Part 1

There's nothing like the sight of a rock group to bring out the inherent snobbery in hotels, though in fairness to Auckland's plush Sheraton, it's the other guests, not the staff, who cast sideways glances at the members of U2. The younger staffers, who are in the know, are all smiles. The word is around that these are not only stars, these are nice guys.

U2 are small town boys made good. This comes through not only in their unpretentious dress and manner, but in their natural warmth. They are also self-conscious and shy, not wishing to be photographed while doing interviews.

The overriding feeling, though, is one of apprehension. The band has only just finished recording a new album and apart from three days' rehearsal, has not played live for more than six months. The opening dates of a world tour can be real killers.

"These performances will be very interesting,” says Bono, “it'll be like coming along to a rehearsal. That is exciting for us, hopefully it'll be the same for the people.

"You know, there's a lot said about the music in general terms, but when we're on stage, things start to fit into place. We really are just four jerks making forward steps in our music. We're as much fans of the music as anybody and we're as interested in how it's made as anybody. That's probably why we do interviews, to find out how it's done (laughter).”

"We're actually starting this tour earlier than we intended to,” says the Edge, “but the reason we agreed to play here was because we hadn't done so before, and the emphasis on new material wasn't quite so important. People had never seen us play the old material, so no matter what we did, it was still going to be new and there was going to be interest in what we were doing. We didn't feel embarrassed about not coming out with a totally new set of live material. I don't know what these performances are going to be like, but they will be totally committed.”

Commitment is a word which looms large on U2's horizon. It was that desire to give the best which led to their pulling out of Sweetwaters, a major disappointment. But Bono says the disappointment would have been bigger, had they played.

"We've never walked onto a stage without wanting to. We didn't want to do Sweetwaters because we knew we were empty and we had no energy. You take flak for that, but now we want to tour again, even though I don't know what the hell is going to happen.”

"The one thing, though, is that we never go through the motions,” adds the Edge. “I think an audience can sense that. It may not ultimately take away from their sense of enjoyment, but if a band is committed to doing something, there’s another level of appreciation that comes in. We've had concerts where it's almost as if the band and the audience have combined to create something that's even bigger than both the halves, where the full excitement and atmosphere of that concert is just so uplifting and incredible. I think that's just down to just going out there and giving everything.”

The new album, Unforgettable Fire, was produced by Brian Eno and should be out in time for next month's RIU, where it will be discussed in more detail.

What sets U2 apart is their sense of tradition, coupled with truly Celtic romanticism and a gritty determination to succeed. The Dublin boys are quick to acknowledge the influence of their environment.

The Edge: "Music, when it's really working, has that ability to draw the listener in, it invites the listener inside the artist's emotions and heart. Coming from Dublin, from a community that is a tenth of the size of New York or London, I think we are far more in touch with those basic human relations. What happens when you’re in one of these huge cities is that you become very conscious of yourself and how small you are, and your ability to communicate becomes less. You tend to know lots of people not very well, rather than say, for instance, us; we know a limited circle of friends extremely well. I’ve noticed that other bands which come from out-lying areas, like Simple Minds, from Scotland, there’s a quality to them which bands from the larger cities don’t have. I think it’s the ability to communicate emotionally.

"The bands which come from London and New York, it’s all very conceptual, it’s all kind of flat and intellectual. Don’t attempt to try and get anything personal from the artist, because the artist is so steeped in his own self-image and the kind of concept he’s trying to present, that he’s almost lost.”

New Zealanders, being landed refugees, are greatly envious of those who can draw on centuries of indigenous heritage, such as the Irish. Bono, having grown up with it, is more matter-of-fact, but readily admits its importance.

"I think it’s an unconscious heritage, with the group. My familiarity with Joyce and Yeats is quite a recent one, and yet the way in which I approach the microphone to sing is, in hindsight, quite in keeping with that Irish tradition, the stream of consciousness, the inside resolving all the conflicts, rather than just your head. Also in the playing, in the notes chosen, there is again the lyrical music rather than just the voice. I don’t know why it’s there, it’s just there.”

