And the New U2 Album is Called…
Jam! Showbiz by John Sakamoto (1996-11-28)
After a series of seemingly endless delays, U2 has finished recording, mixing, and sequencing its breathlessly awaited new album and is currently mastering the disc for release on March 4.
In addition, a source in the band’s camp says the album has at least a tentative title, which is (drum roll please) “Pop.” (Hmm. They must’ve been up half the night thinking that one up.) However, as with all things involving U2, that could change at any minute.
Nonetheless, to commemorate hitting the home stretch — and perhaps to make light of the recent leak of two 30-second clips from the album on the Internet — the band’s U.K. record label has posted a suitably sardonic photo on their site, which reads: “Elvis has hacked his way out of the building …” It’s signed by all four band members.
Meanwhile, the real story behind the leak of those aforementioned clips, including one from the first single, “Discotheque”, is starting to surface. Contrary to a far-fetched report run by the Sunday London Times recently, nobody hacked into U2’s studio through the lines that have been beaming images out to the world via the above Island U.K. site.
It seems that a five-minute promo video was made up this summer when it still appeared that the U2 album would hit the stores in November. Once the release date was bumped to 1997, most of the copies were destroyed. However, one copy somehow ended u in the hands of a fan, who dubbed excerpts from two songs on the video and put them on his web site.
Once word got back to Island Records, the fan was contacted and asked to take the clips down. He did, but by that point, they had already been copied and downloaded onto dozens of sites around the world.
If you want to hear the full, official version of “Discotheque,” you’ll have to wait ‘til Jan. 15. That’s the date on which Island will beam the song out to radio stations around the world via satellite.
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