U2NEWS: January 10, 1999 Part I


Who needs bathrooms? ([email protected])
Sun, 10 Jan 1999 09:34:09 -0700


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Releases:
Best of Maria McKee/Lone Justice, Jan 12, 1999 -- features Bono
in duet with McKee singing "Sweet Jane"

Spellbound - The Best of Sharon Shannon, Jan 12 1999 -- features
Adam Clayton bass-work

Earth Love Fund : "Protection", UK January 17, 1998 (Benefit for
survivors of Hurricane Mitch in Central America)

Across The Bridge of Hope: The Omagh Tribute Album, NA March 17, 1999
(rumoured)

Concerts/Live Events:

Confirmed: March 24, 1999 Hits Under The Hammer Auction,
Bono's original lyric sheet for "Sweetest Thing" to be included in
the auction

Rumour: U2 at Millenium Concert, Dec 31, 1999 - Jan 1, 2000

Confirmed: U2 at my house. Today. :)

Television/Radio Events:

BBC: Straight from The Edge's mouth -- The BBC are working on a
special for "Classic Albums" about the Joshua Tree. Airdate TBA
Network TV:
FOX:
MTV:
MuchMusic/MuchUSA:
MuchMoreMusic:
VH1:
"Legends", January 12, 1999 at 6pm ET
POP UP Videos featuring "Sweetest Thing", Jan 30, 6:00pm ET
Net Events:
--------------
Polygram Video is holding a vote to see which movies should
be released on DVD. You can vote for "Rattle And Hum"
at http://www.dvdfile.com/request_infoline/poll_booth/paramount.html
--------------
http://www.musicvideos.com has "Christmas Baby" on it's site for
free download.
--------------
Official Omagh Album Tribute Site http://www.omaghcd.com
--------------
Vote for U2 at Triple J's(Australian Radio) poll at
http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/hot100/vote.htm
--------------
Vote for U2 at DotMusic's Top Albums of All Time
--------------
Vot for U2 at http://www.bradfitz.com/votingbooth?schwag402
--------------

Fan Club/WIRE/U2 nutzoid meetings:
Coming Soon : U2 Internet Fan Club(WIRE, EXIT, One, U2Lemon,
etc.) Convention -- Calgary, Alberta, Canada
--------------
January 29, 1999, 8:00 pm U2 coverband "Vorsprung durch Technik"
Bremen, Germany. Email [email protected] for more information.
--------------
Brazilian U2 Fanclub meeting, February 6, 1999 in San Paulo.
Contact [email protected] for more information.
--------------
A SORT OF A HOMECOMING 99-The second annual gathering of U2 fans
anywhere and everywhere! July 22-25, 1999, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA
For info, e-mail Liz at [email protected] or checkout the webpage at,
 http://members.aol.com/conguero/asoh.html
--------------
   
NEWS dates:
U2 goes six times platinum in Canada added Jan 9
Bono supports group in favour of debt cancellation added Jan 9
RUMOUR: B-sides to be released as separate album added Jan 9
Play opening to benefit Chernobyl Charity added Jan 8
U2 #1 in 1998 in Ireland added Jan 8
Best of #27 in 1998 added Jan 8
Bono excerpt from Q magazine added Jan 8
Kirk Franklin article with pic of Bono added Jan 7
U2 in Guinness Book of Records added Jan 7
Buy Bono's sneakers added Jan 7
One more McG accident story added Jan 7
Another McG accident story added Jan 6
Rolling Stone Artist Picks added Jan 6
Brief article on McG crash/Mullen birth added Jan 6
Bono and The Edge warned about kidnapping possibility added Jan 6
NYC Billboard Pics added Jan 6
John's Chart News added Jan 5
"Lean on Me" nominated for 3 Grammy Awards added Jan 5
Bono in Switzerland added Jan 5
Top 500 added Jan 5
RS interview with The Edge in RA/V added Jan 4
Entropy Soundtrack? added Jan 4
Prop response to U2K in Dublin added Jan 4
Paul McG involved in car crash added Jan 4
Einstein and U2 added Jan 3
Boyzone to stand beside U2 permanently :) added Jan 3
Sweet William added Jan 3
Dublin Millenium List added Jan 3
CS Lewis article added Jan 3
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Condensed from Jam!:

Other collections dot the certification list this month. U2's 'Best of
1980-1990', spurred on by a limited run of double cd, was certified
six times platinum. Garth Brooks 'Double Live' - with 6 collectible
sleeves - came in at fice times platinum.

