More Eno Excerpts
Of the U2-centric type today. During the recording of the Passengers collaboration...
- "What I love about Ireland is that it brings out the best in me - maybe it's U2, who do that with everyone. Fascinating to see that, after all this time, there is still such courtesy, understanding and love between them. ... Bono as wildly ambitious as usual - within moments he inflates the Pavarotti/Modena project ["Miss Sarajevo," I believe?] into an enormous balloon carrying half the world's artists. Such visions - to make everything happen all at once, to tie together all his current ideas in the current proposal (even when that proposal is a 15 second soundtrack) are his talent. Larry, the realist, pricks the balloon to deflate it slightly and it descends somewhat - at least back into a possible atmosphere."
- "With the U2/Eno stuff you can finish it by putting more into it, but also by putting more round it. That's what makes the idea of film music attractive - it builds context and thus give the music 'reach.' It invites the listener to start constructing a visual and narrative space of the music. It 'grows' the music. So the approach might be to develop the imaginary context - by telling a story or threading voices - bits of invented dialogue - or ambient sound - bits of situations - through it all."
- Refers to himself and Edge as the "E-Notes" when they sing backup. Heh.
- On Bono and Edge, who are simultaneously working on the Goldeneye soundtrack: "They seem to flourish with too much to do at once - producing spurts of stamina and enthusiasm and making everyone believe in everything (sometimes sufficiently to pull it off!)"
- "Great risotto for dinner. Adam asked me which philosophers I was most interested in. I talked about Rorty a bit. Later he drove me to Bono's, where there was a birthday party for Marc Coleman. Funny that Adam still gets lost on the journey. ... That was an interesting evening. I went back up to the party, which was very friendly - a tender feeling but lots of laughing too. Bono and Edge and I talked about our (quite long now) relationship to date, and how we'd sort of overlooked telling each other how much we'd all enjoyed the ride. Bono said they'd learned so much from me, but I said I felt I'd done better out of the deal, being able to watch them working and getting on with each other. Edge later put his arm round me and said, 'Brian, you've got such a young spirit. I always love to see you and look forward to your visits. You are a really sweet man.' I was very touched by this. I guess I don't really expect to be liked."
- "[W]ent through gorse-golden hills to Paul's [McGuinness, I assume] for lunch. ... Adam driving me in one of his weird specialist cars - 2 mm above the ground and bumpy as hell. Of course we got lost, but the beauty of the day and the pleasure of Adam's conversation made that irrelevant. He was talking about Naomi [Campbell], and I admired the lack of any acrimony or covertness or self-aggrandizement at her expense. He's a very balanced person."