Seven Songs for the Week #170 - 8th July 26

God, U2 fans can be a grind. If you haven't been paying attention, they dropped a surprise EP on Ash Wednesday, which was excellent, and said there was an album coming later this year. Then they dropped a second surprise EP on Good Friday and said there was still an album coming. Street of Dreams has been in the ether since May when they very publicly made a video in Mexico and most of the song could be heard from clips posted on social media, unfettered by U2. People started complaining. The single cover leaked about three weeks ago, and this time U2 did ask fan sites to take it down. More fans were complaining. Then fans started saying "oh they aren't going to put out Street of Dreams", "they are changing their minds" loads of parasocial stuff. Anyways, the single gets announced and released and even though we've had over an hour of excellent U2 music this year, easily their best stuff in 20 years, people are still moaning. Street of Dreams is a calling card, the album hasn't been announced yet, and all of this feels very organised. We'll get a second single in September, I guess, album in October and tour for 2027. Nothing is being left to chance. U2 have a new manager, which is interesting.

What year is it? From U2 to Madonna. The best thing I've heard from Confessions II.

Another unannounced Sugar single appeared this week, their third since their reunion was announced last year. I mean, that's 25% of an album so they might as well just got on with it.

The great unrealised Beatles song: written by George, demoed for the White Album, recorded by Jackie Lomax with a backing band of checks notes Paul, Ringo, George and Eric Clapton. Enterprising souls have grafted the vocal from George's demo onto this backing track, so it does exist as a Beatles song, in a way.

A band that has been crying out for a decent reissue programme, but when one was announced last year it seemed messy from the get go: A five CD set with the first two albums, the second one remixed, plus rarities and a remixed early compilation, or a three LP set with just the two albums (and packaged in a very strange manner without inner sleeves), or a limited edition blu-ray which again left off the bonus material. The end result was that I didn't bother. The Atmos mix for second album Second Thoughts is on Apple Music and is well worth checking out (Yes, I know streaming Atmos mixes are not the same quality as an Atmos mix on blu-ray, but life is so very short). The Atmos makes the album feel more alive. This song is great - back in January 2019 Neil & Liam Finn did a gig in Dublin's Olympia (Backed by the rest of the family, Elroy and Sharon) and they opened with this track - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dd_tA7g-jKU .

Saw my 30th Elvis Costello gig this week, made sure I was down the front to overcome any of the complaints that have been dogging the tour: EC in poor voice, bad sound. He was hoarse, but the gig was a hoot. When he went into Party Girl near the end, me and the stranger beside me were so happy, we yelled PARTY GIRL and high-fived. It was a great moment.

As a post script to last week's telephone playlist, this track was one of the many archaic songs in the pre-show playlist playing on the PA at the Elvis gig. You know the tune, did you know it was by Rose Murphy? I didn't.