain helplessly when his work was used in an inappropriate way, and we were determined that would never happen to us.”
Our first course arrives, and he invites me to try his rich chowder, decorated with crackers and shredded rocket. I offer a forkful from my plate – the roasted pumpkin is warm, the ham salty and the toasted pumpkin seeds appealingly nutty.
McGuinness has emerged as a vocal campaigner for internet service providers to pay up for the music consumed over their networks, an idea that has gained support since he raised it in a speech two years ago. Publishers’ drive to be paid for their content, symbolised by Rupert Murdoch’s talk of online subscriptions, has helped, he notes, although he says it is a pity that the News Corp chairman’s “road to Damascus conversion” did not take place sooner.
So why give away valuable content, such as a concert, online? “We don’t quite give it away,” he corrects me. YouTube will pay royalties to Universal Music, U2’s record label and publisher, and share advertising revenues. It is pointless to try to stop fans posting concert clips online, he argues. What is possible, he says, is to expect ISPs to pay rights holders their dues.
McGuinness, who was born in Germany to a military family and lived in Malta, Aden and England before going to Ireland’s Clongowes Wood College, is unsparing in his criticism of how the clashing agendas of Europe’s member states have delayed changes sought by his industry.
“As the EU expands, it is clearly the case that these small, peripheral nations have no significant cultural heritage to protect in an international context, whereas Germany, France, Britain and Ireland certainly do,” he says bluntly, in an accent more English than Irish. “When the Czech Republic held the EU presidency, for example, simply by not tabling a motion on [copyright] term extension, they were able to defeat it. The Czechs!”
Our plates are cleared away and McGuinness snaffles a stray piece of rocket stranded on the table between us. The soup has made him hot and he wipes a hand across his brow.
I ask about U2’s latest album, No Line on the Horizon, which was released in February this year and has sold fewer copies than any album by the band for a decade. “We were not anticipating that we would not have a hit single to drive the record,” McGuinness admits. “That was an unpleasant surprise.”
Our gnudi arrive in a brown butter sauce with a few crisp sage leaves on top. “Isn’t that wonderful – the gnudi?” he asks, enjoying the word again. The album has still sold more than 4m copies, he says, but he doesn’t hide his disappointment. “It didn’t work in the marketplace. It worked creatively, I think. If people give themselves the treat of sitting down with big speakers, playing it properly and giving it the time that an album needs, I think it’s a magnificent record.”
Few people now listen that way, he laments, but they will pay an average of $100 a ticket to see U2 in concert, even in an uncertain economy. In 44 sold-out dates since June, the band played to 3.2m people, for a gross of about $320m. Running the numbers aloud, McGuinness calculates that with a similar number of dates planned for next year, the tour should gross about $750m including merchandise sales, smashing the $389m record set by U2’s Vertigo tour in 2005 and 2006.
It has done so in part by using a 360º stage to increase each venue’s capacity by a fifth. Partly because of the custom-built, claw-shaped set, the tour costs are about $750,000 a day, “whether we play or not”. The tour should still be “highly profitable ... but very often that gross figure is carelessly written about as having gone straight into Bono’s pocket”. Our clean plates are taken away. It is after 4pm and it seems no table has emptied since we arrived. McGuinness orders a double espresso and I ask for an Earl Grey tea; his appearance may be rumpled but there is ruthlessness in his eye as he tells me about the importance of attention to detail when auditing the band’s payments from record companies and publishers: “On not one of those occasions did we fail to uncover an underpayment.”
Don’t such tricks help explain why people feel labels are just getting their comeuppance? “All right, it’s been the law of the jungle many times,” McGuinness says as our drinks arrive. “But what dismays me a little about the online universe is that these corporations, like Google and MySpace and Apple, don’t have anything that’s the equivalent of artist relations.”
One day, tech groups will have their own talent scouts and digital versions of record labels, he predicts. For now, the “great cultural collisions” taking place worry him. “I find I’m often dealing with [technology] executives who are really quite careless and frequently arrogant about the cultural impact of what they’re doing. I wish there were an atmosphere of nurturing and respect, which I really don’t see.”
Our waitress brings a candle. It’s late autumn in New York, and starting to get dark. McGuinness, who is married with two adult children, will soon fly back to his homes in Dublin and London and I ask what he has planned before the tour starts again in May. A stalled Spiderman musical, written by Bono and Edge, backed by McGuinness, should open on Broadway in the spring, and the band is talking about delivering another album very soon. “If they pull it off, that would be great, but I’ve learnt over the years to plan for all eventualities,” he says.
