RATTLE AND HUM

“In the locust wind comes a rattle and hum,” sang Bono on ‘Bullet The Blue Sky’ on ‘The Joshua Tree.’ U2 didn’t know it at the time, but they were naming their next adventure.

‘Rattle and Hum’ was the album that saw U2 build a bridge from the studio to the silver screen, with some superstar collaborations along the way. The incredible global success of ‘The Joshua Tree’ was an undeniable staging post in a story that was already more than a decade old. But U2 have never been a band simply to press repeat.

Now they saw the opportunity to create something different again, a record of what they had just achieved and a signpost to where they were heading next. Hence the typically innovative combination of a full-scale film to commemorate the epic tour for ‘The Joshua Tree,’ and a companion double album that contained live elements, but also stood tall as their sixth studio release. All of this little more than 18 months after the album that had rewritten industry records and taken the band to the very top of their profession.

The idea of presenting U2 on the big screen was in the great tradition established by forebears such as Elvis and the Beatles. But here was a film founded on the simple premise of showing musicians working at the day job, or more often the night job, entertaining scores of thousands of people. Studio outtakes and interview material rounded out a portrait that captured an essential moment in their history.

The ‘Rattle and Hum’ movie was filmed in Colorado — just as the ‘Live At Red Rocks’ video had been four years earlier, this time at the McNichols Sports Arena, in Denver, in November 1987. It captured the overwhelming ebullience of a U2 concert, from the opening cover of the Beatles’ ‘White Album’ romp ‘Helter Skelter’ to a valedictory ‘Pride (In The Name Of Love)’ 21 songs later.

But, far from taking the easy option of a simultaneous CD equivalent to the film, by the spring of 1988 U2 were at work on a very different type of companion release. Even as they oversaw post-production of the Phil Joanou-directed rock documentary, the band started to lay down new material, both in Los Angeles and in the musical holy ground of Sun Studios in Memphis, for what would become ‘Rattle and Hum,’ the album.

There were, as ever, satellite ventures along the way. In September, the band contributed the track ‘Jesus Christ’ to ‘Folkways: A Vision Shared,’ a multi-artist tribute to the pioneering work of Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly. Bono and The Edge also had the honour of having their song ‘She’s A Mystery To Me’ recorded by another American hero, Roy Orbison, and produced by Bono, for ‘Mystery Girl,’ both his comeback and, sadly, his final album. It was recorded weeks before the Big O’s untimely passing.

At the end of September, 1988, U2 announced their return with one of the most exhilarating singles of their career. ‘Desire’ was a breathless, vein-bursting nod to the punk-before-there-was-punk sound of the Stooges, itself distilled from a nucleus of the Bo Diddley beat. The result was utterly compelling. After a UK debut at No. 3, which equalled their best-ever peak with ‘Pride’ four years before, ‘Desire’ climbed to the top to give U2 their first British No. 1 single. It went on to land a Grammy for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocal.

Hard on its heels, the album rattled and hummed into view in October. Time magazine would call it “the best live rock album ever made,” but it was even more than that. Produced by Jimmy Iovine, the double disc incorporated recordings from the Denver shows, others from San Francisco, New York and Tempe, Arizona, as well as new studio material and some truly striking collaborations.

Bob Dylan was present not just via the album’s live cover of ‘All Along The Watchtower,’ but in a new co-write with Bono, ‘Love Rescue Me.’ The association continued later in the year when U2 contributed a cover of Dylan’s ‘Maggie’s Farm’ to the compilation ‘Live For Ireland,’ also featuring Van Morrison and Elvis Costello, among others.

The presence of Jimi Hendrix was felt in the ‘Rattle and Hum’ excerpt of ‘The Star Spangled Banner,’ and then there was the inspired teaming with blues titan B.B. King, already some 45 years into his storied career, on the brilliant hit single ‘When Love Comes To Town.’

“We discovered a common bond between us and some of these older artists like B.B. King,” said Adam Clayton. “When we met him, there was a whole world of understanding and nothing needed to be said. That has been the pay-off of working ten years to get into this position. We no longer have to prove ourselves. It's in the music and people can hear it.”

‘Rattle and Hum’ debuted on the British chart at No. 1, and if the first-week sales of 235,000 for ‘The Joshua Tree’ were a new record, the new album smashed it. 360,000 people bought the album in the first week, as it moved to quadruple platinum certification. By November, it was sitting atop the American chart, in a six-week run that lasted until the week before Christmas. It sold five million copies there, and three times that worldwide. Its four hit singles, also including ‘All I Want Is You,’ kept U2 in singles top tens everywhere for months.

1988 was not a touring year for U2, but as the album began its reign, there was the opportunity to perform four songs at the televised ‘Smile Jamaica’ fundraiser, with the first-ever live outing for the soulful ‘Angel Of Harlem.’ Keith Richards joined them for ‘When Love Comes To Town’ and Ziggy Marley for ‘Love Rescue Me.’

“In its inclusiveness and rollicking energy, ‘Rattle and Hum’ caps the story of U2's rise from Dublin obscurity to international superstardom on a raucous, celebratory note,” wrote Anthony DeCurtis in his review for Rolling Stone. “At the same time, it closes off none of the options the band might want to pursue for its next big move — and, possibly, the album even opens a few doors.”

With the 1990s just around the corner, those doors would be kicked ajar soon enough.

THE JOSHUA TREE

It was the April 27, 1987 cover of Time magazine that sent the incontrovertible message. Rarely at home to hyperbole, and more likely to focus its attention on matters of global political import, the venerable newsweekly ran a certain band name in flaming gold, embossed on a picture of four Irish lads who were in the process of rewriting the record book. “U2,” beamed the headline. “Rock’s Hottest Ticket.”

The time since ‘The Unforgettable Fire’ three years earlier had been uniformly momentous, on stages that responded in size and scale to U2’s now global popularity. As Time made its weighty pronouncement, the band were sitting proudly atop the American album chart for the first time, in a nine-week reign for the artistic statement that went on to win the Grammy Award for Album of the Year, ‘The Joshua Tree.’

U2 were now masters of their domain both in the studio and on the road, and their adventures en route to this latest album landmark included some unforgettable encounters. In June 1985, they were at home in front of 55,000 fans in Dublin’s Croke Park, as the ‘Wide Awake In America’ EP became a new calling card in the United States.

A few weeks later, an audience calculated in the billions saw Jack Nicholson, via satellite from Philadelphia, introduce U2’s almost show-stealing contribution to Live Aid at Wembley Stadium. Readers of Rolling Stone voted it the best performance, and at this most glittering roll call of worldwide superstars, that was saying something.

Bono’s voice was now being heard in a variety of settings, including as a guest on the all-star, anti-apartheid ‘Sun City’ single and, in early 1986, on Clannad’s plaintive hit single ‘In A Lifetime.’ In June that year, U2 joined Amnesty International’s caravan of impassioned campaigners on the Conspiracy of Hope tour of the US, with Sting, Lou Reed, Peter Gabriel and Bryan Adams.

But as the year progressed, the need and desire for a new studio statement was growing tangible. In the summer, after sessions in other locations, U2 reconvened in their trusty bolthole of Windmill Lane Studios in Dublin. Their confederates, again, were the production pairing that had helped them take ‘The Unforgettable Fire’ to such heights, Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois.

Bono would later say that a lot of the ‘Joshua’ material was, essentially, recorded in Clayton’s living room, or Larry Mullen Jr’s spare bedroom, in sessions that were almost demo-like in their spontaneity. “It could have gone off in a number of different directions,” he remembers. “We wanted the idea of a one-piece record, not a side-one, side-two thing.”

There was, indeed, an unforced and sometimes unadorned nature about the results, on which tints of folk music blended into the rock canvas, especially on the introspective, Dylanesque ‘Running To Stand Still.’ The flavours ran from the blues to the biblical, and even the celebrated ‘With Or Without You’ and ‘I Still Haven't Found What I’m Looking For,’ which became their first American No. 1 singles, burned slowly but surely.

The recurring spiritual themes were a perfect fit for the album’s visual imagery, inspired by a photo shoot with Anton Corbijn in the Mojave desert amid the unyielding, aged trees of the title, named after the Old Testament prophet.

