1. Helter Skelter
2. Van Diemen's Land
3. Desire
4. Hawkmoon 269
5. All Along the Watchtower
6. I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
7. Freedom For My People
8. Silver and Gold
9. Pride (In the Name of Love)
10. Angel of Harlem
11. Love Rescue Me
12. When Love Comes To Town
13. Heartland
14. God Part II
15. The Star Spangled Banner
16. Bullet the Blue Sky
17. All I Want Is You
approx. play time: 72 minutes
U2 seems to be one of those bands you either love or can't stand. I happen to fall into the first group mrgreen My favorite album of theirs, and also one of my all time favorites in general, is Rattle & Hum. Being one of their 'live' albums (the other is Under a Blood Red Sky), the music is considerably more... well, lively than the stuff you'll find on their albums.
Calling it a live album is somewhat of a misnomer, though, since only about half of the songs were actually recorded from their live shows. The rest were recorded in-studio, but with few exceptions, that doesn't make them stand out any less. The tracks on this album that are from a live show are much heavier or more intense than those that were recorded in the studio, prime examples being 'Bullet the Blue Sky', 'Silver and Gold', and 'When Love Comes to Town' (which features BB King), along with two rather entertaining covers ('Helter Skelter', which opens the album and sets the tone to follow, and Jimi Hendrix's 'All Along the Watchtower', which Hendrix fans may or may not like).
Since this was recorded on their Joshua Tree tour, you won't find some of the newer fan/radio favorites like 'Mysterious Ways', 'Lemon', or 'Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me' on here, although with how the band rocks on this album, it's not difficult to see how they pulled off the hard rock sounds in much of their newer stuff. You will find some of their best known songs, though, such as 'All I Want Is You' and 'I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For' (which has some very interesting use of Southern Gospel choirs).
If you don't like U2 because you don't like Bono's singing, then you probably won't like this album, either. If you don't like U2 because you don't think their early music is all that impressive, then I say give this album a shot, especially if you're looking for some good jam-stompin' rock and blues biggrin
Overall, I give the album 9.5/10, simply because there are some aspects of the music that irk me on repeated listenings (the choirs on 'I Still Haven't Found...', namely). Very highly recommended for U2 fans, and anyone else who likes excellent, energetic rock music that has actual talent behind it and which doesn't sound the same from one song to the next.