I ask for the bill, as McGuinness tells me his own musical tastes run from the Rollling Stones’ Exile on Main Street to the sung Latin mass at London’s Brompton Oratory. “There is no check,” the waitress tells her investor, and considerable confusion ensues. “No, I’m afraid that’s no good. Do you ever see that column in the Financial Times called Lunch with the FT? They have to pay. Oh that is funny.” He is still chuckling as I hand my card over (just the tea and coffee end up being free) and ask whether he’ll ever retire.
“Oh, I’d hate to. People used to think that rock and roll was music for teenagers. But we’ve just come from Madison Square Garden where Sir Mick was performing aged 66. I’m always delighted when Mick makes a record or does a tour because he makes U2 look so much younger.”
Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson is the FT’s media editor
ft
Bono’s New (RED) Collaboration With Nike
December 1, 2009
(RED) is the new black, according to U2’s front man Bono, and Nike couldn’t agree more. The singer and co-founder of the (RED) brand, whose proceeds benefit the fight against AIDS in Africa, attended a press conference in London on Monday to announce a partnership with the sportswear company. The first (Nike) RED product to hit the market is simple, affordable, red shoelaces. “This is a very big day for everyone involved in the fight against AIDS,” said Bono at Niketown’s British flagship. “Nike is about winning and if we keep our concentration over the next few years, things might start to turn around.” With Chelsea footballer Didier Drogba modeling the new laces by his side, Bono said he couldn’t wait to announce more (RED) collaborations and told PEOPLE that he’s even persuaded one of his favorite new artists to participate. “Lady Gaga is the latest (RED) warrior to get involved,” Bono told PEOPLE at the launch. “You know Dr. Dre did those Beats headphones, the big ones, you see people wearing round their neck? Well, Lady Gaga is launching her own (RED) headphones and they are the best sound money can buy.” (Nike) RED laces are $4 and are available starting today at Nike stores and key retailers worldwide. Tell us: will you buy (Nike) RED laces?–Monique Jessen
stylenews
December 1, 2009
(RED) is the new black, according to U2’s front man Bono, and Nike couldn’t agree more. The singer and co-founder of the (RED) brand, whose proceeds benefit the fight against AIDS in Africa, attended a press conference in London on Monday to announce a partnership with the sportswear company. The first (Nike) RED product to hit the market is simple, affordable, red shoelaces. “This is a very big day for everyone involved in the fight against AIDS,” said Bono at Niketown’s British flagship. “Nike is about winning and if we keep our concentration over the next few years, things might start to turn around.” With Chelsea footballer Didier Drogba modeling the new laces by his side, Bono said he couldn’t wait to announce more (RED) collaborations and told PEOPLE that he’s even persuaded one of his favorite new artists to participate. “Lady Gaga is the latest (RED) warrior to get involved,” Bono told PEOPLE at the launch. “You know Dr. Dre did those Beats headphones, the big ones, you see people wearing round their neck? Well, Lady Gaga is launching her own (RED) headphones and they are the best sound money can buy.” (Nike) RED laces are $4 and are available starting today at Nike stores and key retailers worldwide. Tell us: will you buy (Nike) RED laces?–Monique Jessen
stylenews
1.12.09
Bono and Wyclef Jean Receive RFK Center for Justice & Human Rights' Ripple of Hope Award
Honor Recognizes Courageous and Innovative Approaches to Human Rights
NEW YORK, Nov. 19 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Last night at its annual awards dinner, the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights presented Bono and Wyclef Jean with the organization's 2009 Ripple of Hope Award. The award recognizes the bold leadership demonstrated by the two honorees on humanitarian issues.
(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20091119/DC149610)
"As champions of justice, Bono and Wyclef have brought the national spotlight to human rights violations, empowered local activists, and transformed the lives of millions of people living in poverty from Port-Au-Prince to Darfur," said Kerry Kennedy, founder of the RFK Center for Justice and Human Rights. "Their efforts evoke the spirit of my father and we are honored to recognize them."
Jenni Williams, founder of Women of Zimbabwe Arise and 2009 RFK Human Rights Award winner, introduced Bono who was then presented the award by Ethel Kennedy. Bono, the lead singer of U2 and co-founder of the advocacy organization ONE and (Product) RED, was recognized for his efforts in the fight against extreme poverty and preventable disease, particularly in Africa (www.one.org, www.joinred.com).
"Though we're not usually that partial to Royals, growing up in Ireland in the 70s, the Kennedy family felt like an Irish royal family. Bobby Kennedy was a super-hero, an Irish scrapper who didn't see any contradiction between hard-headed pragmatism and an idealism that challenged all of us to change the world. That's why the Ripple of Hope award means so much. RFK was the blue print for our activism in the ONE campaign," Bono said. "The image of Bobby that will forever be in my mind is of a man with his sleeves rolled up, hard at work and showing a hint of muscle. His life is an enduring challenge to all of us to do more, get beyond ourselves and send out our own ripples of hope to the world."
