Pink Floyd criticized them, Everclear mocked them, and Twitter had no idea who they were; now Foo Fighters’ Taylor Hawkins has joined the ranks of those who have expressed their distaste for U2’s latest album, Songs of Innocence.
Speaking with theMusic.com.au, Hawkins took issue with the widely maligned surprise release of the album via iTunes:
I mean, I think they probably thought it was gonna be a great idea, ‘Here’s the deal: everybody who has an iPhone, gets your record. And they get it for free!’ And they thought, probably, ‘Well that’s pretty awesome!’ but they didn’t really take into consideration the Big Brother feeling that kinda goes along with like, ‘[In menacing voice] You have the new U2 record’ … You couldn’t get rid of it and they actually had to come up with an app to get rid of it, that’s horrible.”
It wasn’t just the method of distribution that Hawkins found offensive, however, as he also questioned, “What happened to U2, man? I don’t think people are that hyped on them.” He said he has only listened to Songs of Innocence once, and didn’t find “anything great on it.” He added, “…it’s so marred by that whole sort of, like I said, Orwellian, 1984 extreme that it just kinda sounds like a fart any way you listen to it.”
Bono recently did a bit of back pedaling on a previous apology for the release, which he now calls “one of the proudest things for us ever.” Meanwhile, Foo Fighters just today released their own latest effort, Sonic Highways.