‘Joshua’ was also home to the more confrontational and outspoken ‘Bullet The Blue Sky’ and ebullient pieces such as ‘In God’s Country’ and another in their expanding catalogue of anthems, ‘Where The Streets Have No Name.’ There was sadness, too, in the album’s dedication to Greg Carroll, the group’s PA, killed in a motorcycle accident in Dublin as the album was being created in July, 1986.

“In ‘The Joshua Tree,’ U2 fills in the sketches with sometimes breathtaking signs of growth,” wrote Robert Hilburn in the Los Angeles Times. “Bono Hewson's lyrics are also more consistently focused and eloquently designed than in past albums, and his singing underscores the band's expressions of disillusionment and hope with new-found power and passion.” Rolling Stone said that the album “could be the big one, and that’s precisely what it sounds like.”

How right they were. On its March 1987 release, ‘The Joshua Tree’ went platinum in the UK in 48 hours and sold 235,000 copies in its first week, becoming Britain’s fastest-selling album ever to that point. It topped the charts throughout Europe and positively tore through the platinum certifications in America, with four million shipments by the end of the year and the hallowed, rarely-bestowed diamond certification, for ten million, in 1995.

Underpinning it all was the unstoppable force that was U2 on the road, now embracing stadia as well as arenas. 96 shows, 11 countries and three legs, starting, as the tree took root, in North America in April 1987: five nights at the Los Angeles Arena, the same number at Meadowlands in New Jersey, then on into Europe through the summer, incorporating two mighty nights at Wembley Stadium. Then back to the coliseums and stadia of North America for another two and a half months. No one could ever say U2 did not become the biggest band in the world without putting in the miles, or the meticulous devotion to spectacular rock events.

Soon, MTV and BRIT Awards would precede their double Grammy honours for ‘The Joshua Tree,’ which also included Best Rock Performance. They were the first two Grammys in a collection that, to 2015, totals 22 trophies.

Capturing the heart of their appeal, that historic Time cover story avowed: “Bono stalks a song as much as sings it, and the moment he takes the stage there is no doubt what his terms are: unconditional surrender. [Adam] Clayton and drummer Larry Mullen Jr have found some solid musical grounding, and the lead guitarist, The Edge, can work a riff around to an epiphany.”

If there was a sense of arrival, it was leavened with humility. “People respond to our naivete," said Clayton in the same article. "I think they see four guys from Ireland who don't want to let go of their dreams.”

THE UNFORGETTABLE FIRE

In 1974, Iwakichi Kobayashi, a 77-year-old Japanese survivor of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, walked into the offices of the Japan Broadcasting Corporation in the city. He was delivering a drawing of what he had witnessed, and it started a wave of public contributions about that apocalyptic day in World War II. It led to the publication of a compilation of images three years later, and then to an art exhibit in the early 1980s. It was titled ‘The Unforgettable Fire.’

In late November 1983, U2’s worldwide tour in support of the ‘War’ album took them, for the first time, to Japan. During their stay, they went to visit that exhibition. Its title would inspire the late 1984 album with which they took a dramatic new direction and continued the process of becoming one of the premier rock attractions in the world.

The months following the release of ‘War’ had been exhausting but eventful. In May, ‘New Year’s Day’ had followed its success everywhere else by reaching No. 53 in America. If not a stunning peak, it was a sure sign that U2’s distinctive rock attack was beginning to impact on pop radio programmers there as well.

In August, they were the headline attraction for 25,000 passionate fans at the open-air festival A Day At The Races, in Phoenix Park, Dublin. In the middle of a run of festival dates, U2 had fun with their setlist, mixing a little of ‘Let’s Twist Again’ into ‘Two Hearts Beat As One’ and then some ‘Give Peace A Chance’ into ’11 O’Clock Tick Tock.’ For a final encore of the already anthemic closer of the ‘War’ album, ’40,’ they were joined by Annie Lennox.

That multi-faceted ‘War’ tour of 1983 saw the band matching the muscular sound of the album with similarly grand-scale performances, but a signal change of pace was just around the corner. With bootleg concert recordings now exchanging hands for large sums, U2 brought this era to a conclusion by answering the public demand for their first live album and video.

The album was ‘Under A Blood Red Sky,’ produced by Jimmy Iovine and recorded at three shows on the ‘War’ itinerary, in Boston, Germany and at a rain-soaked Red Rocks in Colorado. Soon afterwards came the sister release on video, ‘Live At Red Rocks: Under A Blood Red Sky.’

Both captured the closing of a chapter, and both were phenomenally successful. The album soared to three million sales in the US alone, and the video stayed on the American chart for three years. Rolling Stone later described the band’s watershed performance of ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ from the film as one of the ’50 Moments That Changed The History Of Rock ‘n’ Roll.’

The first half of 1984 brought the opportunity to take stock, and to consider the more textured, atmospheric sound that the quartet sensed should be their next departure. In May, they convened at Slane Castle in Dublin, where the gothic ballroom was chosen as the location for the early sessions on what would become ‘The Unforgettable Fire.’

The band’s admiration for Brian Eno as a musician of unassailable originality and imagination made him the producer of choice for the project. When he recommended his engineer, the relatively unknown but already experienced Canadian studio hotshot Daniel Lanois, the alliance was complete.

In July, when Bob Dylan played at the Castle, he had a certain on-stage guest in the form of Bono. In August, the album sessions were completed at Windmill Lane, and the band took time to announce the formation of their own Mother Records label, created to give new, mainly Irish talent a significant platform. The first such were Dublin’s own In Tua Nua.

Before the end of that month and nearly five weeks before the new record was even available, U2 set off on what would be the first of six legs of the ‘The Unforgettable Fire’ world tour; such was the demand that there were two separate legs each in North America and Europe. The starting point was Christchurch, New Zealand, the first of 19 Antipodean dates that included five each in Melbourne and Sydney. The opening single, ‘Pride (In The Name Of Love),’ a celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King, was unleashed in September, and soon assumed towering proportions.

If the train was already rolling, then by the time the album was released on October 1, the locomotive was roaring like thunder. A 21-date European run was illuminated by the fireworks of a spectacular response to the new album, which went double platinum in the UK and triple in the US. ‘Fire’ roared straight to No. 1 in Britain, and where ‘War’ had toppled Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ at the summit, now they succeeded David Bowie’s ‘Tonight.’

The beauty of Eno and Lanois’ understanding of the U2 essence was in allowing the band’s motivation to burn as brightly as ever, but now in the context of a more sophisticated, nuanced sonic backdrop. ‘Wire,’ for example, came out spitting flames in a perfect four-way mesh of Bono’s fiery vocals, Edge’s kaleidoscopic guitars, Clayton’s funk-friendly bass and Mullen’s frenetic drums. Released from the formality of rigid structures, pieces such as ‘4th Of July’ were free to roam, and ‘Bad’ had the confidence to build to a lofty yet pensive crescendo.

On November 25, 1984, in the few days in between the end of their first European tour for the album and the start of the first North American one, Bono and Adam performed on the original Band Aid recording of ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas.’

In the spring of ’85, U2 officially made arena status, on another huge run of US shows that included a Madison Square Garden headliner. For Rolling Stone magazine, they were now officially “the band of the ‘80s,” and few could argue with the designation.

WAR

‘Is That All?’ That was the question posed by U2 back where they had left off, on the last track of their sophomore set ‘October,’ in the autumn of 1981. No, that most certainly was not all.

The next time we heard from them on an album, they had developed into something more outspoken, more political and even more muscular. The message went out, just like the title says, with a single released on New Year’s Day, 1983. Fearlessly addressing the Polish Solidarność movement that dominated the headlines of the period, it proved that political motivation and rock credibility can be bedfellows after all.

Bono’s impassioned vocals and The Edge’s evocative piano narrative took the lead on a song that swiftly became an anthem everywhere, from American rock radio to MTV to the upper chart echelons of Europe and beyond. By early February, ‘New Year’s Day’ was the band’s first British top ten single, and the scene was set for a much-anticipated third album.

When it arrived, late in February, ‘War’ was a loud and clear statement that U2 were ready for the world — as the gold and platinum certifications started to accrue, it was clearly reciprocal. Among its countless achievements, one of the most cherished was that the record became their first UK No. 1, the first of ten to date.

Just as during the ‘October’ chapter, much groundwork had been laid with domestic and international touring in the early stages of 1982, including two months on the road in the US. In the employ of another cause the quartet were impassioned about, they also played a ‘No Nukes’ show in Utrecht in April, with the likes of the Stranglers and the Beat.