Despite the youthful exuberance of their music, these men have old heads on their shoulders, although only in their mid-20s. Bono and the Edge are both married, the latter also being the very proud father of a six-week-old girl, Holly. That sort of stability is unusual in musicians so young, and to the Edge, it’s another source of strength:

"Dublin, the family, our circle of friends, they give us something we can rely on. What happens to a lot of groups is they create something special and unique, suddenly it’s successful, they go to London, Sydney, New York and I think groups then lose whatever unique quality they had originally, because they’ve changed the very source of those ideas and feelings that made them unique. So for us, we’re always aware that coming from Dublin gave us the strange objectivity to the music business, this ability to throw away all the bullshit and yet keep all the positive and good things that were coming out. We could still retain that ability to relate to people and our sense of human relationships, which is important when you’re playing music, when you’re expressing emotions and trying to create something that people can latch onto and understand, in an emotional and intuitive way.”

The Celtic outlook also has a way of cutting people down to size when they appear to be getting a bit up themselves. Bono relates the delightful story of the night Jim Kerr’s dad went to see Simple Minds in concert. Kerr, as usual, was in full flight. His father, a dour Glaswegian, commented: "Look at him. He thinks he’s God. What he needs is a good kick up the arse.”

Bono and the Edge are both highly critical of what they call ‘mush music’, mainly originating from the south of England, all style and no content. Fashion music. Both express admiration for bands like the Waterboys, REM and even the Alarm, whom the Edge thinks have been misunderstood and dealt with harshly by the British music press. U2 have come in for similar treatment.

"I really hate myself for reading those pieces of trash,” he says. "I don’t respect them at all. I respect the individuals that bust their arses to write for them and get paid very little, and a lot of them are real fans of music. But the actual editorial concept behind them, the general trend within those papers, is just sickening. I think they’re important for a band when they’re just starting, they expose the apathetic radio and TV audience to something new. I think they’ve been responsible for the strength of youth culture, their awareness of bands and style and those sort of things, which since the 70s has just exploded in Britain. While that’s got its negative side, it can be extremely tribal and anti-individual, I think it’s probably overall a positive force because it develops the creative side of people and gives them something they consider worthwhile getting interested in. That can only be good, with the kind of apathetic mood the world is in at the moment.

"I’m not sure if it’s right to say they can create or destroy things, because when something is in the air, it’ll happen regardless. They tend to be quite accurate in their assessment of things from time to time, but they are also very unjournalistic in their attitudes. They never attempt to talk about the act in a general sense. All they’re doing is presenting their opinion in a kind of way that is final, you know: ‘This band is awful’. Instead of documenting what is happening or describing the act, it’s just a series of personal, random feelings and ideas about that band. Really it tells you more about the journalist than the band, in a lot of cases.

"One of the qualities I despise about so much of today’s music is that it’s so disposable. If it’s not listened to in that precise geographical location, at that point in time, it’s meaningless. If you listen to it six months later, or play it to people in another country, it means noting. Art, if it has any qualities, has to transcend barriers like that. It has to be timeless.

"I feel our music has that quality. It’s not important to catch the subtle nuances of the lyrics, it’s not important that you discover everything about the band that are performing this music. You’ll transcend that and gain an insight. I think it comes through in the performance, and a lot of these new artists just don’t understand that, it’s a foreign idea to them. But I think all great music has that quality. How else would a white kid of 15 in Sheffield be able to relate to someone like Ray Charles? It’s that quality of soul, that ability to empathise, to present yourself or some sort of emotion through your music.

"Commitment and honesty and truth are the things that matter. Take Marvin Gaye. There was a man who had no illusions about himself, he was not idealistic to any extent, yet he had this ability to be honest and committed to his work. There was a pain involved in that. John Lennon had the same thing, there was pain in his work. That’s what it’s about, it’s whether the artist has the guts or even the ability to present himself in any honest way.

