Video: U2 performs for the BBC rooftop in London
U2 performs a mini set on a roof top in London for the BBC.
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Video: U2 performs for the BBC rooftop in London
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U2 News Aggregator
U2’s Bono Previews Innovative “No Line on the Horizon” Tour
After selling out countless arenas this decade, U2 are heading
outdoors this year with their first U.S. stadium tour since 1997’s
PopMart Tour. The band members, who release No Line on the Horizon on
March 3rd, haven’t yet announced dates for the tour or details about
what they’ll play.
But they hope to keep ticket prices unusually low,
and they’re already planning an innovative setup that will allow for
360-degree seating around the stage, which will be moved closer to the
center of the field than in any other stadium show. “It’s an
engineering feat that creates this real physical proximity to the
crowd,” Bono tells Rolling Stone, adding that the band wants to
maximize space in the enormous venues to accommodate the many young
fans it has made this decade with hits such as “Vertigo.” “We’re going
outdoors to try to meet that audience.
“We want to play for each other as much as we want to play for the
crowd this time,” Bono adds. “You just don’t know how long you will be
going to be doing this. I just sat everyone down the other day,
because some concerns about the tour had come up, and nobody wants to
be away from their families. I just said, ‘This is an unbelievable and
rare opportunity to be in this band and to play at this level. You
don’t know what is around the corner, you don’t know if you will be up
for it or the audience will be up for it.
Right now, we are perfectly riding across those two thoughts and every single night should be the
best night of your life. If not, then we are just the worst of those
Seventies dinosaur bands that felt it was enough to just turn up and
play and that people were lucky to be in their presence.’”
- RollingStone
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U2’s Bono Previews Innovative “No Line on the Horizon” Tour
U2 – BONO BORES HIS CHILDREN
U2 rocker BONO fears his teenage children find him embarrassing, after he overheard his eldest daughter call him “boring” during a dinner with superstar couple BEYONCE and JAY-Z.
The 48-year-old singer, who has two daughters - Jordan, 19, and Memphis, 17 - with wife Alison Hewson, admits he suffers the same fate as most parents.
And the teens’ opinions became clear when he overheard Jordan talking about her dad while the family were entertaining celebrity guests at their holiday home in the south of France.
He says, “I went in to get some wine out of the fridge and I heard her talking to her friends, because she loves Jay-Z and Beyonce. “I heard her saying, ‘He’s probably boring their a***s off talking about Africa ‘. And, actually, I think I was at the time.”
And Bono concedes it’s not the first time his antics have annoyed the youngsters, adding, “There was a funny moment on the last tour when there were formal objections by our kids to some of the music that was being played at the aftershow party.”
- ContactMusic.com
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U2 3 Nights Live
FMQB Productions & Interscope Records present U2 3 Nights LiveIn a rare, radio extravaganza, U2 is taking over the airwaves of North America for three consecutive nights.
U2 3 Nights Live will find Bono, The Edge, Larry Mullen, Jr. and Adam Clayton in a different city for three unique broadcasts on March 9, 10 and 11 in celebration of their new release, No Line On The Horizon.
Monday, March 9 LIVE from
Los Angeles An Inside Look At No Line On The Horizon
Time: 9-10pm Eastern, 8-9pm Central, 7-8pm Mountain, 6-7pm Pacific
Hosted by Shirley Manson
Tuesday, March 10 LIVE from Chicago Radio Takeover featuring a deejay set by U2
Time: 9-10pm Eastern, 8-9pm Central, 7-8pm Mountain, 6-7pm Pacific
Hosted by Shirley Manson
Wednesday, March 11 LIVE from Boston Featuring live performance and audience Q&A with U2
Time: 9-10m Eastern, 8-9pm Central, 7-8pm Mountain, 6-7pm Pacific
Hosted by TBA
U2 3 Nights Live will be delivered via satellite on ABC Satellite Services and Westwood One in the United States.
There is one :30 second commercial contained within the program each night.
This program is not market exclusive.
U2 3 Nights Live is intended to run as a three part series.
The following radio stations just announced they are having contests for secret gigs on March 10th in Chicago and March 11th in Boston.
http://www.wtmx. com/home. php
http://www.1019rxp. com/u2/
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U2 Play Rooftop, Bono Disses Martin
U2 performed a “surprise” rooftop concert on the BBC Broadcasting House on London, England’s Regent Street today (Friday) to promote the March 3 release of No Line On The Horizon.
