The night Bono lost his voice and U2 thought the band was finished
U2 believed it might be the end of the band when Bono lost his voice at the beginning of a gig in Berlin in September.
Bono’s voice specialist Steven Zeitels, whom the band rang from under the stage on the night, said at the time there was a 70pc chance that Bono had suffered a serious vocal haemorrhage, which would mean it could be years, if ever, before he was able to sing again.
The band speak in detail about the incident for the first time in an exclusive interview in today’s LIFE magazine.
The Edge recalls how he kept playing guitar initially, running through options in his head.
He considered stepping up to sing lead vocals himself, and also considered Bono miming to taped guide vocals the band use for rehearsals. But ultimately he decided that that just wouldn’t be a U2 gig. he hadn’t felt a pop, and his voice was working. But Zeitels insisted that Bono’s throat needed to be checked.
It is still not known what caused the sudden voice loss. Bono speculates that “it might have been a vocal spasm brought on by an allergic reaction to something. It might have been smoke; it might have been a blockage in the ventilation system”.
Fans attending U2’s run of sold-out Dublin gigs next week will be glad to know that Bono says he is “singing like a bird now”.
Meanwhile, Bono’s wife Ali didn’t get the news of what had happened until much later on.
U2’s friend and creative adviser Gavin Friday was frantically trying to ring her from Berlin to tell her, but Ali, who was at Electric Picnic to see her son Elijah’s band Inhaler, didn’t hear her phone because she was enjoying B*Witched’s live performance at that point.