"I’m sick of music that is just façade, you put it on and you know exactly what is happening, the guy is just writing off the top of his head, there’s no commitment to his work or the ideas he’s trying to present, it’s just something he thinks is a good lyric, or what have you. It’s just empty music.”

Controversy always sells, although in a year when we were all meant to be reassessing our lives, the biggest stink raised has been over Frankie Goes To Hollywood. Sing if you’re glad....

"Yeah, they’re at least different,” says the Edge. "We’ve seen it all before, though, with the Sex Pistols and Bowie. As well as some excellent production, though I may not agree with the ethics of that style of production, basically it’s the same old ‘creating a scandal through challenging the kind-of middle class values of England’. The really amusing thing is to see how successfully they’ve done it, how the same old techniques still work.”

The slightly vexed issue of Christianity is not something U2 willingly discuss these days. Their beliefs have been misinterpreted, certain media endowing them with a ‘squeaky clean’ image which is quite inaccurate. But there is no doubting the strength of their faith (three out of four, Adam Clayton being the uncommitted one). Prior to the interview, the Edge questioned me in detail about the state of religion in this country. He is not greatly impressed with the ‘born again’ types, the Bible bashers with the conservative, often bigoted outlook. His religion is more broad-based, not aligned to any particular church. It is a true Christianity that comes from inside, does not need to be shouted from the rooftops, is both understanding and tolerant, and constantly seeks knowledge. The Edge was born in Wales and when his family shifted to Ireland, they found the Presbyterian church the closest to the Chapel. Bono is from a mixed Catholic-Protestant background.

For the record, we also discussed politics and nuclear weapons in some depth. U2 do not refuse to play concerts on Sundays and the Edge says, jokingly, that he hasn’t seen ‘Chariots of Fire’. It’s actually the first time in two years that he’s discussed religion with a journalist, because of the way it’s been distorted.

"None of us are ashamed of our upbringings, which are actually about as different as you can get. But essentially, our beliefs are very personal, they don’t relate to any organised religion whatsoever. In fact, I don’t think any organised religion is up to it, because our beliefs are that Christianity, if it’s to work at all, must work on two levels. It must work on an absolutely personal basis, but it must also work for everybody, you can’t isolate it for a particular community or geographical location and mould it to suit that. This is what happens in most religions. It becomes small-minded and I just despise that side of church life and religion generally. I think it’s so destructive, it’s so untypical of God, Him being such a huge concept.

It’s something that is really very difficult to discuss through the media generally, because it’s not something that lends itself to being analysed intellectually, or even articulated about, because it’s a feeling, it’s something that is instinctive.

"The one way that we’ve found of communicating this side of our lives is through the music, and I think that is one of the only legitimate ways that I have found of communicating it. This is because our music reflects us as individuals, it’s something we’ve always wanted to do. We’ve never wanted to express ideas or concepts through our music, we’ve always just wanted to express our own beliefs and our won personalities. I think you can tell a lot about our beliefs by getting to know our music.

"A lot of people used to hope that they would, in an interview situation, learn about our music by understanding our beliefs, but I believe it’s the other way round.”

The religious references in your music have always seemed rather oblique.

"Yeah, I would hope that is the case. Again, we have never, ever felt in a position to tell people how to run their lives. This is one thing we’ve always been sure about. What works for us is great, but the idea of ramming it down other people’s throats is just so anti-everything that we believe in. Yet at the same time we feel no compunction to hide this thing from people who are interested in our music.

"So the two have to be balanced, obviously, commercially speaking. Christianity is not something you want to promote, as everybody knows, and I’m sure Bob Dylan would back me on this. It just doesn’t make good copy in the press. It doesn’t sell your records, in fact it can be extremely damaging to a group. But we’ve never been a group that relies too much on what the press or other people think of our work. It’s an extremely self-reliant thing, this group, we’ve always looked to ourselves for the judgement of whether what we’re doing is working.