The concert, which started around 7 p.m. local time and was streamed online through various websites, began with the new record’s first single, “Get On Your Boots” (which Bono says is an east African slang term for using a condom). Bono occasionally leaned over the railing to look at the crowd and thanked fans for sticking with them because “we’re not going away anytime soon.”
U2 also performed “Magnificent” and “Vertigo,” which Bono dedicated to his fear of heights. “Vertigo” concluded with Bono singing a snippet of The Beatles’ “She Loves You,” which was perhaps a nod to the Fab Four’s 1969 rooftop gig in London. The short set ended with “Beautiful Day.”
The BBC is dedicating a lot of airtime to U2 this week, but the national public broadcaster was forced to issue an apology this morning after Bono called Coldplay singer Chris Martin a wanker during an interview with Radio 1 DJ Jo Whiley. Whiley played a Coldplay song before U2’s arrival in the studio and asked Bono if Martin was as talented as Paul McCartney.”
I think he’s that good a melodist, but he’s a wanker,” was Bono’s reply.
Whiley cut him off and asked for an apology, to which Bono responded, “I’m a reformed character, I don’t any more.”
Bono went on to say that Martin was “obviously a completely dysfunctional character and a cretin, but he happens to be a great melodist and up there with Ray Davies, Noel Gallagher and Paul McCartney.”
Whiley was still offended and offered this to listeners: “I’m sorry if anyone is listening at the moment who were offended by the words that Bono said. I will apologize on his behalf.”
Bono later backtracked by saying, “I think [Coldplay] are a great band and, actually, it turns out [Martin's] a great soul as well. Sorry about that. I was just joking entirely.” Bono and Martin performed together in London at a War Child benefit concert last week after the BRIT Awards.
U2 will appear on The Late Show With David Letterman for five nights next week.
- ChartAttack
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U2 Play Rooftop, Bono Disses Martin
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U2 Catfights? That’s what this CNN video says.
Denise Quan recently interviewed U2 on-air about the creation of No Line on the Horizon and this is what they had to say:
Embedded video from CNN Video
This is a post from the @U2 blog.
U2 Catfights? That’s what this CNN video says.
Bono, The Fortune Teller?
In “Breathe,” Bono sings of a traveling salesman selling a cockatoo. As the quote goes, “Only in America.” According to CNN, someone offered two kids for a cockatoo that was up for sale. TRUE STORY! You can’t make this stuff up!
What’s next? An intellectual tortoise teaching at Cambridge University?
This is a post from the @U2 blog.
Latest Updates on Live Nation / Ticketmaster Merger
What a week in the world of Live Nation and Ticketmaster. After appearing before the two congressional committees, much has been unearthed for the public to digest.
Fans may not have noticed that there are some high-powered political players serving on the boards of the two companies, as well as a few others who are classified as lobbyists. The Chicago Sun-Times states:
“Live Nation’s board members include director Ari Emanuel, brother of President Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, and Ticketmaster’s board boasts director Julius Genachowski, a Harvard classmate of the President and a co-leader of the transition team’s policy work group on technology, innovation and government.
Ticketmaster has retained former Rep. Mel Levine (D-Calif.)’s lobbying firm, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. Lee Godown, longtime chief of staff to California Democratic Rep. Loretta Sanchez, and Daniel Kohns - Rep. Mike Honda’s (D-Calif.) former communications director - both registered on behalf of the lobbyist firm and Live Nation.
Should the merger happen, Reuters is reporting that “Live concert promoter AEG may end its ticketing relationship with Ticketmaster Entertainment (TKTM.O) if the world’s largest ticketing agency merges with Live Nation Inc (LYV.N), according to a regulatory filing on Thursday.”