After that, it was back to work at Windmill Lane. A large chunk of ‘82 would be spent at that Dublin studio working on new material, but the band still managed to be on the road through much of the summer, at festivals ranging from Roskilde in Denmark to Rock On The Tyne in Gateshead. There was a summer break from the intensity for Bono’s August wedding on the outskirts of Dublin to Ali Hewson, which the couple followed with a short sojourn in Jamaica.

When U2 returned to the road in the latter part of the year, they had a new album, produced for a third time by Steve Lillywhite, ready to make its appearance. The sharply-titled ‘Pre-War Tour’ went into battle across the UK and Ireland in early December, armed to the teeth with the live debut of ‘New Year’s Day,’ ‘Surrender’ and the song that would grab listeners by the throat when the LP arrived, ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday.’

The sentiment was close to home, boldly addressing The Troubles, as Northern Ireland’s political and religious trauma came to be known all too well. If the title came from the infamous 1972 Bogside massacre, the anti-sectarian message was sadly relevant all over the world. A December 20 concert had them performing the song in Belfast.

By the time U2 finished their 1982 touring, with three nights back home at SFX in Dublin, ending on Christmas Eve, ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ and ‘New Year’s Day’ were essential focal points of the set. Those who tally such things calculate that they are both among the band’s five most-performed songs.

They also became the driving forces of the ‘War’ album. U2 were now, so to speak, big enough to shoot at, and the New Musical Express, among others, predictably loaded their pens with vitriol. Creem magazine was more sympathetic, seeing ‘War’ as a loss-of-innocence, coming of age record. “The persistence of The Troubles [in Ireland] has forced the group into 1980s-style adulthood,” wrote Richard Riegel, “with lifetime passes to all the weighty seriousness they aspired to in their mooncalf-banshee days.”

Far more importantly, the connection between U2 and their audience was now permanently locked. That applied not just to the paying public, but certain artistic forerunners, who also volunteered their endorsement. “When it comes down to what I listen to in the car,” offered Pete Townshend enthusiastically in 1983, “at the moment, it's very much U2, who sound a bit like certain early Who mixed with the Byrds mixed with the Beatles. It's difficult to explain, but it's just a sound that very much appeals to me.”

The sound of ‘War’ was bigger than ever, with Larry Mullen Jr’s drums venting admirably on the likes of ‘The Refugee,’ while Adam Clayton’s snaking bass and The Edge’s choppy lead lines brought something close to a new wave dance groove to ‘Two Hearts Beat As One.’ “I don’t know which side I’m on,” keened Bono, with a sense of alienation that was, perhaps perversely, now helping to turn U2 into a very big deal indeed.

"I think we've reached the point," said Clayton at the time, "where we have the skill to direct the playing on each song right towards the feeling that caused the song to be written. We're trying to strip away everything till we get to that cause."

In what looks in retrospect almost like a changing of the guard, ‘War’ removed Michael Jackson’s ‘Thriller’ from No. 1 when it entered the UK chart at the very top in March, 1983. Other newcomers of the week, from the traditional rock of Thin Lizzy to the synth tones of OMD, couldn’t compete. Then, where else but back to the road for 100-plus shows, as U2 elicited superlatives from the American media and made new inroads everywhere else.

OCTOBER

The 12 months following the release of U2’s debut album ‘Boy’ were eventful, to say the least. Ronald Reagan had become President of the United States, the Iran hostage crisis ended, then Reagan himself was shot, as was Pope John Paul II. J.R. was shot and so, devastatingly, was John Lennon.

Riots in Brixton lit an angry fuse around Britain. Cultural icons such as Steve McQueen, Mae West and Bob Marley all left us and the Stones were out on tour. Meanwhile at Windmill Lane Studios in Dublin, and initially at Compass Point in Nassau, four Irishmen were purposefully going about the business of becoming a premier division rock force.

U2 toured ‘Boy’ through the first half of 1981, taking the album into college venues from Norwich to Northampton, Manchester to Glasgow, then into Europe. They popped back to London for an ‘Old Grey Whistle Test,’ then crossed the Atlantic for an extensive American schedule.

Even before the band finished the ‘Boy’ tour at Hammersmith Palais in June, they’d seized the offer of their Island label boss Chris Blackwell’s hospitality at his Compass Point facility, by recording the new song ‘Fire.’ That track would underpin what became the second U2 album.

‘October’ saw the band rising not only to the usual challenges of proving that you’re more than a one-album wonder, but to the specific pressure of creating new work as the clock ticked ever louder. When Bono’s initial lyrics for the new songs were lost, he had to rewrite them in the studio at Windmill, with producer Steve Lillywhite poised to press record.

‘Fire’ was the fanfare, the opening shot, and it made some noise. The song was their first hit single at home, reaching the top five in Ireland, and gave U2 their first UK top 40 entry — albeit modestly, as it nudged into the top 40, incongruously positioned that August in between Elaine Paige and Eddy Grant.

Next came ‘Gloria,’ the second single and the opening track when the album arrived seven days later. The song’s Latin chorus foretold an LP with strong religious themes, but also with a developing sense of the band’s songwriting maturity and instrumental dexterity. The innate percussive tension of ‘I Threw A Brick Through A Window’ and urgency of ‘Rejoice’ were offset by the measured, near-instrumental ‘Scarlet’ and the affecting piano balladry of ‘October’ itself.

Where ‘Boy’ had only brushed against a mainstream audience in the UK, peaking at No. 52, ‘October’ reached No. 11, fuelled by the British tour that U2 were already on by the time it hit the shops. European shows followed, then it was back to the US, where the record topped out at No. 104, rather lower than the No. 63 peak of the introductory ‘Boy.’ The band broke for Christmas with two nights at the Lyceum in London, before an American onslaught in the early stages of 1982 that would lay the groundwork for the breakthrough to come.

"All we know is what we are,” Bono told the NME during that US tour. “What we have in this band is very special. The sound may be classical in one sense, but it's naturally our own. We don't sound like any other group. Our songs are different — they hold emotions of a spiritual nature. I don't have anybody to look up to in rock 'n' roll. I find...I'm talking around it all the time."

Then he concluded: "I don't really feel U2 has been born yet. I'm 21, Larry's just turned 20. In the past two years we've been directors of a very large business, worked till we thought we'd die, and the value of the experience is only now beginning to come out. I'm still learning.”

BOY

October 20, 1980. The last MGB roadster rolls off the production line. The Police dominate the British bestsellers, Queen reign in America, and ‘Private Benjamin’ rules the big screen. Into this world comes the first album by a confident young Irish band who have already been paying their dues and building their reputation for quite some time. U2’s ‘Boy’ is born.

It would be another ten months before the record, or the band, made their first showing on the British charts, as ‘Boy’ gave U2 their initial inroads to an audience that will soon multiply beyond all measure. By then, the next album ‘October’ and its flagship single ‘Fire’ were giving the quartet sophomore momentum.

But in October 1980, U2 marked the release of their first long player by setting off on an extensive British tour, and played their first European shows in Belgium and Holland, before their opening US dates, in clubs on the East Coast. “Steam was dripping off the ceiling,” Bono later remembered. “I just looked at Edge and said ‘Hey, wow, if this is America, I want some more.”

‘Boy’ was the album that laid the exciting ground rules for what U2 could be. It began the extraordinary journey of 13 studio records that has seen the band return to the debut set’s lean, razor-edge sound with the new ‘Songs Of Innocence.’ Connecting the two ends of one of the most storied careers in modern music, both albums evoke U2’s formative social and musical years, their education on the cusp of the new wave in Dublin and their love of bands like the Clash, Television, the Ramones and others.

U2 crafted the debut record at Windmill Studios in their home town for a large block of time in 1980, as they cemented their relationship with fast-emerging English producer Steve Lillywhite. ‘Boy’ contained such subsequently celebrated songs as ‘I Will Follow’ and ‘A Day Without Me’ as well as perhaps lesser-known but equally personal observations on the young band’s life and surroundings, such as ‘An Cat Dubh’ and ‘The Electric Co.’

“A glorious roar of hope, drenched in emotion,” wrote Trouser Press approvingly, soon after the album’s release. “U2 singer and main songwriter Bono Vox, 20, projects warmth and openness from the moment you meet him.” The frontman told the magazine: “What we were looking for in ‘Boy’ was a sort of cinema sound, a Panavision — really textured and big, like a huge screen in a cinema.”