(Prarit's note: Six times platinum in Canada = 600,000 units sold
to customers, *NOT* shipped copies. For those of you who
are counting, that means 1 in 50 people in Canada bought a
copy)
-------------
>From The Irish Times:

Cancellation time, come on

Ann Pettifor, co-founder of the British section of Jubilee 2000
tells Angela Long why the Group of Seven countries should
cancel poor countries' debt to mark the year 2000

Debt forgiveness is not a subject Ann Pettifor wants to
discuss. Raise the term in description of the huge sums
owed by poor countries to rich, and one's wrist is
metaphorically slapped.

"Don't talk about forgiveness," commands Pettifor. "For
that implies that something bad has been done, and
forgiveness is required."

Better that the worldwide push for the removal of the
crushing debt burden of more than 50 countries be called
debt cancellation - crisp and comprehensive, something
like Ann Pettifor herself. A former trade union official,
Pettifor is the co-founder and coordinator of the British arm
of Jubilee 2000, the movement to get the Group of Seven
countries to cancel poor countries' debt to mark the year
2000. She is coming to Dublin next week to chair a
seminar on the ethics of debt cancellation. Held at the Irish
School of Ecumenics in Milltown, Dublin, the two-day
seminar will contrast and compare Jewish, Christian and
Muslim attitudes towards debt and the morality of writing it
off.

About the correctness of such an act Pettifor has no doubt.
"This transfer of wealth from poor to rich must end," she
says. "Our movement is talking about 52 countries, mainly
in Africa, but also in Latin America and South-East Asia.
On average in these places, for every dollar in aid going to
them, $11 is coming back servicing the national debt."

Jubilee 2000 has a low profile in most people's
consciousness, but the enormity of the debt burden for
developing countries was brought home when Hurricane
Mitch struck Central America in October. Mainstream
news bulletins compared the aid which was gingerly
offered to Honduras and Nicaragua with their daily bills to
the rich West. Honduras already has debt of more than $4
billion. "To service this Honduras pays $1.5 million a day.
Britain, for example, was offering �1.5 million in aid." That
would pay about two days worth of debt, leaving the vast
sums of reconstruction and social assistance necessary
untouched.

Ann Pettifor argues that the financial system embraced by
the G7 (Russia makes it a Group of Eight on paper, but
with Russia's financial woes is probably best left out of the
equation) runs against logic, let alone compassion. "In our
domestic financial arrangements we have bankruptcy law.
In Dickens's time people were sent to prison with their
families if no money was forthcoming to pay their debts.
Then society realised the futility of this - you can't get
blood out of a stone - and bankruptcy legislation became
common, which recognised that. But there is no
international bankruptcy law. So you have a situation
where a country like Tanzania has to take funds away from
health, clean water and education to pay its huge debts."

The name and concept of Jubilee 2000 comes from the
Bible. The book of Leviticus makes the specific command,
that every seven years the land should be restored, the
slaves freed and debts cancelled. The word "jubilee"
(derived from the Hebrew word "yobel", for the goat's
horn with which the start of the celebrations was blown) is
actually used, and this feature is common to Christian and
Jewish traditions. The Catholic Church has had its eyes
fixed on the year 2000 for Jubileo 2000 Roma, a more
wide-ranging marking of a year with a profound
psychological impact, if nothing else.

The current Jubilee 2000 debt movement started to operate
in the mid 1990s, with gradually bigger actions such as the
demonstration at the G7 conference in Birmingham last
year, when 70,000 people encircled the convention centre
where the Western leaders were meeting. The movement
does not get involved in prissy arguments about when the
new millennium starts (January 2000 or January 2001), but
its activities will extend into the year 2000. The main event
now being planned is a huge rally in Cologne in June of
this year, when the G7 meets again, to dwarf the action in
Birmingham. "We also have some very good, high-profile
supporters," says Ann Pettifor. "In Ireland our main
supporter is Bono, and the other members of U2. In
Britain, Anthony Hopkins is very interested, and the
comedian Jo Brand is getting involved. In the US we have
the Reverend Jesse Jackson and Muhammad Ali."