"We cater for ourselves first, artistically, because I think we’re our most ardent critics. We’re always extremely hard on ourselves, and if we think it’s working, we’re pretty accurate. If it’s not happening, we’d be the first to say so.”

In the city of Hiroshima, famous for just one thing, there is an exhibition of paintings. The artists range in age from children to senior citizens. All were victims of the nuclear holocaust, all were invited to confront their nightmares by painting them. The title of the exhibition is The Unforgettable Fire. On tour, offstage, U2 are observers and absorbers, wanting to learn something from wherever they go. Their visit to Japan gave birth to song, which heads an album.

The Unforgettable Fire has been a test for the players, now it’s the audience’s turn. The album represents an earnest desire to change. Many of the songs are abstractions, a new producer is strongly evident, the guitarist dominates less, the vocalist and drummer stretch themselves. It’s a sometimes-nervous affair because it’s not a "safe” album. It may take another album to fully realise what’s been started on The Unforgettable Fire; it’s a metamorphosis and a bridge.

"When we finished the War tour we were completely exhausted,” recalls the Edge. "We collapsed into our respective homes in Dublin and lay panting for a couple of weeks.

"When we started planning the next album the thing that stood out was that we had started something that could develop into a monster we didn’t want anything to do with. There was a sort of tidal wave forming behind the group. We were becoming the figurehead of a guitar-based ‘new rock’, with lyrics that dealt with political topics. It was accessible for Americans, it was the New English Invasion and we just saw in the distance the possibility of us becoming a total caricature of ourselves.

"Then Steve (Lillywhite, producer) started working with Big Country and he did the Simple Minds album as well and that seemed to compound the whole feeling again.

"The strange thing was we weren’t going to work with Steve on either October or War. We contacted a lot of producers, but because of problems with timing they couldn’t do it. So Steve stepped in at the last minute on both occasions and produced both albums very well. They were difficult to produce, I don’t think anyone else could have done them, given the restrictions of time. So that was a backdrop to the decision to do something we hadn’t done with those two albums, which was to take a bit of a sidestep away from what was accepted as the ‘U2 Sound’.

"We’ve never enjoyed the idea of being a band which you could always anticipate what was coming next, a la the Rolling Stones, or whatever. We were more interested in the Beatles and their ability to evolve and do different things, yet still maintain some sort of continuity overall and keep their personality in their work. That’s the way we felt that U2 was not a sound, U2 was not a particular producer, or studio or set of arrangements; U2 was the four members of the band.

"So with this album we decided to start changing those things which were in our power to change. The first one was producer, the second one was studio and I suppose the third one was method of song writing and arrangements and stuff.

Around that time we must have talked to half a dozen different producers, any one of whom might have ended up producing the album. But with Brian Eno ... all the members of the group felt he would be the bravest move. Knowing his own work, his productions, his collaborations with Talking Heads, David Bowie, we just felt that whatever we did with him, it would be worthwhile. It might not be the most commercially successful album we’d ever made but ultimately it would do us good, in terms of our respect worldwide, and our career generally.

"So we rang Brian, we explained what we were up to, we wanted to go and record on location, in the big castle with the big ambient rooms, instead of bringing our music into the small, acoustically dead environment of a studio.

"It was remarkable, because he was going through the same frustration with studios that we were. He and Danny Lanois, who ended up co-producing, were talking about doing the same thing with their work. And it was the basis of that hour-long phonecall that Bono had with Brian that secured not the project but them coming to Ireland to meet us and talk about it.”

To abbreviate a lengthy narrative, discussions were held, previous recordings and new demos were played and hands ended up being shaken. The recording took place in Slane Castle, home of a genuine Irish peer. One of its features is a huge ballroom, with a ceiling the Edge estimated at 10 metres high. Slane had a live ambience which the band was keen to use, having already spent some weeks during the northern spring (March-April) rehearsing in another part of the same building. They’d worked on some 30 pieces of music by the time Eno and Lanois arrived. Then began the real experiment.