In an early sign of the remarkable transatlantic span that U2 would soon confirm, ‘Boy’ made the American charts well before showing on the British equivalent, entering the Billboard 200 in March 1981 and climbing to No. 63. In November 1982, the album was certified both gold and platinum there on the same day.

Hello, it's me
I was wondering if after all these years
You'd like to meet, to go over everything
They say that time's supposed to heal ya
But I ain't done much healing

Hello, can you hear me?
I'm in California dreaming about who we used to be
When we were younger and free
I've forgotten how it felt before the world fell at our feet

There's such a difference between us
And a million miles

Hello from the other side
I must've called a thousand times to tell you
I'm sorry, for everything that I've done
But when I call you never seem to be home

Hello from the outside
At least I can say that I've tried to tell you
I'm sorry, for breaking your heart
But it don't matter, it clearly doesn't tear you apart anymore

Hello, how are you?
It's so typical of me to talk about myself
I'm sorry, I hope that you're well
Did you ever make it out of that town
Where nothing ever happened?

It's no secret
That the both of us are running out of time

Hello from the other side
I must've called a thousand times to tell you
I'm sorry, for everything that I've done
But when I call you never seem to be home

Hello from the outside
At least I can say that I've tried to tell you
I'm sorry, for breaking your heart
But it don't matter, it clearly doesn't tear you apart anymore

Ooooohh, anymore
Ooooohh, anymore
Ooooohh, anymore
Anymore

Hello from the other side
I must've called a thousand times to tell you
I'm sorry, for everything that I've done
But when I call you never seem to be home

Hello from the outside
At least I can say that I've tried to tell you
I'm sorry, for breaking your heart
But it don't matter, it clearly doesn't tear you apart anymore

At a time when a sizable chunk of the American population is debating whether immigrants are lazy sponges or job-stealing sponges, it may be refreshing to learn that Trinidad has a national holiday celebrating the arrival of Indians to its land. It was 1845, and they were workers coming to quench the country’s withering labor shortage. Of course, that ‘‘labor shortage’’ was actually how plantation owners described a result of African slaves’ winning their freedom — a thought almost as depressing as the fact that the Indians were actually indentured servants brought in to take their place. But today, Trinis are chest-thumpingly proud of their blended heritage.

 Those Indians, their descendants and the waves of immigrants after them fundamentally reshaped Trini culture, music and food. So much so that, if you wandered into any random Trini restaurant, as I did at Singh’s Roti Shop in Trini-rich Richmond Hill, Queens, you could be forgiven for assuming you’d just arrived at an Indian buffet. (Well, if you somehow missed the Olympics-like procession of Caribbean flags, the accents and the D.J. who starts the party by bumping bouncy soca riddims at 9 a.m.) Everywhere you look, there are curries, rices and rotis.

 Nearby, Dolly Sirju teaches Trini cooking classes in her home, through a company called the League of Kitchens. When I attended one, she welcomed us warmly but spoke with nonsense-free authority, and she didn’t want to hear any noise about her curries seeming like Indian food. ‘‘My great-grandparents moved to Trinidad from India, and Indians ask me, ‘How come you guys make the same thing we make but cook it different?’ ’’ she said before letting out a salty harrumph. ‘‘For me, India is totally different from Trinidad. I’m not fascinated by it. What we do is take a little from each culture — Indian, African, Caribbean, Chinese — and that makes it Trini.’’

Four spoonfuls into her nutty, herbal, spicy chana and aloo, I started to understand. (Actually, I got it after one bite, but I had to take three more — for journalistic purposes.) An everyday staple, the dish shares a look and a name with a typical North Indian curry: Chana means ‘‘chickpeas’’ in Hindi; aloo means ‘‘potatoes’’; the ‘‘and,’’ I assume, is a musical flourish of Caribbean English. But while Indian cooks make a gingery tomato base and grind fresh spices for their dish, Sirju’s version announces its island origins. The flavor is built on a floral wave of shado beni, a cilantro-like herb that grows wild all over Trinidad, stirred in raw and pungent and cooked down to a mellow, sweet swell. (The herb is also called culantro; if you can’t find it, you can substitute a combination of cilantro and parsley.) The stew gets a slow, building heat from fruity Scotch bonnet peppers and aroma from preground Madras curry powder, which was popularized by colonial merchants to create a British market for their spices­. All these flavors drape over soft chickpeas and potatoes to make a dish that’s particular to its homeland. It’s a rare combination of intriguing and satisfying — the kind of thing that sparks some pride. ‘‘There are a lot of Guyanese in this neighborhood,’’ Sirju said. ‘‘But if the Guyanese are having a function, they’ll ask a Trini to come cook.’’

She showed us other Trini kitchen moves: rubbing raw goat with ground cloves, then rinsing it with lemon and water to wash off its gamy taste; puréeing shado beni, parsley and scallions with water to make ‘‘green seasoning,’’ a killer flavor base, even if it sounds like a juice-bar nightmare; griddling roti flatbreads and then whacking the bejesus out of them with paddles to break open their flakes for maximal curry absorption. (The roti is called ‘‘buss-up shut.’’ It means ‘‘busted-up shirt.’’ Everything about it is amazing.)

In the backyard behind the kitchen, Sirju’s sons, clad in white tank tops, were teaching themselves how to take apart a car and put it back together: classic Americana. They disappeared for a while. Then, after hours of cooking, tons of curries and shirts being busted up, the kids came home — with a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken. I wondered if Sirju would take this as an affront — cultural decline at the drive-through. But she pulled out a bottle of Kraft barbecue sauce. ‘‘I make American food,’’ she said. ‘‘My neighbors are American, and when we’re barbecuing, forget it. The whole neighborhood is in my backyard.’’ She handed me a spoonful of the sauce. She’d warmed it with spices, sharpened it with tamarind, then napalmed it with chiles. She took it and made it Trini, made it her own. And she was proud as hell of it.

Did You Know: Our Sugar Cane History
"Trinidad and Tobago, owes much of its culture, races and development to sugar cane plantation. Explore this section to learn a bit about the country’s sugar cane history including its impact on population and traditions as well as the rise and fall of the sugar industry.
The Beginning of our Sugar History
Trinidad began its road to development with the sugar industry which obtained its first boost with the arrival of Roume de St. Laurent and his French compatriots with their slaves in 1783. Though discovered in 1498 by Christopher Columbus who claimed the island for Spain, Trinidad was largely ignored until 1777 when Philippe Rose Roume de Saint-Laurent made his first visit to Trinidad.
Roume de Saint-Laurent was a French planter born in Grenada who saw Trinidad’s potential in many ways. He wrote an in-depth report on the development potential of the island and although he was not given credit at the time, his advice was taken into consideration by the Spanish King. This led to the historic issuance of the Cedula of Population on November 20th 1783, which was designed to attract immigrants to the island.
While some of the land gained was used to plant cane, Trinidad’s sugar industry was further amplified when the island was taken over by England. War in Europe bought a fleet of British ships into Trinidad waters in 1797 and without much of a fight Trinidad changed hands and became a British possession. For the next century Trinidad became a typical British sugar colony with its fortune following the price of sugar.
Sugar Cane Plantation & its Impact on Trinidad & Tobago’s Heritage
Trinidad and Tobago, two islands which comprise one country may be considered one of the most cosmopolitan societies in the Western World. This can be greatly attributed to sugar cane plantation in Trinidad, where the melting pot formation began with the importation of labor to work the cane fields. Europeans, Africans, Chinese and East Indians came to Trinidad bringing with them their cultural traditions which exist throughout the country today.
First from its beginnings in Northern Trinidad the sugar industry gradually moved to the Central and Southern areas as slavery continued to provide the necessary labour. After emancipation, the African slaves brought over by the English, settled into their home with free rights. Many left the fields while some remained as cartermen, boilers, carpenters, mechanics, cane weighers and policemen.
To help work the sugar plantations after the abolition of slavery, indentured labourers were brought over from China, India and the Portuguese island of Madeira beginning in 1845. The East Indians seemed to thrive on the sugar plantations and here the two major races, Africans and Indians, struggled to keep the economy on a sound footing. In the process they created a culture of sugar which still dominates the life of the former sugar lands. Taken together, all the people brought to Trinidad’s shores during the sugar cane era built the diverse culture and enriched heritage Trinidad and Tobago proudly boasts today.
The Development & Demise of Sugar Production
In 1937 there were two major developments which occurred on these sugar lands. One was the formation of the All Trinidad Sugar Estates Factory Workers Trade Union which for the first time gave representation to many thousands of sugar workers who had revolted in 1935, 1936 and 1937 against slave conditions on the sugar estates. Now, under the leadership of Adrian Cola Rienzi they transformed the nature of the industry.
At the same time, Caroni (1937) was created when Tate and Lyle, a British multi-national company bought our Caroni Sugar Estates (Trinidad) Ltd making a conglomerate which included Waterloo on the Western coast and Brechin Castle in Couva. By 1940 the landscape of its headquarters, Brechin Castle, was changed by the construction of the factory and the four cooling ponds at the back as well as major company offices, the dispensary, Sevilla School, Sevilla Club and residences for mainly expatriate senior staff.
In 1960 Caroni bought out Usine Ste. Madeleine factory which had grown considerably since its founding in 1870. In 1975 the State bought the conglomerate, calling it Caroni (1975) Ltd which continued producing sugar but also went into diversification, producing citrus, prawns, large and small ruminants and rice.
By the end of the 20th century as oil became increasingly significant, the sugar industry and agriculture generally sank into a low second place until the state closed down Caroni Ltd in 2003, retrenching 9,000 workers directly and a further 35,000 who were indirectly dependent on the industry. Just over 75,000.00 acres of land now became available for other uses."