Loune Viaud, who received the RFK Human Rights Award in 2002 for her work in Haiti, introduced her fellow countryman, Wyclef Jean. Jean was recognized for his work to strengthen and inspire change in Haiti through his Yele Haiti organization (www.yele.org).
"It is an honor to receive this award for so many reasons," said Jean, who was also the evening's musical performer. "The Kennedy Family and Robert F. Kennedy have represented and fought for the rights of people around the world, and have paid the ultimate sacrifice for it. I am humbled by their work, and use it as an example in the work I continue to do in Haiti, the United States, Africa and around the globe. I look forward to working closely with Kerry Kennedy and the RFK Center for Justice and Human Rights in Haiti as a part of our Yele Center."
The evening was emceed by actor Peter Gallagher and included monologues based on the play "Speak Truth to Power" performed by Matthew Modine, Matt McCoy, Joey Pantoliano and Gloria Reuben. There was also a special tribute to Senator Edward Kennedy, who served as a member of the RFK Board of Directors from 1968 until his passing this year.
Other guests included Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Governor Jon Corzine, Harry Belafonte, Martha Stewart, Bill O'Reilly, Ana Ortiz, Aasif Mandvi, Liya Kebede, Earl Graves, Terry Kinney, Rebecca Minkoff, Charles Nolan, Richard Plepler, Tom Freston and Orin Kramer.
The evening concluded with a rousing rendition of "Redemption Song" by Wyclef and Bono, and a performance of "Carnival" by Wyclef that brought the entire crowd of over 800 people - including Ethel Kennedy - to their feet singing and dancing.
The RFK Center for Justice and Human Rights is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the human rights movement through innovative support to human rights defenders around the world. With an over forty-year track record of attaining concrete results on cutting-edge social justice issues, the RFK Center carries forward Robert F. Kennedy's vision of a more just and peaceful world. To learn more about the RFK Center, please visit www.rfkcenter.org.
SOURCE RFK Memorial Center for Human Rights
prnewswire
Honor Recognizes Courageous and Innovative Approaches to Human Rights
NEW YORK, Nov. 19 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Last night at its annual awards dinner, the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights presented Bono and Wyclef Jean with the organization's 2009 Ripple of Hope Award. The award recognizes the bold leadership demonstrated by the two honorees on humanitarian issues.
(Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20091119/DC149610)
"As champions of justice, Bono and Wyclef have brought the national spotlight to human rights violations, empowered local activists, and transformed the lives of millions of people living in poverty from Port-Au-Prince to Darfur," said Kerry Kennedy, founder of the RFK Center for Justice and Human Rights. "Their efforts evoke the spirit of my father and we are honored to recognize them."
Jenni Williams, founder of Women of Zimbabwe Arise and 2009 RFK Human Rights Award winner, introduced Bono who was then presented the award by Ethel Kennedy. Bono, the lead singer of U2 and co-founder of the advocacy organization ONE and (Product) RED, was recognized for his efforts in the fight against extreme poverty and preventable disease, particularly in Africa (www.one.org, www.joinred.com).
"Though we're not usually that partial to Royals, growing up in Ireland in the 70s, the Kennedy family felt like an Irish royal family. Bobby Kennedy was a super-hero, an Irish scrapper who didn't see any contradiction between hard-headed pragmatism and an idealism that challenged all of us to change the world. That's why the Ripple of Hope award means so much. RFK was the blue print for our activism in the ONE campaign," Bono said. "The image of Bobby that will forever be in my mind is of a man with his sleeves rolled up, hard at work and showing a hint of muscle. His life is an enduring challenge to all of us to do more, get beyond ourselves and send out our own ripples of hope to the world."
Loune Viaud, who received the RFK Human Rights Award in 2002 for her work in Haiti, introduced her fellow countryman, Wyclef Jean. Jean was recognized for his work to strengthen and inspire change in Haiti through his Yele Haiti organization (www.yele.org).
"It is an honor to receive this award for so many reasons," said Jean, who was also the evening's musical performer. "The Kennedy Family and Robert F. Kennedy have represented and fought for the rights of people around the world, and have paid the ultimate sacrifice for it. I am humbled by their work, and use it as an example in the work I continue to do in Haiti, the United States, Africa and around the globe. I look forward to working closely with Kerry Kennedy and the RFK Center for Justice and Human Rights in Haiti as a part of our Yele Center."
The evening was emceed by actor Peter Gallagher and included monologues based on the play "Speak Truth to Power" performed by Matthew Modine, Matt McCoy, Joey Pantoliano and Gloria Reuben. There was also a special tribute to Senator Edward Kennedy, who served as a member of the RFK Board of Directors from 1968 until his passing this year.
