Song of the Day #1,632: ‘If You Wear That Velvet Dress’ – U2

u2_popToday’s track is one of my favorites from U2’s mostly forgettable 1997 album, Pop. It has a sleek, sexy groove, courtesy of Larry Mullen, Jr., and Adam Clayton’s subliminal rhythm section that kicks in about a minute and a half into the song.

I’ve always thought that this song is mixed too quiet for general consumption. If you listen to it on anything other than good headphones in an empty room, you’re going to miss half of it. And I think I mean that more as a compliment than a complaint.

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Song of the Day #888: ‘Wake Up Dead Man’ – U2

You can’t really have a theme week on religion in pop music and leave out Bono. U2 is certainly the most successful band to ever write so openly about god and faith and some of their best songs are deeply religious.

A favorite of mine is this little-known track from the under-rated 1997 album, Pop. Pop remains the band’s worst-selling album and even the band members themselves have dismissed it as a failed experiment that they released essentially unfinished.

But while it isn’t perfect, the album does go places sonically that the band hadn’t gone before and it contains some deeply heartfelt and provocative material.

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