Et Tu, Bono: You, Too?

As if in response to the massive media campaign that has geared up to promote U2’s latest album, NO LINE ON THE HORIZON, Andrew Gumbel has penned the following article for The Wrap, “Bono, U2 Blasted as Hypocrites and Sell-outs.” Gumbel chides U2 for turning its back on its fans as revealed by the band moving its business operations offshore in order to escape Irish taxes. While Gumbel may have a point, one might do well to remember that the history of rock is marked by continuous controversy: the strongly negative reaction to Bob Dylan’s going electric at the Newport Folk Festival in July 1965, for instance, or the commercialization of the Woodstock 1999 festival, and the violence that erupted there. While I sympathize with Gumbel’s position, I think his article is, in part, a response to the problem of feeling disenfranchised. Alienated from the products and services of mass culture, one feels drowned by consumer goods.