U2 slash fangirling - how I got here.

[lydia-petze.livejournal.com]

I was about 16 when U2 first appeared on my radar properly. Bit of backstory - I am one of those folks who was just about *born* slashing. I was slashing characters from TV and movies very, very early - before I even understood the *ahem* mechanics of the thing :-)
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I'd had, up to then, a vague awareness of U2. I'd heard of them, of course, because I hadn't been living under a rock, but let's see, I was about 15 or so when Achtung Baby came out, which would have made me a little young to be too aware of the Joshua Tree hype. I'm the eldest of three children, so unlike my sister (she's eight years my junior, and more or less grew up on U2 - she and I are hitting Vertigo in Sydney, when it eventually materialises) I had no elder siblings to usher me into the world of popular music at a tender age.
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So anyway. 1993. The Zoo TV tour went on sale here and a bunch of friends were going. Did I want to come? Sure, I said. Little did I know what I was about to launch myself into. I bought a few albums to bone up. AB and Zooropa, of course, and RH and JT, I think. Cool, I think.
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Yeah, cool. So, 1993 was also the year The Phantom of the Opera finally made it to Sydney (I have a point, I swear!). Lucy (little sister), Mum, Grandma and I were going. The morning of the show, 9-year-old Lucy was so excited she got me out of bed at some obscene hour. Stumbled out, made coffee, and flopped down in front of the TV. Being a Saturday, Rage was on. Rage is a video show that runs on the national broadcaster, ABC, from about 11PM Friday and Saturday nights right through to about 8 or 9 the following morning. BRILLIANT - I have caught the BEST stuff on it. And what did I happen to catch that morning?
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Numb, for godsake. Numb was my first U2 video. Numb, with all the Bono-nuzzling-Edge slashy goodness. It was the beginning of the end, for me :-) Once that little bell in my head, the one that hunted up slashy stuff like a bloodhound (even though I was not to learn the term "slash" for about another five or six years) went off, I was a great big U2 fangirl and nothing was gonna stop me. Luckily I already liked the music - it's not JUST the slash that keeps me hanging around. But it *was* the kick :-)
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