Justified till we die
You and I will magnify
Oh, the magnificent?
Magnificent?
Magnificent

Magnificent
U2
No Line On The Horizon

No Line On The Horizon, the new studio album from U2, will be released on Monday 2nd March 2009. (Tuesday March 3 here in the States)

Written and recorded in various locations, No Line On The Horizon is the group’s 12th studio album and is their first release since the 9 million selling album How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, released in late 2004.

Sessions for No Line On The Horizon began last year in Fez, Morocco, continued in the band’s own studio in Dublin, before moving to New York’s Platinum Sound Recording Studios, and finally being completed at Olympic Studios in London.

The album calls on the production talents of long-time collaborators Brian Eno and Danny Lanois, with additional production by Steve Lillywhite.

from U2.com

Now if those in charge of the tour could schedule around the birth of my first born I would greatly appreciate it. Come to Dallas early spring or late summer guys. Just avoid the end of May/beginning of June. Pleeeeeeaaaaasssse!!!!

1) Press: Yours truly has gotten a little bit of press lately from the blog on some music sites. First, I was quoted by Spin magazine in an online editorial about the XM-Sirius merger. According to Spin I am “tuned in” to the issue. They even spelled my name right! Pretty cool. My original post can be seen here and the article from Spin can be found here.

Secondly, my story in my own voice was featured on the March 2nd edition of the @U2 podcast. The POPcast was celebrating the 10th anniversary of the release of U2′s POP album and the @U2 staff asked listeners to submit their favorite stories about the POP album or the tour, POPmart. I never thought in a million years that they would use my story but they did. You can listen to the podcast online or you can subscribe on iTunes. My part begins at around 54:20. Enjoy.

2) PlanetWisdom: I took my students to a great youth conference called PlanetWisdom last friday and saturday. The event was awesome. We had seats on the very front row and my students had a blast. The featured band was group named Addison Road and they totally rocked. The teaching times were solid and the whole event seemed to go flawlessly and smoothly especially from a youth leader’s perspective. It went so great that my students are already asking to go back next year.

On a related note, instead of driving back and forth from here to the conference, we stayed at my parent’s house.

Note to youth ministers out there: Burn all of your stuff from high school if you are going to let your youth group stay over at your parent’s house! They will find something that they think is hilarious. They will make fun of it. They will take pictures and post them on their Myspace pages. I’m just saying.

3) Bono-Fatigue I wouldn’t go so far as to diagnose what happened this weekend as Bono-fatigue but it was at least a case of over consumption. As I set out on my road trip I thought that it would be a great idea to listen to all of U2′s studio albums in a row without skipping any songs. Between Texas and Mississippi I listened to Boy, October, War, Under a Blood Red Sky, The Unforgettable Fire, The Joshua Tree, and Rattle and Hum. After All I Want is You finished playing I was about spent. “On the U2 timeline,” I thought, “this would be a natural break so I should probably quit this experiment right now before I just lose it.” On my return trip yesterday I picked up where I left off: Actung Baby, Zooropa, Pop, All That You Can’t Leave Behind, and How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb. Again maybe not fatigue but my tummy does hurt.

4) Saturday: I am completely stoked about heading out to Colorado to hit the slopes. We will be shooooshing down the mountain at Monarch starting this weekend. Can’t wait.

Meetings in Washington last Thursday between rock star Bono and Democrats, including Senate leader Harry Reid of Nevada, yielded a nice photo-op but not much else, according to Bono.

Bono, the U2 frontman and anti-poverty activist, was on Capitol Hill to seek assurances that $1 billion in planned U.S. spending to fight AIDS and malaria in Africa would not be lost if Congress freezes agency budgets in the coming year.

Bono said he also was seeking to close a “commitment gap” between what President Bush has requested for anti-poverty efforts and what Congress has agreed to spend in the past.

After meetings with incoming Senate Majority Leader Reid, House Speaker-to-be Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Democrats on the House Appropriations Committee, Bono said he came away empty-handed.

“I’m alarmed we could not get a commitment from the Democratic leadership to prevent the loss of $1 billion in the continuing resolution,” Bono said Thursday in a statement.

“I don’t know who to blame. Democrats are blaming Republicans. Republicans are blaming Democrats. But the million people who were expecting (mosquito) bed nets don’t know who to blame. They just know that a promise made by the United States to keep their families safe is in danger of being broken next year.”

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