"We started working with Brian on tape loops and from drum rhythms, with about five people in the same room, all working with different instruments simultaneously. A lot of that material didn’t make the album but it certainly stretched us. I think that was the great thing that Brian gave us in this project, he stretched our perceptions of how songs can be written, how work can be achieved in the studio.”

The backing tracks were recorded over eight weeks at Slane then taken to London’s [sic] Windmill Lane Studios.

"I think it’s an album of contrasts. It shows off the many different facets of the group. Not only is it hard-hitting in places, really brash and abrasive, it’s also very subtle, tender and atmospheric in others.

"Lyrically, it’s probably less outspoken, more impressionist, open to different interpretations. I think that’s one of the good things about this group. People can interpret lyrics as if it’s their life.

"Musically, I think we’ve pushed the instrumentation in a few different directions. We’ve used strings on some songs, Larry’s using brushes on some of his drum parts, a few of the songs are written with drum machines, providing a consistent rhythm backdrop, to which we write on top. Larry is also using some flailing tom-tom work which I don’t think has ever been used before. From my point of view, I’m doing a lot more experimentation with guitar techniques, dampened strings, new bottleneck ideas. I think it’s more of a showcase for Larry and Bono than for Adam and myself. I don’t think we suffer essentially, but it’s less of a guitar-dominated album that before. There are keyboards as well, played by Brian and me.

"One of the great things about this band is the aptitude we’ve had for originating material in a kind of loose way, improvising new things. On this album Brian encouraged us to leave some of the improvisation as it was, without enhancing it in any way. There’s one song called ‘Elvis Presley In America’ which is an improvised vocal, there were no lyrics, no melody, no nothing, up until the moment the tape started turning and Bono started singing. It was a backing track of another song that Danny had slowed down and had a particularly unusual ‘blend’ happening on the board at that moment. Bono walked into the room, immediately said ‘My God, that’s great, what is it? Give me a microphone,’ and started singing. That vocal, as he sang it, is on the album.

"There are lyrics. We deciphered them as he’d sung them at that moment. But there’s also a lot of it which is lyric-less, which is sounds and half-words and things. On the lyric sheet they’ll probably read ‘indecipherable’.

"Also, some of the other tracks have been left very bare. There’s one called ‘Bad’, which was another one of those virtually live recordings, where Larry is trying to switch from brushes to sticks during the song and he has to play one-handed while trying to pick up the sticks. We left that as it was because it worked so well, another piece of totally intuitive work.”

So, having said all that, how do you expect people to react to what they hear?

"I think it will surprise people who know Eno’s work because it still sounds so much like us. Although our other albums have presented a very rich sound I don’t think there was a huge variety in the picture. This LP really is an album of contrasts. You’ve got songs which are very basic formats, really simple, like ‘Fourth Of July’, which is just two instruments, myself and Adam, another improvisation. You contrast that with ‘The Unforgettable Fire’, which has got so many subtle overdubs and treatments, a really rich piece of work.

"I think ‘Pride’ is the link between our past work and this album. It’s the transitional song on the record, it’s quite guitar-dominated without the guitar being really overbearing. It was a song that originated at a soundcheck, I think. Adam started playing this bassline, out of the blue came a melody from Bono and Larry started playing along. Bono and I took the tape away, worked on the arrangement, then played it to Brian, who was very excited. He didn’t mind it being so guitar-heavy.

"I think we recorded it about five times before we were happy. It was a very troublesome piece to record satisfactorily. I don’t know why, there were all sorts of troubles getting it to sit right, to work emotionally. It’s just as well, because I think the original versions are just a shadow of the final version.”

The Edge, being a quiet sort of chap, is not really comfortable in the ‘guitar hero’ role. The English music media has tried to breed a new generation of axemen, people with ‘credibility’, not metal masturbators, who have brought about the rebirth of the guitar as a lead instrument. In this context the Edge is frequently placed in the same bracket as Big Country’s Stuart Adamson.

