Fender presents THE EDGE STRAT®

Enthralling millions worldwide with his acclaimed textural guitar work—as well as his knack for writing catchy riffs and hooks—U2 guitarist, The Edge, relies on his trusty Strat® guitar to sculpt his unique sound. Designed in close collaboration with Fender®, The Edge Strat is his new constant companion, replacing his favored vintage Fender instruments onstage in arenas around the world.

An innovatively supercharged instrument, the Edge Strat is engineered for top-notch performance with versatile tone and effortless playing feel. A pair of special Custom Shop Fat 50s single-coil pickups with flat-staggered polepieces for personalized string response sits in the neck and middle position, cranking out versatile tone with enhanced bass response. A powerful DiMarzio® FS-1™ pickup inhabits the bridge position for added tonal balance, smoothing out the guitar’s response and boosting the output for arena-sized sound with clear articulation. The strong, stable quartersawn maple neck generates a slightly brighter tone while the sleek contoured neck heel and comfortable 9.5” fingerboard are ideal for most playing styles, supporting low end chords and riffing along with chiming upper-register chords and leads with ease. Enjoy increased sustain from the modern two-point synchronized tremolo bridge with pop-in arm and fully adjustable block saddles for pinpoint intonation accuracy.

An elegant guitar for a refined player, this guitar combines the classic curves, appointments and effortless playability of classic Strat guitars with modern enhancements and materials to create a player’s dream instrument—a flexible music machine with timeless Fender style and authentic sound. Don’t delay, add The Edge Strat to your sonic toolbox. Includes a special black and gray tweed hardshell case.

For more specs: http://intl.fender.com/en-GB/guitars/stratocaster/the-edge-strat-maple-fingerboard-black/

http://intl.fender.com/

U2 nomimated for BritAwards 2016

U2 has been nominated for INTERNATIONAL GROUP together with  Alabama Shakes, Eagles of Death Metal, Major Lazer & Tame Impala

The award ceremony will be nxt 24th February at the  02 , Londres.

Bowie’s influence on U2

Planet earth is blue- Bono (U2 twitter account)

Back in 2010 , Rolling Stone magazine did a special “Playlists” issue where popular artists listed their favorite songs from other artists. Bono gave the magazine a 15-song playlist of his favorite David Bowie songs. The top five:

1. “Space Oddity”
2. “The Man Who Sold The World”
3. “Changes”
4. “Five Years”
5. “Life On Mars”

In his write-up, Bono talked about Bowie’s influence on U2 — and note the talk about concert-as-drama, which is something U2 has incorporated into its live shows since day one.

"U2 owe him a lot. He introduced us to Berlin and Hansa Studios, to collaborating with Brian Eno. It’s the high singing, beyond your ‘man’ voice into the feminine. And there’s the staging, the attempt to be innovative. It has been pointed out that the Claw [the 360 stage] looks like the Glass Spider. Bowie wasn’t afraid to use scale, to dramatize things. His set list was not just a jukebox he could run through. It was drama.”

Rolling Stone put Bono’s full Bowie playlist on Spotify. 

http://www.atu2blog.com/

David Bowie (1947-2016)

R.I.P. David

Bono on Holidays in Burma

Bono paid a holiday visit to Burma this week, including a tour of the ancient city of Bagan in Mandalay Division.

In a post on Tuesday to the Facebook page of U2,  a photograph of the Bagan skyline dotted with hot air balloons, a popular means of taking in the sacred Buddhist site, was accompanied by the caption “Hot & cold air – Bono.”

Fans were quick to show their support, thanking Bono for visiting the former hermit state and doling out thousands of “likes” to the post. One user shared a picture of Bono with well-known Burmese comedian Zarganar, also known as Maung Thura.

Eleven Media reported on Thursday that the singer-songwriter flew Wednesday to Shan State’s Heho, where the airport is commonly used as the fly-in point for Inle Lake, another popular tourist attraction.

When National League for Democracy (NLD) chairwoman Aung San Suu Kyi was under house arrest for nearly two decades under Burma’s former military junta, Bono dedicated the band’s 2002 Grammy Award-winning song “Walk On” to the pro-democracy leader.

In an interview with ITV News in 2012, Bono said he was “very, very moved” to meet Suu Kyi, referring to when he met the face of Burma’s pro-democracy movement in Dublin to award her Amnesty International’s Ambassador of Conscience Award, also in 2012.

“Ms. Suu Kyi is enormously admired in this country, and her visit here is something which we have long hoped to see,” Bono said in the interview.

“I expressed the warm welcome and admiration which is felt for her in this country. I wished Daw Suu Kyi every success with her Irish visit and her ongoing important work on behalf of the Burmese people, which enjoys the full support of the Irish people.”

http://www.irrawaddy.com/

The Edge Says U2’s Next LP Is Coming Soon, Sounds Like ‘Zooropa’

After U2 released 2014’s Songs of Innocence, they promised that the record’s companion album, Songs of Experience, would drop soon. Now, in a new interview with Q magazine (via DIY), guitarist the Edge has confirmed that U2 is in fact completing the William Blake-inspired Experience during the downtime between legs of their Innocence + Experience tour.

The Edge also compared the recording process to how they made their 1993 album, Zooropa, adding that its producer Brian Eno “would love to see us making albums a bit more like that. Where we go, ‘You know what? We’re not going to second-guess any of this. Let’s just go for it.’ I think there’s a quality you get when there’s a certain momentum to the process.”

Bono also noted that his 2014 bike accident had a lot to do with getting Experience out the door in a timely manner: “The gift of it was that I had time to write while in the mentality that you get to at the end of an album. There is a reason why all the great groups made their best albums while in and around touring, because the ideas have to come out of your head.”

http://www.spin.com/

Happy New Year from Cedarwood Rd. Gang!!!

Photo: Edge