Other guests included Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Governor Jon Corzine, Harry Belafonte, Martha Stewart, Bill O'Reilly, Ana Ortiz, Aasif Mandvi, Liya Kebede, Earl Graves, Terry Kinney, Rebecca Minkoff, Charles Nolan, Richard Plepler, Tom Freston and Orin Kramer.
The evening concluded with a rousing rendition of "Redemption Song" by Wyclef and Bono, and a performance of "Carnival" by Wyclef that brought the entire crowd of over 800 people - including Ethel Kennedy - to their feet singing and dancing.
The RFK Center for Justice and Human Rights is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the human rights movement through innovative support to human rights defenders around the world. With an over forty-year track record of attaining concrete results on cutting-edge social justice issues, the RFK Center carries forward Robert F. Kennedy's vision of a more just and peaceful world. To learn more about the RFK Center, please visit www.rfkcenter.org.
SOURCE RFK Memorial Center for Human Rights
prnewswire
Bono’s Biggest Influence is His Wife
November 19th, 2009 12:56 pm / Author: Valerie Nome
Bono’s charity work is renowned worldwide, but the most influential person in his life these days is his wife, Ali Hewson, whom he wed in 1982.
“Getting me out tonight was my Mrs.,” the U2 frontman tells me in a lilting Irish accent Wednesday during the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights Ripple of Hope Awards dinner held at NYC’s Pier Sixty at Chelsea Piers.
He laughs, “She wears really, really attractive underwear.”
The powerhouse musician/philanthropist and Ali have four kids including Jordan, 20, Memphis, 18, Elijah, 10, and John, 8. Along with Wyclef Jean, he’s being honored with the Ripple of Hope Award for his charitable efforts.
In the giving back arena, Wyclef looks up to the late Michael Jackson.
“I don’t think we should’ve ever stopped giving him awards, you know what I mean?” the Yele Haiti founder says. “When you see stuff like what Michael’s done, it makes us feel like we’re just getting started, and it’s our duty as human beings to keep doing what we’re doing.”
What does the recognition mean to them?
“Actually, the honor is for the people, and we’re here for the representation of the people and the fact that we can be recognized sends that signal to the world that there are people that care,” Wyclef says. “Every time this happens, it definitely puts a boost on our back to know that the job is just getting started and we have a long way to go.”
Bono adds, “We represent a movement in our different spheres of people who got organized and got busy and put on their marching boots, and that’s the thing I’m excited about. For me, at the One campaign, two-and-a-half million Americans signed up for that. I’m here to represent them, really.”
Why is it important for celebs to raise awareness?
“I think it’s important for everybody,” Bono says. “Everybody has something to offer. I’m as jaded as anyone by famous faces and posing in photographs with vulnerable kids, but sometimes that’s what it takes.”
Hm, how are Wyclef’s charitable pals Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie doing?
“I don’t know, I’ve gotta call them,” he says. “I do miss them.”
okmagazine
November 19th, 2009 12:56 pm / Author: Valerie Nome
Bono’s charity work is renowned worldwide, but the most influential person in his life these days is his wife, Ali Hewson, whom he wed in 1982.
“Getting me out tonight was my Mrs.,” the U2 frontman tells me in a lilting Irish accent Wednesday during the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights Ripple of Hope Awards dinner held at NYC’s Pier Sixty at Chelsea Piers.
He laughs, “She wears really, really attractive underwear.”
The powerhouse musician/philanthropist and Ali have four kids including Jordan, 20, Memphis, 18, Elijah, 10, and John, 8. Along with Wyclef Jean, he’s being honored with the Ripple of Hope Award for his charitable efforts.
In the giving back arena, Wyclef looks up to the late Michael Jackson.
“I don’t think we should’ve ever stopped giving him awards, you know what I mean?” the Yele Haiti founder says. “When you see stuff like what Michael’s done, it makes us feel like we’re just getting started, and it’s our duty as human beings to keep doing what we’re doing.”
What does the recognition mean to them?
“Actually, the honor is for the people, and we’re here for the representation of the people and the fact that we can be recognized sends that signal to the world that there are people that care,” Wyclef says. “Every time this happens, it definitely puts a boost on our back to know that the job is just getting started and we have a long way to go.”
Bono adds, “We represent a movement in our different spheres of people who got organized and got busy and put on their marching boots, and that’s the thing I’m excited about. For me, at the One campaign, two-and-a-half million Americans signed up for that. I’m here to represent them, really.”
Why is it important for celebs to raise awareness?
“I think it’s important for everybody,” Bono says. “Everybody has something to offer. I’m as jaded as anyone by famous faces and posing in photographs with vulnerable kids, but sometimes that’s what it takes.”
Hm, how are Wyclef’s charitable pals Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie doing?
“I don’t know, I’ve gotta call them,” he says. “I do miss them.”
okmagazine
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