U2's Bono agrees with the comments made by George Michael yesterday about manufactured pop. He spoke to The Sun newspaper after playing a gig at the BBC's Maida Vale studios. He said, about manufactured pop groups:

"People are sick to the teeth of processed and hyped pop bands. It's crap."

"They want something real again and that's were we come in. The tide is turning."

"Normally people want big rock bands to fall flat, but what I'm picking up is that they want us to do well because we are flying the flag for bands who can really play."

"The state of music in Britain and Ireland hasn't been very healthy recently but you can tell it's changing by the chart positions of pop acts - they are slipping."

"We went in at Number one, which surprised me. We were Number one in the singles chart and Radiohead Number one in the album chart."

"That tells me things are changing for the better. Fans are getting wiser. I mean, who are Steps?"