From the very first time I rest my eyes on you, girl,
My heart says follow t'rough.
But I know, now, that I'm way down on your line,
But the waitin' feel is fine:

"The past tempts us, the present confuses us, and the future frightens us and our lives slip away, moment by moment. Lost in the vast terrible in between. But there is still time to seize that one last fragile moment."

A church was shot up by a lunatic. The US government never lets a tragedy or crisis pass without attempting to find a new way to restrict the American people. So, we can expect a renewed push for gun control. There is a lot of propaganda about gun control. So much so that the truth has been lost.
The National Rifle Association (NRA) would have you believe that guns stop murders. The gun control lobby would have you believe that gun control reduces murders. They are both wrong. Gun bans have always had the same effect once implemented: none. They do not create a (sustained) period of increased murders, nor do they reduce the rate of homicides. The gun control crowd is currently stomping their feet and screaming “No, it reduces violence! I’ve seen the statistics.” What you probably saw were studies that point to reduced instances of “gun murders,” not murder. The pro-gun crowd is screaming that gun bans cause crime. At least this is grounded in reality. Typically, there is a spike in murders immediately after a ban, but it is short lived.


Gun control is designed to stop people from killing each other, at least that’s what we are always told. Let’s take a look at the data:
United Kingdom: The UK enacted its handgun ban in 1996. From 1990 until the ban was enacted, the homicide rate fluctuated between 10.9 and 13 homicides per million. After the ban was enacted, homicides trended up until they reached a peak of 18.0 in 2003. Since 2003, which incidentally was about the time the British government flooded the country with 20,000 more cops, the homicide rate has fallen to 11.1 in 2010. In other words, the 15-year experiment in a handgun ban has achieved absolutely nothing.
Ireland: Ireland banned firearms in 1972. Ireland’s homicide rate was fairly static going all the way back to 1945. In that period, it fluctuated between 0.1 and 0.6 per 100,000 people. Immediately after the ban, the murder rate shot up to 1.6 per 100,000 people in 1975. It then dropped back down to 0.4. It has trended up, reaching 1.4 in 2007.
Australia: Australia enacted its gun ban in 1996. Murders have basically run flat, seeing only a small spike after the ban and then returning almost immediately to preban numbers. It is currently trending down, but is within the fluctuations exhibited in other nations.
Plain and simple. Gun control has no significant impact on murder rates. Removing firearms does not typically create massive lawlessness. It is a moot point. These figures aren’t a secret. Why would the governments of these nations want a disarmed populace? For the answer, it is best to look at a nation that has had long-time gun bans that is currently relaxing their laws. Russia recently relaxed its firearms laws. For the first time in recent memory, a Russian citizen can carry a firearm. The prohibited items speak volumes about what a government’s motive behind disarming the population is. Russia has allowed “smoothbore long barrelled guns, pistols, revolvers, and other firearms, as well as Tasers, and devices equipped with teargas.” That’s almost everything, what is still banned? Rifles. So the Russian government has made it clear that the real objective is to remove rifles from civilian hands. The reasoning is pretty clear: you need rifles to overthrow a government.


The Real Reason Gun Control Will Never Work:
Poverty has a greater correlation to violent crime than access to firearms. Education and poverty are directly linked. In short, we don’t have a gun problem in the United States, we have a cultural problem.Home Depot. Most people in the gun control lobby know nothing about firearms or their construction. Everything you need to manufacture firearms is available at Home Depot. The materials needed to manufacture a 12 gauge shotgun cost about $20. If someone wanted to build a fully automatic Mac-10 style submachine gun, it would probably cost about $60. Every electrician, plumber, and handyman in the country has the materials necessary to manufacture firearms in their shop. The items are completely unregulated. They aren’t like the chemicals necessary to manufacture methamphetamines. How is the battle against that black market working out?
We have a society that panders to the basest desires and instincts. One of those is violence. We live in a society where women are given dirty looks for breastfeeding in a restaurant, while over their heads on the wall-mounted television plays a movie that graphically depicts someone being tortured to death. We are desensitized to violence, and we have a generation of people that do not have the coping skills necessary to deal with reality.

Firearms are the Pandora’s Box of the United States. The box is open, it can’t be closed through legislation. If you want to change society, you have to actually change the whole of society. You can’t blame an inanimate object that’s availability has absolutely no correlation to murder and expect to end violence.

Nothing is forever.

Here is a list of 15 things which, if you give up on them, will make your life a lot easier and much, much happier. We hold on to so many things that cause us a great deal of pain, stress and suffering – and instead of letting them all go, instead of allowing ourselves to be stress free and happy – we cling on to them. Not anymore. Starting today we will give up on all those things that no longer serve us, and we will embrace change. Ready? Here we go:

1. Give up your need to always be right

There are so many of us who can’t stand the idea of being wrong – wanting to always be right – even at the risk of ending great relationships or causing a great deal of stress and pain, for us and for others. It’s just not worth it. Whenever you feel the ‘urgent’ need to jump into a fight over who is right and who is wrong, ask yourself this question:
“Would I rather be right, or would I rather be kind?”
Wayne Dyer 
What difference will that make? Is your ego really that big

2. Give up your need for control

Be willing to give up your need to always control everything that happens to you and around you – situations, events, people, etc. Whether they are loved ones, coworkers, or just strangers you meet on the street – just allow them to be. Allow everything and everyone to be just as they are and you will see how much better will that make you feel.

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“By letting it go it all gets done. The world is won by those who let it go. But when you try and try. The world is beyond winning.”
Lao Tzu

3. Give up on blame

Give up on your need to blame others for what you have or don’t have, for what you feel or don’t feel. Stop giving your powers away and start taking responsibility for your life.

4. Give up your self-defeating self-talk

Oh my. How many people are hurting themselves because of their negative, polluted and repetitive self-defeating mindset? Don’t believe everything that your mind is telling you – especially if it’s negative and self-defeating. You are better than that.
“The mind is a superb instrument if used rightly. Used wrongly, however, it becomes very destructive.”
Eckhart Tolle

5. Give up your limiting beliefs

about what you can or cannot do, about what is possible or impossible. From now on, you are no longer going to allow your limiting beliefs to keep you stuck in the wrong place. Spread your wings and fly!
“A belief is not an idea held by the mind, it is an idea that holds the mind.”
Elly Roselle

6. Give up complaining

Give up your constant need to complain about those many, many, maaany things – people, situations, events that make you unhappy, sad and depressed. Nobody can make you unhappy, no situation can make you sad or miserable unless you allow it to. It’s not the situation that triggers those feelings in you, but how you choose to look at it. Never underestimate the power of positive thinking.

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7. Give up the luxury of criticism

Give up your need to criticize things, events or people that are different than you. We are all different, yet we are all the same. We all want to be happy, we all want to love and be loved and we all want to be understood. We all want something, and something is wished by us all.

