MIXED MEDIA

A periodic survey of pop-related laser discs, books and videocassettes. Ratings are on a scale of one star (poor) to five stars (a classic). “U2: THREE CHORDS AND THE TRUTH”----*** By Niall Stokes and the Editors of Hot Press Magazine Harmony Books ($14.95)

As Ireland’s foremost rock magazine, Hot Press enjoys unusually good access to the country’s favorite sons, U2, and its writers usually manage to dig beyond the cliches perpetrated by 99% of all international music journalists. “Three Chords” collects all the publication’s U2 stories of the last four years, starting with Live Aid in ’85 and ending with Adam Clayton’s drug possession trial in ‘89, and stands as a worthy, eminently readable sequel to the magazine’s previously published collection of pieces from the early ‘80s. The attitude among the critics and interrogators represented is generally adulatory but not uncritical. And Bono really lets his ponytail down in the interviews--he comes off as arrogant, true, but arrogant in a far more interesting way than he’s usually given credit for. Just as you’re about ready to smack him for having an opinion on every issue known to man, he interjects: “When it comes to talking politics, I just want to be the man at the bar talking, that’s all.” Fair enough. As a collection of dated odds and ends and soused musicians mouthing off, this is not the definitive U2 book, but for real fans, it’s easily the most informative on the market.