U2

Ultravox or Bono Vox, which is better? Well, as stated elsewhere, Ultra is better music (millions take to the streets in angry protest) but Bono is a better singer (six people in heavy mascara have a sit-in) – which isn’t to disparage Midge Ure’s pipes, as he is quite a good singer. But you don’t get a name like Bono Vox unless you have an exceptional voice. And Bono Vox has one of the best rock voices of all time.

U2 started in an Irish high school in 1976 (as a Beatles cover band), before the punk explosion really ripped through the musical landscape, and turned from a local phenom (one of my least favorite neologisms) to one of the biggest bands in all of popular music history. They’ve reinvented themselves a number of times, and gone from earnest, politically charged idealists to jaded postmodern cynics, and taken much of the civilized world with them. Even when they were a small cult band in the early ‘80s, they were prone to grand gestures more suited to stadia than clubs, and eventually their musicianship and passion brought them to the arena for which they are so well suited – the arena.

U2 is a traditional four-piece, and, as tradition dictates, the singer and the guitarist get most of the attention and the rhythm section – drums and bass – are usually lumped together in the background. Which, in my experience, is just fine with them. They are also the only two in the band who kept their given names. Drummer Larry Mullen, Jr. started the band by posting a notice on the high school bulletin board, and he soon locked into a groove with bass player Adam Clayton. Their simple, no-frills approach to the rhythm section works extremely well in a large context and gives a solid foundation for the more flamboyant guitarist (The Edge) and vocalist (Bono Vox – usually just Bono) to swing from. The solid beat anchors The Edge’s more abstract, ethereal playing, a style that was cemented with his acquisition of one of the only two or three Infinite Guitars Michael Brook had made. But that came later.

In the beginning, they played fairly straight up rock featuring the soaring voice of Bono passionately singing strongly political material. Growing up Irish in the tumultuous ‘70s made many people deeply committed to politics and they instantly gathered a following of local fans who were just as passionate about U2 as U2 was about their songs. Their reputation quickly spread to England and started trickling over across the Atlantic. I first heard of them in 1981, right after the release of their second album, Boy, and I clearly remember standing in Downtown Sounds (along with Full Moon Records, the closest thing we had to a hip record store in Traverse City) and studying the album, turning it over in my hands, looking at the cover, and trying to decide if it was worth taking a chance on. If I had done so, I would’ve been able to get in on one of the biggest bands in history near the very beginning (akin to listening to The Beatles before they left Liverpool), but I decided against it, which is a decision I’ve never regretted. For as big as U2 became, and as appealing as a lot of what they did was, they never really turned me on very much.

But lots of people found their righteous politics and deeply held belief that music could be revolutionary appealing and their star continued to rise. In some ways, U2 was a ‘60s band, idealistic to the extreme, committed to their generation and its ability to change the world and make it a more positive place. And, at the time they were rising through the ranks, there was very little popular music for liberal ideologists to hang their beliefs on, which only helped their cause (it also didn’t hurt that Bono was smokin’ hot in that rumpled, bad boy with a heart of gold way). At the time, much music was coolly intellectual (new wave) or, if it was passionate, it was passionately pissed off (punk), and I think this ideology helped their cause immensely.

Where I started to get interested in them was with the release of their 1984 album, The Unforgettable Fire. I was just starting at Hampshire at the time, and U2, along with REM and Elvis Costello (and, though they had passed their peak, Talking Heads), were de rigueur listening. The Unforgettable Fire caught my ear, not because of its politics or Bono’s passionate performance on the hit (and Martin Luther King tribute) Pride (In the Name of Love), but because of the texture of the sounds. The Unforgettable Fire was U2's first album under the production team of Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, and that remarkable duo polished and deepened their sound into a swirling, evocative wash. The Edge’s intricately intertwined guitar parts started coming to the forefront, and the whole album gave the band some much needed air in their production. The album sounds big, and it opened the door for them to take over the world. As usual, what I liked on the album wasn’t what anybody else did. My favorite track is what most people consider to be the throw-away final cut, MLK, in which Bono, in a rare restrained moment, sings over a glorious wash of sound. The wall of music that backs him is an indistinguishable fog – no instruments can be identified, no note has any attack whatsoever, the whole thing just shifts slowly along, changing by degrees and giving the track a wonderful melancholy and peaceful feeling. And Bono sings