8. Give up your need to impress others

Stop trying so hard to be something that you’re not just to make others like you. It doesn’t work this way. The moment you stop trying so hard to be something that you’re not, the moment you take off all your masks, the moment you accept and embrace the real you, you will find people will be drawn to you, effortlessly.

9. Give up your resistance to change

Change is good. Change will help you move from A to B. Change will help you make improvements in your life and also the lives of those around you. Follow your bliss, embrace change – don’t resist it.
“Follow your bliss and the universe will open doors for you where there were only walls.”
Joseph Campbell

10. Give up labels

Stop labeling those things, people or events that you don’t understand as being weird or different and try opening your mind, little by little. Minds only work when open.
“The highest form of ignorance is when you reject something you don’t know anything about.”
Wayne Dyer

11. Give up on your fears

Fear is just an illusion, it doesn’t exist – you created it. It’s all in your mind. Correct the inside and the outside will fall into place.
“The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt

12. Give up your excuses

Send them packing and tell them they’re fired. You no longer need them. A lot of times we limit ourselves because of the many excuses we use. Instead of growing and working on improving ourselves and our lives, we get stuck, lying to ourselves, using all kind of excuses – excuses that 99.9% of the time are not even real.

13. Give up the past

I know, I know. It’s hard. Especially when the past looks so much better than the present and the future looks so frightening, but you have to take into consideration the fact that the present moment is all you have and all you will ever have. The past you are now longing for – the past that you are now dreaming about – was ignored by you when it was present. Stop deluding yourself. Be present in everything you do and enjoy life. After all life is a journey not a destination. Have a clear vision for the future, prepare yourself, but always be present in the now.

14. Give up attachment

This is a concept that, for most of us is so hard to grasp and I have to tell you that it was for me too, (it still is) but it’s not something impossible. You get better and better at with time and practice. The moment you detach yourself from all things, (and that doesn’t mean you give up your love for them – because love and attachment have nothing to do with one another, attachment comes from a place of fear, while love… well, real love is pure, kind, and self less, where there is love there can’t be fear, and because of that, attachment and love cannot coexist) you become so peaceful, so tolerant, so kind, and so serene. You will get to a place where you will be able to understand all things without even trying. A state beyond words.

15. Give up living your life to other people’s expectations

Way too many people are living a life that is not theirs to live. They live their lives according to what others think is best for them, they live their lives according to what their parents think is best for them, to what their friends, their enemies and their teachers, their government and the media think is best for them. They ignore their inner voice, that inner calling. They are so busy with pleasing everybody, with living up to other people’s expectations, that they lose control over their lives. They forget what makes them happy, what they want, what they need….and eventually they forget about themselves. You have one life – this one right now – you must live it, own it, and especially don’t let other people’s opinions distract you from your path.

You have Stage 1 morality, which is described as preconventional morality. According to the studies done by Lawrence Kohlberg, anyone who is Stage 1 sees morality in an egocentric way. This means you make decisions on what's right and wrong based on how it effects you

Jonathan Trager, prominent television producer for ESPN, died last night from complications of losing his soul mate and his fiancee. He was 35 years old. Soft-spoken and obsessive, Trager never looked the part of a hopeless romantic. But, in the final days of his life, he revealed an unknown side of his psyche. This hidden quasi-Jungian persona surfaced during the Agatha Christie-like pursuit of his long reputed soul mate, a woman whom he only spent a few precious hours with. Sadly, the protracted search ended late Saturday night in complete and utter failure. Yet even in certain defeat, the courageous Trager secretly clung to the belief that life is not merely a series of meaningless accidents or coincidences. Uh-uh. But rather, its a tapestry of events that culminate in an exquisite, sublime plan. Asked about the loss of his dear friend, Dean Kansky, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author and executive editor of the New York Times, described Jonathan as a changed man in the last days of his life. "Things were clearer for him," Kansky noted. Ultimately Jonathan concluded that if we are to live life in harmony with the universe, we must all possess a powerful faith in what the ancients used to call "fatum", what we currently refer to as destiny.

why a nation of, by and for the people has become the savings-and-loan of a government system whose survival depends on an Orwellian state of constant war.

THE planet Mars is increasingly uneasy about the attention it is getting from humans.

As Homo sapiens discovered evidence of water on its surface, the planet braced itself for very bad things.

Mars said: “I was like ‘don’t find the water, don’t find the water, don’t – oh fuck’.

“Because first they find the water, then they send the ships and before you know it I’m home to car factories, cheese-crust pizza and Roadchef service stations.

“Thankfully the whole ‘mass extinction’ thing seems to be coming along more quickly than space travel.

“I know it’s wrong to want that, but I can’t help it. Just being honest.”

The upper house of Japan’s parliament has approved legislation giving more power to the armed forces. This includes permitting the military to fight overseas – something banned for 70 years since WWII.

Japan is a pacifist country – at least according to its constitution. Article 9, introduced under the occupying forces after the Second World War, seems unequivocal: “The Japanese people forever renounce war and the threat or use of force.”
But new laws introduced by conservative Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will allow a broader interpretation of what the constitution does, and does not, permit – so-called “proactive pacifism”.

the jewish bankers crashed the stock market
their the one's who saddled germany with debts
and ruined the economy

Your ego is black

 Your ego creates a barrier between itself and the outside world, providing comfort while protecting its emotions and feelings, and hiding its vulnerabilities, insecurities and lack of self confidence.

You are most concerned with power and control, hanging onto information and things rather than giving out to others.

You are very strong, contained and sophisticated, although at times you can also be perceived as aloof, withholding and pessimistic.

Slender Man


The legendary Slender Man has been lurking in the dark recesses of online forums for years now, the spindly apparition mythologized by blurry sightings in monochrome photographs and half whispers of Internet hearsay.
In recent years, Slender Man has become somewhat of a cultural phenomenon, spawning terrifying video games, unnerving fan fiction and even novelty mugs.

"When the world was created, countless centuries ago, it was made under a set of rules."

 

"But our world is not the only world. Sharing this same space just beneath our limited senses lies another world. One likely much older. One where the rules are different."

 

 

"We should not know of this place. But sometimes those who inhabit this other realm will cross over."

"If we can’t handle what’s happening in Syria — if we can’t even get the nomenclature right, insisting on calling these desperate refugees “migrants,” as if they had just packed their suitcases and moved north for a change of scene — how can we possibly handle the more chronic, endemic humanitarian crises of extreme poverty and hunger and sickness? Who, exactly, do we think we are, launching another fanciful campaign?"

Virgo, not to be a jerk or anything, but you think too much. It’s a good thing thinking isn’t deadly. Your biggest source of stress is not being able to organize these thoughts. Make lists. I use spreadsheets to keep track of my day to day tasks. But just writing things down is a relief for you.

 Virgos also think too much, like Geminis. Virgos have a very logical thinking process, and hardly do anything in life without thinking every little aspect through to the fullest. Without making lists to organize their thoughts, Virgos can easily let stress get the best of them. They also can be very critical of themselves and others, and enjoy a profession that requires paying attention to minute details. They are problem-solvers, and will help others solve any issues they’re having in life. However, getting to the bottom of their own problems is a difficult task. Virgos would do well to put their thoughts and ideas on paper, and also not scrutinize themselves and others so much.

Virgos are very meticulous. They like organization and order, especially in the way they communicate. Grammar errors drive Virgos crazy!

happy birthday to me

Aquarius (January 21 - February 19)

The Aquarius is a hippie elitist. They think they're the special snowflake of the bunch, constantly looking down their noses at every other Zodiac because they're so basic, man. The funny thing is, their entire lives are dedicated to the pursuit of being unique, so that tends to make them especially boring. They don't realize how boring they are until their bodies are glittered with Chinese symbol tattoos and their Hybrids are covered with every stereotypical progressive bumper sticker there is.

In sum, the Aquarius is an asshole; and they like the smell of their farts so much that everything else ends up smelling bad.

 Pisces (February 20 - March 20)

The Pisces can't take a joke. They're overly sensitive and tend to get triggered all too often. You know the type. They're the ones that heckle at comedy shows when the comedian tells an "offensive" joke. They then go home and write a blog about it.

It's fitting that they're represented by the fish, because they're slimy and cold-blooded. If you know a Pisces, always walk on eggshells because you're going to make them pout with a sarcastic joke or a harmless jab.