"I think Stuart’s ideas all relate to the very specific way he perceives the guitar as an instrument. I know he’s a big fan of Bill Nelson and he changes the image of the instrument, but basically it’s the same format for him. I suppose that’s legitimate, he’s using the primary colours in the same way we did on our first and second albums; guitars, bass, drums and voice. But I think now he’s creating moods and feelings that haven’t been heard on the radio for a long time. Heavy metal became such a boring, lifeless, awful thing, even though the originators, Led Zeppelin, displayed a lot more variety.

"I suppose there are a lot of similarities in approach between my work and his. For the first albums we were using the guitar in a very traditional way, although the sound was quite different, as were the arrangements. We sort of expanded that with October and in War we brought it 10 steps back, because War was kind of a reaction LP. We wanted to produce something that was an absolute contrast to what was happening in the charts at that time. It was just slush, there was nothing of any substance. Lyrically, Bono was feeling he wanted to stand up and be counted on some issues, political issues, and things he felt strongly about.

"That record was a slap in the face. It was harsh, it was brash, it was outspoken, it was difficult to sit back and do the washing-up to. But I don’t think it was necessarily what the band was about musically, I think it was a bit of a one-off. It was probably the closest that we’ve come to what we do live. But to me, studio and live are very different things and the two mediums needn’t correlate exactly. I don’t think the guitar is so upfront for me now, I’m more interested in using it in different ways, not necessarily the way Stuart does. I’m trying to use the instrument as the originator of all sorts of different sounds. This new album and subsequent albums will be real attempts to create new precedents with the guitar. Simple ideas, not really complicated, technical ideas. I think the guitar has got ‘soul’, to use a really simple word. It’s got a musicality which synthesisers don’t have. And because of that, whatever you do with the instrument, I think it will still be musical, whereas synthesisers aren’t like that at all. At the end of the day they still sound limp. To me, the guitar is still the most emotionally satisfying instrument.”

The Edge, as the guitarist, can express his emotions often better in technical terms. Bono has to put them into words and is more able to articulate the meaning of the music and what people get from it.

"They react in many different ways,” he says. "It’s music to eat cornflakes to, music to catch to a bus to, fall over, go to bed, whatever. It’s all many different levels and we would never want any one part to dominate.”

"That’s important,” the Edge continues. "Because for a lot of groups it isn’t there. You go in and after five minutes you’ve seen it all, you’ve seen the haircuts and the clothes, you’ve heard the songs, they’re all the same and you can leave knowing you will never have to see that band again, you’ve seen it all.

"But with this group it’s far more complex. The personalities of the band are all given room to express themselves within the live context and it’s changing all the time. I don’t think any two performances are the same. There’s a lot of improvisation from Bono’s point of view and although there’s a commitment to each show they all turn out different. Some of them can be awful. When we started playing live, about the third or fourth show was just the worst show you’ve ever seen in your life. And then the other three would be really good, probably the best you’d seen in a long time.

"I remember one show we did in Cork, we had Paul Morley, the NME journalist (as he was then) come over to watch the show. We were all very excited and we were very unprofessional, the technical backup was not what it is now. All the equipment failed about a third of the way through the show, my guitars and the PA broke down. What ensued from Bono was this kind of frenzy on stage. He was bringing people up on to the stage, he was putting on their clothes and at one stage he stood up on the monitor and shouted ‘Right, worship me!’, playing the rock ‘n’ roll adulation game. Bono thought ‘Shag it, I’ll do what I like’.

"Well afterwards we were quaking in the dressing room, wondering what this guy was going to think of the absolute bedlam which had ensued on stage. Well, he came in and he was freaked – he said ‘Lads, I haven’t seen a gig like that since Joy Division! It reached metaphysical peaks’.

"We didn’t understand what we had.”

"I think we’re real ignoramuses,” says Bono. "We have a very warped impression of why people like us.”