U2 and Green Day
The Saints Are Coming

"The Saints Are Cumming"

Here we are again with yet another reprise of the festival of hypocrisy, of "let's all get along," the rock saints who strive on worldwide TV to save the world. We already knew about U2: Bono traversed the 80s like Christ returned to earth, then posed as the "intellectual" of mass media in the 90s, followed by third-world recycling under the cry of "cancel the debt," culminating in the obscene Live Aid 2005 and a thousand other rhetorically coated initiatives, often in the company of his heir apparent, Chris Martin of Coldplay.

The Green Day shift is more recent: from the paeans to masturbation of "Dookie," we moved to the claims of representing today's America with its thousand contradictions in the pretentious and lackluster "American Idiot." This supergroup is therefore active in yet another charity operation, interpreting in a sickly sweet and MTV stereotype-laden manner the Skids' song: all proceeds will fund the foundation set up to help Katrina's displaced victims etc., etc... but can we say we're fed up with these shrewd managers of their market shares, with these operations where Berlusconi singing with Apicella seems a genuine artistic collaboration by comparison?

What will Bono's next collaborations be? A split single with Gigi D'Alessio - featuring Fabio Cannavaro and under the patronage of that mummy Clio Napolitano and her husband - with a cover of "Uno su mille ce la fa" with proceeds dedicated to the victims of Camorra and the "children of Fuorigrotta"? After all, the next U2 album won't be out until the end of 2007, something must be done to stay on the front page...