Light My Way

Ok. Before I get started let me say this, I've never dressed up like Bono for Halloween (or any other time), I have no U2 tats, and I don't spread their cds out in front of me and observe any moments of silence. That being said, I am so deeply in the tank for these guys that not only can I not see the surface, I have absolutely no interest in trying to find it. So anyone looking for objectivity can jump ship now.

There are reasons for this level of devotion, and if you're still reading then let me just say, here it goes.

First off, no one (and I do mean no one) sounds like U2. From the start, bursting out of the post-punk, new wave scene in 1980 with their first American single, "I Will Follow," it was clear they were something special. Larry Mullen's pounding, tribal skin smashing, Adam Clayton's throbbing bass, Bono's soaring vocals, and the Edge's groundbreaking, chiming guitar sound separated them from the pack of contenders. They were after greatness. Beatles and Stones type greatness. And while they had their influences (Joy Division and The Clash in particular) they didn't really sound like any of them.

As good as they were on their debut album "Boy," they've only gotten better over the years. The albums they have released since then create one of the most memorable resumes in the history of popular music. Classic records like Boy, War, The Unforgettable Fire, The Joshua Tree, Achtung Baby, All That You can't Leave Behind, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, and this year's No Line On The Horizon set the standard for this generation's rock groups (sorry R.E.M.). Even their "lesser" albums are pretty interesting. October's sense of spiritual searching, Rattle and Hum's immersion into American music, Zooropa's atmospherics, and Pop's techno experimentations all help to illuminate the road to here. And yes I did just defend "Pop." Any album with "Staring At The Sun," "Mofo," and "Please" on it cannot be summarily dismissed.

Speaking of tunes, what an embarrassment of riches! I Will Follow, Gloria, Sunday Bloody Sunday, New Year's Day, 40, Pride, MLK, Where The Streets Have No Name, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For, With Or Without You, Desire, All I Want Is You, One, Mysterious Ways, The Fly, Until The End Of The World, Stay, Staring At The Sun, Please, Beautiful Day, Walk On, Elevation, Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own, Vertigo, City Of Blinding Lights, Magnificent, and Moment Of Surrender, are a wholly incomplete list of some of their best and most memorable songs. In fact, their back catalog is so deep that several of these classics don't even make the set list of their current show.

And these tunes are about something. In these songs are the personal and the political, the sacred and the profane. From subjects like the war in Northern Ireland (Sunday Bloody Sunday), the loss of family (I Will Follow, Sometimes You Can't...), the test of faith (One, I Still Haven't Found...), and the burn of romantic desire (With Or Without You, The Sweetest Thing), prove that no topic is outside of their grasp.

While it would certainly be enough if they stopped there, they insist on going further. These songs manifest themselves into action. This is a band with a clear commitment to social justice. Sure, they have performed their fair share of benefit concerts (Live Aid, Amnesty International, Live 8), but they do so much more. It's not too difficult for a famous band to turn up at a venue and perform a truncated set to assist a charity. However, it's altogether something else to create an organization dedicated to the eradication of extreme poverty (Bono's ONE.org), or another to return instruments into the hands of New Orleans' musicians who lost everything due to Hurricane Katrina (the Edge's musicrising.org).

Martin Luther King Jr. once said "...when you pray, move your feet." Well no one in popular music or in almost any other walk of life moves their feet quite like Bono. His efforts to fight poverty and disease in Africa have resulted in his nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize the last two years running. In one of their finer deep album tracks (Crumbs At Your Table), Bono sings "where you live should not decide whether you live or whether you die." Ain't it the truth.

These four Irish lads have never felt it was enough to simply "entertain." When they head out on tour, they do more than put together a great set list, and a fancy stage, they build their themes of social justice into the show. Pleas to support the revolutionaries in Iran during Sunday Bloody Sunday, and the imprisoned, democratically elected President of Burma (Walk On), are just two examples. I can remember seeing them in South Bend just one short month after 9/11 and watching a curtain drop down with the names of the victims of September 11th written upon it during Walk On. Let me tell you, there wasn't a dry eye in the house. This is what you get when you go to a U2 show.

And what a show this current incarnation is! With a huge spaceship-like claw hovering over the main stage, with a massive circular, retractable video screen that extends and contracts like some sort of "tractor beam" out of Star Wars, it is a set up that would leave Major Tom, David Bowie, Ziggy Stardust and everyone of his Spiders From Mars caught up in fits of envy.

Of course, all this technology would mean little if U2 weren't a cracking live band. Which they are, in spades. Last week, me, my wife, my best friend and his wife, had the pleasure to attend U2's opening night in America at Chicago's Soldier Field. So, when I tell you that Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey got nothing on these guys, I know from whence I speak. It was my tenth time seeing them live and never have they been so fierce. The set roared at a breakneck pace for nearly two and a half hours. From the stomping opener "Breathe" to the soulful closer "Moment Of Surrender," they performed these songs and every one in between with the vitality of a much younger band. How many groups have been together for thirty years (with no line up changes!) and still remain relevant? It would be easy for them to simply go on tour every few years and cash in on past achievement whenever they wanted to buy an Irish castle or a new yacht, but that's not enough for these guys. They are still pushing themselves to be the biggest and best band in the world. Their current album, No Line On The Horizon, is every bit as ambitious as The Joshua Tree and Achtung Baby were when they were released. And here's the important part, it's nearly as good too.

All of this started over three decades ago when a teen aged Larry Mullen Jr. posted a "let's start a band" flyer on the school bulletin board. Among the barely post-pubescent lads who showed up to rehearse in the drummer's family kitchen were a charismatic, would-be guitarist who played so poorly they decided to make him the singer, a bass player whose most distinguishing asset was a massive blonde afro, and a shy, unassuming guitarist who turned out to be a genius. When they first got together they could barely play at all. But they knew they had something. A chemistry, an energy, and that shamelessly charismatic lead singer. As Bono once said "God did a lot with a little."

What an amazing journey. It's really a love story if you think about it. A gang of four who form a band in a Dublin kitchen, became best friends, and thirty years on are the biggest band in the world. They've had their ups and downs for certain. A crisis of faith that enveloped Larry, Bono, and the Edge while making their difficult sophomore album "October" nearly derailed the band then and there. Adam's struggle with the bottle, Larry's prickly nature, Bono's time consuming charity efforts, and the Edge's ongoing battle with his daughter's serious illness, have all put an occasional strain on the unit. Still, they have stuck together. How? Because they share the money equally, because they are still chasing greatness, and because they are friends. Best friends. Like I said, it's a love story.

These are the reasons why I love this band. All of this and more. So last week, with my sweetheart by my side, my best friend, and his lovely wife next to us, I got to be a part of a 60,000+ person sing-a-long. And sing we did, at the top of our voices, together, for two and a half hours, and to paraphrase Ernest Hemingway, the world was a "wonderful place, and worth fighting for." Where else on earth would I have rather been?

Sumo-Pop
September 22, 2009

P.S. To all those who don't get it, who may think me too effusive in my praise, I will leave you with a quote by the late, great Louis Armstrong:

"some people, if they don't know, you just can't tell 'em."