 Aries (March 21 - April 20)

Hitler was an Aries. And that makes sense.

They like to throw hissy fits when things don't go their way. This tends to make everyone think they have a dominant personality, because their tantrum is especially loud and domineering, but in reality, it's only a tantrum. They usually only need a hit of bitty and maybe some warm milk and a nap.

Also, the plural of Aries is "Arians," which is exceptionally creepy by itself.

 Taurus (April 21 - May 21)

Metrosexual. Materialistic. Money whore. The Taurus can be found at all hours of the day standing in front of a mirror trying to catch slight imperfections. They will then apply a new-to-the-market topical cream to address those blemishes. Once perfect, the Taurus will attend a nightclub and buy a fruity drink and sip, while scoffing at his lessers and their crappy fashion choices.

They are exceptionally boring people.

 Gemini (May 22 - June 21)

A prototypical Gemini has a dual personality. On one hand he fancies himself a genius voice of his generation, and on the other he's a complete moron. One is these ends up being the truth.

Wily and unpredictable, the Gemini loves to make people around them uncomfortable. They have zero tact, grace, or concept of self-awareness. Cough, Mike Myers. Cough, Taylor Swift.

 Cancer (June 22 - July 22)

Remember that kid in high school who wallowed in sorrow and liked to cry in the bathroom? Well, he was probably a Cancer. They retreat to their little crab shells when they get their wittle feewings hurt, which happens a lot, and usually explodes in a Columbine-like fashion in time.

Nobody likes them. They're sad.

 Leo (July 23 - August 21)

Leos are disgustingly vain creatures. They demand constant attention, or else they wither away and die. Oftentimes the Leo has a crack team of sycophants just for that purpose, whom he employs to pat his ego and sometimes do his laundry. The Leo thinks he's just being a great friend, because it's a gift to be around him, when in reality his little minions simply hate themselves.

If you call out a Leo's bed hair, they will put you on their shit list for life.

 Virgo (August 22 - September 23)

The Virgo is one lazy bastard. But not in the traditional sense. While it may seem like they're wasting away on the couch eating Pringles and masturbating for months at a time, they're actually making plans. They're meticulous and patient, and they will spend years if necessary analyzing the pros and cons, weighing the benefits, and perfecting the strategy, of getting off their fucking asses and into a cubicle.

They're also racist.

Libra (September 23 - October 22)

Libras are flirtatious to a fault. This often attracts pigs. They will then undergo serious, lengthy relationships with said pigs and never leave leave because they're too indecisive and don't have the sack.

And they're lazy. Even lazier than the Virgo. They love nothing more than sleeping in till 1 PM and spending the day in bed. They may get up to go to the bathroom or fetch the laptop to masturbate, but that's generally it.


Scorpio (October 24 - November 22)

Butters from "South Park" is the perfect Scorpio. Everyone knows him as the innocent little scamp who wouldn't harm a fly, but on the inside is an alternate ego: Professor Chaos.

Yes, the Scorpio may be a little dweebish, sad, and pathetic on the outside, but they're quite the vindictive sociopath on the inside. You will never know if they're plotting to kill you. Best to avoid them.

 Sagittarius (November 23 - December 22)

Famous Saggitarians: Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears, Nikki Minaj. The one thing in common? Obnoxiousness.

When Miley twerked like a little white idiot, when Britney shaved her head and went batty, and when Nikki wrote "Truffle Butter," these were the choices of a Sagittarius. Reckless and stupid.

The Sagittarius is also fond of saying, "I'm not religious, I'm spiritual." Which is obnoxious in its own right.


Capricorn (December 23 - January 20)

You try to get them to come out of their shell and hang, but they're painfully shy. They usually shuffle away awkwardly and do paperwork. Everyone in the office makes jokes about it.

Finally, after months of persistence, the Capricorn gets the balls to hang out. You plan to get drinks.

You order drinks from the bar and sit. Nothing. Uh oh. The Capricorn ordered fish sticks and tonic water. This is weird. You realize that you should have never invited him out because there was a reason they didn't want to. They're nothings in the personality department.

The photograph on the album cover was taken by long-time U2 photographer Anton Corbijn in the Roissy Hall 2F of the Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, France.[11] Unlike the busy colour sleeves of the band's 1990s records, the cover is a single monochrome image of the band in the airport's departure terminal. The designers describe the look they created as "grown up". Early versions of the cover released to the press show a departure sign that reads "F21-36", however, this was changed to J33-3 in reference to the Bible verse Jeremiah 33:3, "Call unto me and I will answer thee great and mighty things which thou knowest not." Bono referred to it as "God's phone number"[11] The lyric "3:33 when the numbers fell off the clock face" appears on the song "Unknown Caller" from the group's 2009 album No Line on the Horizon.

"You have grown into a violent thing. A man of solitude, drifting across these sands. Fearing those who make you feel human."

Traditional educational systems basically teach us that the history of man only dates back to about 8,000 years ago while religious texts date mankind to approximately 6,000 years ago.  It is more than obvious that there a massive push to occlude our true history and origins.

A map drawn on a gazelle skin of an unfrozen Antarctica was found in 1929.  The map was drawn in 1513 by Piri Reis, who had privileged access to the Imperial Library of Constantinople.  Contained within the notes found on the map, Reis stated that he compiled and copied the data from a large number of source maps, some of which dated back to the 4 BC or earlier.  Our history books tell us that Antarctica was discovered by Captain James Cook while crossing the Antarctic Circle on January 17, 1773 with the ships HMS Resolution and Adventure.

1. How did Reis know of Antarctica several hundred years before Captain James Cook ‘discovered’ it?

The last time Antarctica was not frozen was at least 4,000 BC, so…

2. Where did the Imperial Library of Constantinople get THEIR information and who is responsible for the initial drawing of that map?

oopart-clay

A tiny figurine made of baked-clay (right) was brought up in amongst the debris churned out by a huge drill bit during the drilling of a well in Nampa Idaho in 1889. The object is a one inch long figure with one leg broken off at the knee.

3. Is it possible that mankind has been here many times LONG BEFORE our recorded past?

4. How many millennia would it take for an object like this to be buried 300 feet into the ground?

According to Darwinism, man evolved from ape.

5. If man evolved from ape, then why are there still apes?

6. There are pyramids on every continent of the world.  Who built them and why were they built?

In Ecuador, one large Jade cup and 12 smaller Jade cups were found. Each of the smaller cups are a little bit different in size, but if you were to fill each one and pour them into the larger one, the contents would exactly fill the larger cup. The large cup has a perfect inlaid star constellation, showing Orion and other stars.

Klaus Dona stated, “inside the big cup it is very, very magnetic and outside the cup nearly nothing. Professional geologists are saying this is impossible because if a stone has metal particles inside the stone, it must be same magnetic from both sides.”

7. If scientists say that it is impossible to have a very magnetic inside of a jade cup with a non-magnetic outside of the same cup, then who created these vessels and where are they from?

In Illoinois a well bit brought up a 200,000 year old bronze coin from a depth of 114 feet just outside Chillicothe, Illinois. According to the Illinois State Geological Survey, the deposits containing the coin are between 200,000 and 400,000 years old.

8. Long before our state-sponsored recorded history will admit that civilized man was on Earth, what culture made this coin?

More than 350 artifacts were found in Ecuador in an old tunnel system.  One artifact in particular shows the same pyramid with an all-seeing eye at the top of it (below).  Under a black light, the eye takes on an interesting hue while on the bottom of this artifact (see picture below), you can see a star map of Orion’s Belt along with writing that is older than any known writing on this planet. According to the research of Klaus Dona, the same writing has been found all over the world, proving that there was a pre-existing GLOBAL civilization that is much older than any Sanskrit writings.

9. Why do all history classes exclude this information?

We are seeing a continuing theme involving Orion’s Belt.

The pyramids on the Giza Plateau also reflect the exact same alignment as the “3 Kings” of Orion’s Belt.

10. What visitors came to this planet from Orion’s Belt?

11. What is the significance of the Orion’s Belt constellation?

Professor Kurt Schildmann, former President of the German Linguistic Association, called this writing “pre-Sanskit” (older than 6,000 years old) and was able to translate the writing as follows:

“The son of the creator comes.”