JUBILEE 2000 - not to be confused with another outfit of
the same name, proliferating on the Internet, whose aim is
to create a new cyberspace universe for the year 2000, and
whose literature is studded with quotations from the
Beatles - operates mainly in the G7 countries (the US,
Canada, Britain, Italy, Canada, Germany, France). The
response has mostly been positive, although Pettifor says it
has been slow to get off the ground in France, where the
social tradition is that the government looks after the poor
and individuals are less conditioned to charitable
intervention. A petition for the cancellation of debt is being
circulated in 130 countries.

Pettifor was recruited by the coalition of aid agencies
working on debt cancellation in 1994. She is well tailored
for the job. "I was born in South Africa and spent some
years in Tanzania, which was a formative part of my life -
that feeling for Africa is what drives me."

Raised an Anglican, she attended a Catholic convent
school, and had a strict Calvinist father. "I gave up on the
established churches as a young woman, but Christian
values are deep in my psyche," she says. "Fundamentally I
believe that God has given bountiful gifts to the world, but
he has also placed a responsibility on us to be fair in their
use."

This feeling, with her background in the labour movement
(she worked as a fixer for Ken Livingstone when he
presided over the greater London Council in the volatile
Thatcher years), gave her the credentials for a
finely-balanced act.

The Ethics of Debt Conference takes place at the ISE,
January 12-13th, and other participants include the
Columban priest Father Sean McDonagh and Sheikh
Mr Zaki Badawi, principal of the Muslim College in
London. Tel 01-2601144 or email [email protected]
-------------
Until official confirmation(from Uni-gram/PM/etc.), this is a
RUMOUR:

Oli G, who in the past has provided reliable information to
U2NEWS, has informed that the B-sides collection will be
released SEPARATELY.
-------------
>From a ONE post by Cindy Trickel:

I read an article in The Examiner today that said the profits of the
premiere of a new play by playwrights Brendan O'Carroll and Gerry Browne
will go to the Chernobyl Children's Project. The play, which is titled
Mrs. Brown's Boys - The Last Wedding, premieres at the Everyman Palace
Theatre in Cork on Monday, January 25, with a pre-show reception at the
Metropole Hotel. This will be attended by Executive Director of the
Chernobyl Children's Project Adi Roche, among others.
-------------
Condensed from The Irish Times:

Titanic sales: U2 and Celine Dion were the two
best-selling recording artists in Ireland last year, says
IRMA, the Irish Recorded Music Association. U2's Best Of
1980-1990 topped IRMA's official 1998 album chart,
beating George Michael and The Corrs, while Celine's My
Heart Will Go On - from the movie Titanic - outsold the
Cher, B*Witched and Boyzone singles.
-------------
U2's Best of... was the 27th highest selling album on 1998 in
Canada.
-------------
>From @U2 News <http://www.atu2.com/news/> and the Daily Mirror (London):

January 4, 1999, Monday

HEADLINE: U2 ROCKER MOVED BY PEACE MEN

BYLINE: By Michael Sharkey

Rock star Bono has told how John Hume and David Trimble left him with
treasured memories of 1998.

The U2 frontman identified the historic moment he held hands with both
politicians as one of the highlights of his year.

It happened after they joined him on stage in Belfast during a concert for
a Yes vote on the Good Friday peace deal.

In a personal review of 1998 Bono admits: "To be the filling in the John
Hume -David Trimble sandwich is a very great honour."

But he modestly insists that U2's role in the event - organised by Northern
Ireland band Ash - was a proud but small one.

And the singer tells how he was moved later when the SDLP and Ulster
Unionist leaders scooped the Nobel peace prize.

"It was as if the rest of the world had put its arms around us."

It was a year that also saw U2 perform in some of the world's other
political hotspots.

Bono boasts that in Chile they got a chance to "harass" General Pinochet,
now under arrest in Britain.

"On a live TV broadcast of Pop Mart, 50 or so Mothers of the Disappeared
walked on stage with photo placards of their lost loved ones, some of which
had been tortured to death in the same stadium."

