In my formative years, album served as anthem to life in America

I don’t remember the exact moment U2 entered my musical orbit.

What I do recall is the feeling the music gave me. It was brash and defiant, unlike so much of what occupied my Walkman at the time.

It felt, in some ways, like freedom.

I was a kid sifting through Latin pop alongside the sounds of MTV superstars such as Madonna, Michael Jackson and even Debbie Gibson. So much Debbie Gibson. I just couldn’t shake enough of my love.

U2’s music was something entirely different. The songs on “The Joshua Tree,” which turns 30 this year, were big, bold and “IMPORTANT.” In titles alone, they mined so many American ideals and clichés — but made them feel new and inspired.

“Bullet the Blue Sky” touched on religion and war. “In God’s Country” described a conflicted America. “One Tree Hill” mused on mortality.

Sonically, they traversed through rock and blues and country. It is, in many ways, the quintessential American album, albeit from an Irish rock band.

“The Joshua Tree” was led by a trio of singles that had a tremendous impact: “With or Without You,” “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” and “Where the Streets Have No Name.”

These are obvious tentpoles for serious U2 fans. But there’s a reason the first two stand as the band’s only No. 1 singles. Beyond being near-perfect stadium anthems and songs designed for earnest singalongs, they speak to larger ideas about love, obsession and life in America.

Their effects were amplified by nonstop play on various video channels, led by a stoic superhero known only as Bono. In a black vest and ponytail. Interacting on the Las Vegas strip. Towering atop a liquor store in Los Angeles.

It all felt alternately desperate and dangerous, thoughtful and triumphant. It was light-years away from Gibson’s high-fructose pop dreams.

And it set the stage for a slight U2 obsession that carried through “Achtung Baby,” “Zooropa,” “Pop” and “All That You Can’t Leave Behind” — for myself and a legion of other music fans.

The U2 fascination has settled in recent years. But every time I see one of those videos, I’m taken back to my teenage years — and U2’s rallying cries for love, life and everything in between.

And it still feels like freedom.