"Discothèque" is a song by Irish rock band U2. It is the opening track on their 1997 album, Pop, and was released as its lead single on 3 February 1997. The song exhibits influences from electronic dance music, characteristic of the band's musical direction in the 1990s. The music video, directed by Stéphane Sednaoui, was set inside of a mirrorball and featured the band members dressed as members of the disco group the Village People. "Discothèque" peaked at number one in several countries, including Finland, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Norway and the United Kingdom, and it also reached number one on the American and Canadian dance and alternative charts. The song received mixed reviews from critics.
Release history
A 30-second sample of "Discothèque" was leaked to the Internet on 26 October 1996. By 27 December, the entire track had been leaked, after which U2 moved the release date forward. "Discothèque" debuted at number three on the US Modern Rock Tracks chart, and hit number one the following week. It was certified Gold by the RIAA on 7 April 1997. The song debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 at number 10, but dropped off the charts after only four weeks in the Top 40. It was also the band's sixth top ten single in the US. It debuted at number one on the UK Singles Chart, remaining on top for one week and spending a total of eleven weeks in the chart. The song was remixed for U2's The Best of 1990-2000greatest hits album, released in 2002. The new version has a longer intro and subtle use of the techno-sounding drum beat that figured prominently in the opening of the original track. The new "Discotheque" sounds similar to the way U2 performed the song during the PopMart Tour in 1997 and 1998. The version on most versions of the single was the 12" version, which altered the introduction's instrumentation and vocals. It was also slightly shorter than the album version. A somewhat abbreviated form of "Discothèque" was played during the first two legs of U2's Elevation Tour in 2001, normally containing the snippets of "Staring at the Sun" and INXS's "Devil Inside". A more rock-sounding version of the song was played twice on the Vertigo Tour accompanied by an elaborate stage lightshow. It has not been played in full since 20 September 2005. In the 2010 European leg of the U2 360° Tour, the band began performing an extended snippet of Discothèque during their remixed version of "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight", with Bono singing several verses of the song during the intro and the outtro, and Edge mixing its guitar riff in at the end.
Music video
In the accompanying music video, which was directed by the Frenchman Stéphane Sednaoui, the band performed in what seemed like the inside of a mirrorball. They alluded to several elements of the disco era, including disco-style dancing and the film Saturday Night Fever. U2 further and directly alluded to the Village People, a popular disco era band, by similarly adopting the guises of various professions: a motorcycle police officer, a gay-fetish biker, an American sailor and a cowboy. Stylus magazine described the video as "sublimely bizarre".
Reception
U2 were criticized by some reviewers for the large number of dance music remixes used as B-sides, suggesting that it was an attempt to gain credibility. However, Stephen Thomas believed it to be indicative of the growing influence of remixes in music. Commercials for the 2003 Toyota Matrix used the Hexadecimal remix. In a 2006 article by Stylus, the magazine had trouble trying to classify the genre of the song, calling it "sheer WTFery" and "permanently unclassifiable".
