Sunday, August 30, 2020

Death haunts singles from U2 and The Ruts

U2: A Day Without Me


In August of 1980, U2 released its first Steve Lillywhite produced single ,  "A Day Without Me",  from the forthcoming debut album  b/w an instrumental called "Things To Make And Do". 

Though the song predates the suicide of Joy Division's late frontman Ian Curtis, Bono tells Sounds 

"'A Day Without Me' is about  Ian Curtis. It's the image of death, of the landslide. You're really not that important, after death even your friends and relations will soon forget you. It's like the unimportance of the individual in terms of this world. The world doesn't care about the individual."





The Ruts  :  West One (Shine On Me)


At the end of August 1980, The Ruts were back in the UK charts with "West One (Shine On Me)", their final recording with Malcolm Owen, who had died a month earlier of a drug overdose. The single peaked at UK#43. A secret message was scratched in the wax "And now..." flipped with "...Ruts Da Capo". The band would henceforth be known as The Ruts DC.


No comments:

Post a Comment