In a twist of irony, Ticketmaster’s CEO Irving Azoff is crying that the secondary ticket market should be illegal. The Guardian quotes Azoff: “I don’t believe there should be a secondary [tickets] market at all,” Azoff said. “I believe that scalping and resale should be illegal.” Would that mean that TicketsNow.com would also be illegal? Well, when Ticketmaster bought the site, Azoff was not in charge. Had he been, Azoff says that he wouldn’t have bought the company. Sadly, as paper reports:
Despite this announcement, the “glitch” has again reared its ugly head. CBC has reported that Canadian fans were forwarded to TicketsNow when attempting to buy Leonard Cohen tickets from Ticketmaster. Tickets with a face value of $99-$250 were allegedly being sold at TicketsNow for between $568 and $856. On Thursday, the LA Times reported that TicketsNow is proffering seats for the forthcoming No Doubt reunion tour, with tickets due to go on official sale via Livenation on 7 March.
All this being said, Live Nation will make its earnings public on Monday, however they are already bracing investors for a fourth quarter loss. Forbes.com is stating that “analysts surveyed by Thomson Reuters are expecting a fourth-quarter loss of 22 cents per share on revenue of $1.00 billion.”
Given that Live Nation and Ticketmaster are claiming that 40% of their tickets go unsold, I can understand why there would be a loss. If that is indeed the case, then shouldn’t those acts who are having losses be playing in smaller buildings or in different markets? Seems like there should be some management restructuring going on here so that the fans aren’t being asked to foot higher prices to cover their losses.
This is a post from the @U2 blog.
Latest Updates on Live Nation / Ticketmaster Merger
Making Mental Notes
Hello. My name is Sherry and I am a U2 collector. @U2 is part of my 12 step program in admitting that I am indeed a fan, and that part of my fandom is that I like to collect U2 items. Some might label me as a “completist,” but after having children and carrying a mortgage in this economy, my money is tied up elsewhere and I am unable to fulfill my ambition to collect U2 as completely as I used to.
I had to start this blog post as a confession because after listening to Bono and Adam’s interview on BBC Radio 5 Live today, it struck me that there is a small place in Bono’s heart for those fans who are completists. They were asked a question by someone on the radio show’s blog about their views on the reissues and greatest hits compilations, and if they felt the fans were being milked a bit too much by them all. Bono responded by stating that it’s simple - just don’t buy them if you feel that way. Sure, that’s easy for him to say! Adam piped in to say that the early recordings were mastered differently as CDs weren’t around at that point and that it was important to remaster them for the CD world. Bono then responded about those who, like me, like to collect everything the band ever puts out.
Bono said, rather tongue-in-cheek, that completeists have a mental condition, but that he does share a concern about this group of die-hard fans being milked with these items.
Now, I knew I had a mental condition about this band, but to have Bono rather matter-of-factly confirm that made me feel a little more understood while at the same time feeling “hey - because of my collecting of your goods, you own houses in many countries and can travel the world as freely as you’d like!” So thanks to my mental condition, his wallet is a bit better padded.
Fair play, Bono.
This is a post from the @U2 blog.
REPORTING LIVE FROM LONDON (via @U2)
From our friends at @U2:
U2 is set to play a rooftop gig in London in a matter of moments.
We’ll be using our Twitter account (@atu2) to post updates from fans
who are there.Meanwhile, here are some photos being shared via Twitter and Twitpic:
http://twitpic.com/1q8rl
http://twitpic.com/1q8u2
http://twitpic.com/1q8ni
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REPORTING LIVE FROM LONDON (via @U2)
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REVIEW: FOUR STARS FOR THE FOUR SUPERSTARS
By Elysa Gardner
USA TODAY
U2, No Line on the Horizon
* * * * (out of four)
Thirty years after U2’s recording debut, it’s worth remembering how the coolest band in rock ‘n’ roll earned that status: by rejecting the preoccupation with coolness that then characterized much of modern rock. Bono and friends have never shied from the grand gesture, never been wary of the heart-on-sleeve intensity that can lead lesser artists to sentimentality. Even when they’ve embraced irony, it’s not at the expense of passion.
With its 12th studio album, No Line on the Horizon, U2 continues to set the standard for sonic and emotional potency and daring. It lacks the immediate, relentless melodic punch of The Joshua Tree or Achtung Baby, but texturally, Horizon ranks with the group’s best, boldest work and grows more resonant with repeated listening.
Produced by Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois and Steve Lillywhite, who have helped define and refine U2’s unmistakable yet ever-evolving sound, the album features music written by the band with Eno and Lanois. The result is tracks with both anthemic sweep and intricate nuance. From the pummeling title cut to the hauntingly spare White As Snow, all are showcases for the musicians’ individual and collective strengths.