Writing in Q magazine, Bono also recalls his sadness at the deaths of his
hero Frank Sinatra and his pal Michael Hutchence.
-------------
An article about Kirk Franklin and the Nu Nation project is
available at CNN. Also featured is a pretty cool pic of Bono...

http://cnn.com/SHOWBIZ/Music/9901/07/franklin.gospel/index.html
-------------
U2 is mentioned in the 1999 edition of the famed Guinness
Book of World Records as having the World's largest TV
screen. No word if the band ever did play a PlayStation on
it...
-------------
A pair of Bono's sneakers are available for auction at:

             http://www.icollector.com/

Thanks to des of Interference.com for this info.
-------------
>From The Irish Echo:

U2 manager Paul McGuinness miraculously escaped injury in
a recent car crash -- but his luxury Jaguar XJ6 was a total
write-off.

The incident occurred in Annamoe, Co. Wicklow, where
McGuinness's Jag collided at a sharp turn with an Isuzu jeep.
Despite the severity of thecrash, in which the jeep was
overturned and the left side of the Jag was completely
demolished, both drivers were fine, but we can't help thinking
about the innocent Jaguar . . .

Thanks to Cindy Trickel for the above.
-------------
>From Sleaze:

U2 MANAGER CHEATS DEATH IN HORRIFIC CAR ACCIDENT: U2
manager PAUL McGUINNESS is thankful that he is still around to celebrate the
start of 1999, after escaping virtually unharmed from a nasty traffic accident
near
his home in County Wicklow, Ireland, last week. The rock and roll manager, who
has guided U2 to worldwide success throughout their career, suffered only a
slight
injury to his wrist when his 1996 Jaguar XJ6 was involved in a collision with a
jeep
at a sharp left-hand bend near his home. The jeep was knocked over on its side
and severely damaged, but the Jaguar was completely wrecked. A local police
officer says, "He [McGuinness] was very lucky that all he sustained was a
scratch
on his finger. It was amazing. All he had was a few aches and pains."
-------------
Two artists/groups chose U2's "Best of" in their Top 5
Rolling Stone Artist Picks:

Nick Carter(Backstreet Boys)
#5 U2 Best of 1980-1990

DC Talk
#5 U2 Best of 1980-1990
-------------
>From Rolling Stone:

Really Randoms

U2 manager Paul McGuinness walked away from a accident in
County Wicklow, Ireland, where his Jaguar collided a jeep.
According to police, McGuinness onlyinjured his finger -- and,
no, he wasn't giving it to the other driver. In other U2 news,
drummer Larry Mullen and his wife, Anne Acheson, are
parents for the second time. The couple welcomed a daughter
into the world on Dec. 23. Bet she won't be sharing a room with
brother Aaron Elvis . . .
-------------
Condensed from The Irish Times:

New breed of robbers may shoot it out

The armed gang responsible for the Dalkey raid
had a well-laid plan and was prepared to kill
garda�, senior officers say.Jim Cusack,
Security Correspondent, reports on the
background to the incident

Aspects of the armed raid on the security van in Dalkey
have led senior detectives to the disturbing conclusion
that the gang responsible was prepared, if necessary, to
shoot its way through any Garda checkpoints and to kill.

At a Garda review of the course of events, held i in D�n
Laoghaire yesterday, it quickly emerged that it was only
through good fortune that there were no civilian or Garda
deaths.

Local garda� are alert to the possibility of robbery from
the stock of large houses in the Dalkey and Killiney area
and of kidnapping.

Several internationally-known figures, from racing
drivers Eddie Irvine and Damon Hill to the U2 band
 members Bono and The Edge and film director Neil
Jordan, as well as wealthy business people, live within a
radius of a few hundred yards of the robbery. Just 200
yards further down Sorrento Road, on Sorrento Terrace,
is the most expensive house in Dublin, sold last year for
�5.9 million.

As it happened, two armed detectives from D�n
Laoghaire were in Dalkey station when the first call
about the robbery came in. According to Garda logs they
were at the scene within minutes, by which stage the
gang members were almost certainly aware they were
under pursuit. The gang had two radio scanners to
monitor Garda broadcasts.
-------------
Henry Wagner has some pics of a huge billboard in NYC of
the Best of Album -- check them out at:

         http://www.henrywagner.org/pictures/NYC/
-------------

-- 
Prarit....

[email protected] U2 news: http://www.members.home.net/u2-news/u2.html U2 NEWS is MOVING -- AGAIN!!!!



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