12. What is the true meaning of this pyramid and why is this symbol still being used?

In the pre-religious Anunnaki creation myth, Anu had 2 sons, Enki and Enlil.  Enki, also known as Ea (as in EArth) in Sumerian texts, was loving and kind to the genetically modified humans who mined gold for the Anunnaki.

13. Does “The son of the creator comes” refer to Enki?

The Old and New Testament of the Christian bible clearly shows one vengeful god who kills millions of people while an apparently different god who is all loving.

14. Does the bible reflect the story of Enlil (Old Testament, malevolent towards humans) and Enki (New Testament, all-loving toward humans)?

In the Old Testament, Genesis 1:26, it states, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.”

15. Who is “us” and “our”?

In 1851 in Dorchester, Massachusetts, a 4-1/2 inch high zinc and silver alloy vase was dynamited out of solid rock 15 feet below the surface.  On the sides were figures of flowers in bouquet arrangements, inlaid with pure silver.

The rock out of which it came is estimated to be 100,000 years old.

16. According to academia, what civilization was capable of this type of art 100,000 years ago?

Over 200 metallic spheres have been found in South Africa and areestimated to be 4,500 million years old.  There are two types of spheres:

“One of solid bluish metal with white flecks, and another which is a hollow ball filled with a white spongy center” (Jimison, 1982).

17. Our recorded history tells us that civilized man has only been here anywhere between 6-8,000 years, so who made these spheres millions of years beforehand?

With the exception of stone and precious metals, virtually everything we own right now would eventually turn to dirt throughout the millennia, including all of our TV’s, cellphones, cars, planes and everything made of plastic.

If by chance, some major catastrophe were to hit our planet, within 100,000 years, just about every hint of civilization would be buried under years of decay.

18. Is it possible that there are malevolent rulers who have kept us in economic subservience for literally hundreds of thousands of years, if not millions of years?

All religions seem to share similar stories.

19. Is it possible that this template has been used since the earliest incarnations came to this planet, perhaps billions of years ago?

20. When will we finally learn to live without being economic slaves to the same system of domination and control?

You are my love I feel you in my heart You are my world I just can't live apart Because you are my heart Because you are my soul If you're not here I am all alone You Live in me Everyday I miss you so much my love Everynight i miss your touch And this feeling takes my heart Down and down My nights are sleepless, my love And I know you feel the same, my baby But you know, I do not care anything, Because now you are my love, my heart and my soul

As the 21st century begins, human evolution is at a turning point. Natural selection, the process by which the strongest, the smartest, the fastest, reproduced in greater numbers than the rest, a process which had once favored the noblest traits of man, now begins to favor different traits. Most science fiction of the day predicts a future that will be more civilized and more intelligent. But as time goes on, things seem to be heading in the opposite direction. A dumbing down. How did this happen? Evolution does not necessarily reward intelligence. With no natural predators to thin the herd, it begins to simply reward those who reproduce the most, and  the intelligent are left to become an endangered species.

 As the years pass, mankind becomes more stupid at a frightening rate. Sadly the greatest minds and resources are focused on conquering hair loss and prolonging erections.

TRUE HISTORY:
Let's start with the familiar beginning with the Genesis 6 and the Book of Enoch. In the time of Jared (see Genesis 5), 200 sons of God called the Watchers came to preach to man at Mt. Hermon (Mt. Sion). They saw how beautiful women were and made a plan to marry some and have children. Their children were the Nephilim- tremendous giants(called Titans by the Greeks). The fallen watchers taught them witchcraft and hermetic magic, metal working, technology beyond what we have now, make up, death blows, roots and medicines, etc. They each lived for hundreds and hundreds of years and their technology was far beyond what we have today except maybe for the suppressed types. God had the fallen Watchers punished immediately as told of in 2 Peter 2:4; Jude 6; and the Book of Enoch. They were buried in Dudael (modern day Southwestern desert of USA) to be punished. Their children, the Nephilim, kept doing vile things and ruled over man. They ate all food and animals and then started eating men! God sent the flood to destroy them and all their evil technology. The antediluvians countries of Poseidonis (Atlantis), Mu, Lemuria, and Hyperborea were then destroyed as well.
5 MILLENNIA LATER:
After consultation with Tibetan monks and a huge disgusting satanic sacrifice of Jews, the Nazis found out that Poseidonis was none other than flash frozen Antarctica. They began to dig up rune riddled antediluvian technologies like vimanas, bluebeam holography, crystals, plasma beam weaponry, etc. The Nazis retro-engineered the vimanas. Their first efforts were the Nazi Bell, Haunebu, and the Vril (foo fighters). The US found out and proceeded with Operation Highjump under Admiral Byrd(research him). They took over the technology, the area, and sent the German scientists/occultists of the Thule Society and Vril Society to America under Operation Paperclip. As prophesied in Amos 9:2, the illuminati (via MJ-12)started digging up the fallen watchers from their punishments in Dudael with the help of people like Phil Schneider. Phil was murdered for talking too much to the public. Sadly, he went to his grave thinking he dug up sulphur wreaking "aliens" from deep, random pits in the deserts of south-western USA.
PRESENT AND FUTURE:
Now the fallen Watchers work alongside evil men within D.U.M.B.s all over the world (like Area 51/S-4) building the anti-Christ's army with suppressed technology. They are also remaking the nephilim under the guise of "alien abduction". They have conditioned the public with MK-ULTRA through Hollywood, dumbed down school systems, media, music and even youtube to accept these demons as "aliens". They are going to pretend to be aliens to bring in the anti-Christ's seven year New World Order- one world governYOUment. and one world religion with many ways to Heaven. They will say we are all "christs" and "gods" except the anti-Christ is the main one. They will force the mark (PostiveID verichips & somark tattoos) on everyone. They will share their "alien gospel"- they came to earth because they are from Mars and there was a catastrophe there. They seeded monkey DNA and created us in their image with the evil Vatican leading the way as they try to destroy real Christianity. They are our supposed loving "gods". Now we are ready for their "truths". They will show many wonders and signs to make people believe. They will say they were backwards too until they rid themselves of stupid religious people like the Christians and suggest we do the same. Then we all better be ready to run as fast as you can.
THE SET UP:
This coming greatest lie of all time was mainly set up by two earlier big lies- 1.fake Roswell crash & 2.the faked manned Apollo lunar landings. Watch Jarrah White's Moonfaker videos on youtube that totally expose their lies if you can. We have never been to the Moon on a rocket. Apollo missions are fake. You and I will never go to the Moon nor Mars... a FEMA camp perhaps if we decline the RFID trackers. How would you buy "aliens" if we couldn't even get off this little rock. This was a pivotal ploy of the Masonic astro-NOT gang. NASA sprang forth from JPL which was founded by the sick Jack Parsons (wikipedia him)- the pupil of the most evil Aleister Crowley (definitely research him). Ever wonder why most NASA missions are named after ancient pagan "gods"??? (see 1 Corinthians 10:20) But evil supernatural power will be envoked as to fool even many of Almighty God's very elect.

"I am homesick for a place I am not sure even exists. One where my heart is full. My body loved. And my soul understood."

THE NEW WORLD ORDER by A. Ralph Epperson
The New World Order will include changes in:
the family:
homosexual marriages will be legalized;
parents will not be allowed to raise their
children (the state will;) all women will be
employed by the state and not allowed to
be "homemakers"; divorce will become exceedingly
easy and monogynous marriage
will be slowly phased out;
the workplace:
the government will become the owner of
all of the factors of production; the private
ownership of property will be outlawed;
religion:
religion will be outlawed and believers
will be either eliminated or imprisoned;
there will be a new religion: the worship
of man and his mind; all will believe in
the new religion;
The United States will play a major role in bringing it to
the world.
World wars have been fought to further its aims.
Adolf Hitler, the NAZI Socialist, supported the goal of the
planners.
The majority of the people will not readily accept "the
new world order" but will be deceived into accepting it by two
strategies:
1. Those in favor of the changes will have become seated
in the very thrones of power, generally without the
public realizing that fact;
2. The "old world order" will be destroyed piece by piece,
by a series of planned "nibbles" at the established
format.
The Communist Party is actively supporting the changes
to the "new world order."
The basic tenets of Christianity, which were the base for
the "old world order," will have to be eliminated.
If the slower, methodical techniques of change do not
function, violence will be introduced and controlled by the
planners.
The people of the world will give up their freedom to the
"controllers" because there will be a planned famine, or some
other serious occurrence, such as a depression or war.