FLASHBACK U2 ARTICLES –REWIND!

Telegraph:
First Posted: 05-18-08 10:03 AM

There was a time when one might have expected a meeting with a rock star’s wife to be attended by a certain amount of mayhem – temper tantrums and trashed hotel rooms, perhaps, or at the very least a retinue including a drug dealer, masseuse, hair stylist and personal astrologer.

But the softly spoken 47-year-old woman sitting opposite me in a suite in Claridge’s is anything but the cartoon version of a hell-raising, hard-drinking rock chick; she is wearing a black calf-length Comme des Garçons skirt with a Victorian bell-sleeved blouse; raven hair neatly brushed, porcelain skin unadorned by make-up.

She is, in fact, very much her own woman – Ali Hewson rather than Mrs Bono – and as such it is not wifely duties that have brought her to London today, but a meeting with her business associates in Nude, a thoroughly modern, impeccably ethical skincare brand. And, as befits her role as a long-term environmental campaigner, she has travelled here from her home in Dublin not by private jet but by scheduled airline, and she won’t be partying in the suite tonight, but returning in time to see her four children before they go to bed this evening.
HUFFPOST ENTERTAINMENT

U2 plans to auction off a painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat, which has been hanging at their studio in Dublin for the past 20 years, at a Sotheby’s Contemporary Art auction in London on July 1. The painting, purchased by the band in 1989 after being spotted at a New York gallery by bassist Adam Clayton, is expected to sell for as much as $11.7 million.

The 6-foot-square acrylic, oil stick and collage canvas — which was created in 1982 when the artist was 22 years old — isn’t expected to rival the auction record for a Basquiat work, which was $14.6 million, reports Bloomberg. Basquiat — who had an interest in music that he manifested through his art — died in 1988 of a drug overdose.

Known as ‘Untitled (Pecho/Oreja),’ and featuring Basquiat’s trademark primitive mask motif, Clayton found the piece at the Robert Miller Gallery and convinced his bandmates to collectively buy the painting.
Posted on Jun 18th 2008 11:00AM by John D. Luerssen/ Spinner

Peter Noble, Redferns
Bono, Toronto, December 1980

December 1980 marked the best of times and the worst of times for Bono and his band, U2. Shortly after this wintry publicity shot was taken, Bono’s hero, John Lennon, was killed in New York. The day after the assassination — fueled by emotions surrounding Lennon’s death — U2 put on a stirring show in Toronto, earning the relatively unknown band some of its earliest accolades.

As a Toronto Globe and Mail critic wrote, “U2 turned out to be one of the most vital and interesting new bands I’ve seen in the past few years. They are four young Irishmen who range in age from 18 to 20, yet the intense and energetic music they play belies their youth.” On the Dec. 9 show, the critic wrote, the band played tribute to Lennon by playing two bars of ‘Give Peace a Chance’ during the song ‘Boy.’

Earlier this month, on the 30th anniversary of Lennon’s death, U2 once again paid homage to the fallen musician, performing ‘All You Need is Love’ and other Beatles songs during a concert in Australia.

Posted on Dec 17th 2010 10:30AM by Pat Pemberton Spinner.com