A Song Defying Gravity

U2 is ground zero for me. They weren’t the first act I loved as a kid, but they were probably the first that I took seriously. Achtung Baby wasn’t my first album, but it was certainly the first that I absorbed as such – a world unto itself, sophisticated rock music for adults just a bit beyond my full comprehension as a 12 year old boy. It’s still one of my all-time favorite records, and I’m somehow still growing into it now even though I’m a lot older than U2 were at the time they made it.

U2 were one of the first acts where I learned all the lore, in part because I had an older friend who was an absolute fanatic and had read all the books and collected all the b-sides. I’d do the same with other artists as a teen – R.E.M., Pearl Jam, Pavement, The Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth, Blur, Radiohead – but U2 had some different tensions.

U2’s decisions could be extremely frustrating; their choices could be vexing. They have a tendency to overthink everything. I first encountered them at their creative and commercial apex, so I’ve spent decades witnessing their gradual decline. I love Pop, but they don’t and most other people dislike it, so that appreciating that record has always been a little fraught. I think All That You Can’t Leave Behind has some good songs but it’s mostly corny and mawkish, and I like How to Dismantle An Atomic Bomb a bit more, but it’s kinda stale.

From there it gets trickier. I think most of No Line On the Horizon is clumsy and awful, and while I appreciate the concept of Songs of Innocence, only three or four of those songs actually hit the target. Songs of Experience is pure flopsweat, a band deep into middle age pushing back against waning commercial relevance by chasing the worst aspects of 2010s mainstream music by collaborating with the vile Ryan Tedder. What a depressing record – The Edge stripping away everything that made him an interesting musician in order to be more like OneRepublic. At least aim for Coldplay!

U2 have been semi-dormant for a long time. They haven’t released an album of new material since 2017, and aside from a few aggressively bad stand-alone singles, they’ve been solidly in retrospective mode. They put out Songs of Surrender, a collection of 40 new acoustic arrangements of old material, in 2023. Bono wrote a memoir with the same title. They played an Achtung Baby-themed residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas, which was the first run of shows they’ve ever performed without a core member of the band, as Larry Mullen Jr was recuperating from surgery at the time. I’m extremely jealous of everyone who got to see that show, by the way. I should’ve seen it, not you.

U2 quietly returned this year with two EPs of new material that were dropped without announcement or fanfare at the start and conclusion of Lent. Days of Ash, released on Ash Wednesday, a fairly dark set of songs meditating on grim recent events – the ICE occupation of Minneapolis, the genocide in Gaza, the Mahsa Amini protests in Iran. Easter Lily, released on Good Friday, is a brighter set of tracks focused on friendship and faith. The two EPs are a return to form, at least in that they’ve let go of chasing hits and have allowed themselves to simply sound like U2. If they’ve felt any anxiety in the past about relying on their stock moves, that’s gone now. This is factory settings U2.

This is a mixed blessing. It’s very nice to have new U2 songs that are embarrassing in some way, and even better that a few of them are among the best tracks they’ve released in the 21st century. But it’s a little deflating to notice how much this new material relies on iteration rather than inspiration. The Days of Ash tracks mostly sound like How to Dismantle An Atomic Bomb but with Achtung Baby guitar flourishes. Easter Lily revisits the tonality and aesthetics of The Unforgettable Fire, but with a touch of All That You Can’t Leave Behind-era spiritual bombast. The Edge is mixing and matching elements of his established palette, but there’s nothing “new” here. I can’t tell whether that’s intentional or not.

U2 “Song of the Future”

I don’t want to damn this music with faint praise, but given the context, what else can I do? These songs aren’t anywhere near as excellent as what U2 produced between 1984 and 1997. “Song of the Future” is good U2 music, but it’s not great U2 music. If you already like U2, the lead guitar part will scratch a very specific Edge-itch. I definitely think mediocre U2 is better than a lot of other bands at their best. But if you don’t have a lot of affection for them, I don’t think a song like this will move the needle. I think this requires an existing investment in the band, and possibly also some sunk-cost mindset. Like, you sorta need to be impressed that they can still do it. You need to see them as rising above lowered expectations.

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U2 “Easter Parade”

“Easter Parade” is more interesting to me, and I think it has more to offer than nostalgia even if The Edge is going full The Unforgettable Fire mode with the composition. Mullen Jr’s drums feel especially brisk, and I love the bounce in Adam Clayton’s bass part. It all clicks together beautifully. I hope they have the sense to perform this one in concert.

Bono sings “Easter Parade” with the earnest and dramatic tone of his younger self, but where there was once a fiery urgency, he now conveys patience and certainty. People generally don’t think of Bono as being a humble guy, but there’s always been a true humility in his many songs of faith and devotion. “Something in me died but I was no longer afraid,” he sings in the chorus. Maybe this is where the growth and change is for late stage U2. Bono shedding the showmanship, stripping away his artifice, and standing before us as he’s always truly been: a believer.

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