Why I will always have one big love for Bono’s boys
ACHTUNG Baby was the first U2 album I ever bought. I say bought but Santa Claus brought me the cassette for Christmas.
Up to this point the only music I owned was a blank tape that contained various illegal recordings from 2FM and a Stunning album, stolen from my sister — again more felonious activity.
While it was Santa and not I who had contributed to U2’s everincreasing piggy bank, I was hooked. The art work looked deadly. The sound was like nothing I had ever heard before; the crunchy guitar on Zoo Station, the tub thumping intro to Even Better Than The Real Thing.
Even the poignant and mellow genius that makes up One struck a chord with this pre-pubescent 13-year-old.
For many people U2 were a bit too much to take — this spiritual Christian rock band, brimming with pride from their Live Aid performance and taking over the Trócaire Box duties from the Catholic Church, meeting the Pope and other world leaders.
Not for me though. They were leather sunglasses and trabants; ginormous TV screens, slightly smaller lemons and a discotheque for 40,000 people at Lansdowne Road. It was Bono and the lads at their most bizarre — their most ‘experimental’.
THIS was much more exciting than cowboy hats and afternoon rooftop gigs in downtown Los Angeles. The music videos no longer had moody sepia shots of them walking through Las Vegas or stopping traffic.
I suppose why I am talking about this is the universality of U2 — every Irish person has their own U2 story. For a small few it is the time Bono paid for their meal or bought them and their families a drink. For others it is the first dance at a wedding or even the track that helped them through a break-up.
Being Irish means that you have developed your version or view of the band or your own reason for disliking Bono in particular. We have made Bono-bashing a national pastime. I would imagine Joe Duffy could fill a week on Liveline with people hell-bent on slagging him off. He is too rich, or too preachy or not tall enough. Whatever the gripe is some people love nothing more than taking a potshot at the charismatic lead singer.
The most popular tripe being rolled out now is that he and his band of aging rockers are ‘irrelevant’. But to eschew Bono and company into the category of hasbeens or heritage acts is just petty nonsense and, quite frankly, utterly ignorant.
When U2 sold out Croker gig after Croker gig in the noughties, they were relevant. When U2 hijacked your iTunes account for 2014’s Songs Of Innocence album, they were relevant. When U2 showed up on Kendrick Lamar’s album, Damn, back in April, they were relevant.
There’s not another band in the world like U2. They’ve been going for 40 years. They still release new music. They have never rested on their laurels. There are a couple of other ‘rock’ outfits that continue to operate in such a way, on such a large stage but not many (Springsteen jumps to mind).
The Rolling Stones have become a greatest hits tour, happy to trot out favourites to an adoring public for a saucy ticket price. They haven’t produced a decent tune in decades. U2’s last album and the reason for the Songs Of Experience Tour set to land in Dublin next Monday, was excellent. Was it as good as the Joshua Tree? No. but it doesn’t have to be.
The show is spectacular — an incredible mix of innovation and production craft that will leave anyone lucky enough to have a ticket shaking with excitement. They have also completely reworked the set and the set list for their four Irish shows, because, it matters. I saw the show in Belfast and I was blown away at how keen and impressive the four musicians were.
The desire and energy they put into the show would put a lot of new acts to shame. Relevance in U2’s term is, well, kind of irrelevant. They have risen above it. Next week Dublin will go U2-crazy. And if you don’t like that then you can go and rattle and hum.