Edge’s chiming, richly harmonic guitar work is showcased with loving care, whether he’s propelling a hook or pouring his bursts of color and light into a searing solo. Bassist Adam Clayton and drummer Larry Mullen Jr. remain the most supple and sensual rhythm team in contemporary rock, providing a flesh-and-blood foundation for the densely atmospheric, distortion-flecked arrangements.
As frontman, Bono continues to acknowledge the contradictions that come with being a superstar with a healthy ego and a keen conscience, worldly sophistication and spiritual curiosity. There are self-deprecating nods to his side gig as celebrated activist: “Be careful of small men with big ideas,” he sings in Stand Up Comedy. But the singer is most revealing in yearning, searching mode. “It’s not if I believe in love/But if love believes in me/Oh, believe in me,” he pleads in Moment of Surrender.
After all this time and all that success, U2 still hasn’t found what it’s looking for: The band is as full of questions and thirsty for inspiration as ever, eager to continue exploring and growing.
>Download: Aforementioned songs, Unknown Caller, I’ll Go Crazy If I Don’t Go Crazy Tonight, Fez Being Born >Skip: Nothing
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REVIEW: FOUR STARS FOR THE FOUR SUPERSTARS
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‘Horizon’ evolves with U2’s audacity, creativity, innovation
HOLLYWOOD — Trading a woozy tingle for a restorative jolt, Bono and Edge abruptly switch from margaritas to coffee as they prepare to leave their hotel for a rehearsal stage in downtown Los Angeles. They grew accustomed to such giddy and pronounced mood swings while recording U2’s 12th album, No Line on the Horizon, a kaleidoscopic quest that rivals 1991’s Achtung Baby for audacity and innovation.
“We had to learn a lot before we could do this,” Bono, 48, says. “Normally, you zone in on a particular area and make it your own. On this, we seemed to be able to meander from joy to despair, from introspection to exhibitionism. And there’s a lot of humor. I’m surprised, because people don’t generally buy a U2 album for the laughs.
“There’s fun and frolics here. Real joy, and that’s the essence, the life force, of rock ‘n’ roll.”
One of the year’s most eagerly anticipated albums, Horizon is garnering raves for brazen and byzantine sonic architecture that rises from U2’s familiar foundation of heartfelt rock. The 11-track disc, out Tuesday, found the Irish foursome recording in Morocco, then in Dublin and later in New York and London. The album closes the band’s longest gap between studio albums, following 2004’s How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, which sold 9 million copies worldwide and generated eight Grammys.
Edge, 47, is relieved to emerge from what he calls the “oil rig” after a long spell of concentrated but isolating creativity with Bono, drummer Larry Mullen Jr. and bassist Adam Clayton. Horizon’s lengthy gestation wasn’t the result of setbacks or writer’s block, but rather a geyser of impulses and detours.
“We would have loved to finish the album last summer, but the songs weren’t finished with us,” says Edge, sharing a couch with Bono in a Chateau Marmont bungalow cluttered with video gear. “Realizing there was more to this album than what we had, we kept going. We dropped two or three songs, finished up others. It would have been a darker record before.”
At Mullen’s urging, the band had no timetable and missed the lucrative fall release schedule.
By briefly considering a late 2008 release date, “we lost our way a bit, but when we blew out the deadline, we came back,” Bono says. “When anyone said, ‘Look, we have to put this out,’ Larry said, ‘Oh, it’s going to ruin everything.’ We were making music for its own sake and for each other, and Larry wanted to keep that as long as we could. It was a lovely thing to be lost in.”
More cloistered than on past efforts, the band “wasn’t thinking about who would be listening to the music in the future or how it would go over live,” Edge says.
Second disc on the horizon
After a leisurely recording pace, the band spent a frenzied 48 hours in London rotating seven final mixes, eight vocal versions and lyric rewrites.
Tunes left behind, including the soulful Every Breaking Wave, are slated for a more meditative album due possibly by year’s end. U2 also is sitting on material from early sessions with Rick Rubin, benched after the band reconnected with longtime collaborators Brian Eno and Danny Lanois, who produced Horizon with Steve Lillywhite.
“Rick is a minimalist, which is about getting back to pure essence,” Bono says. “That’s the theme of this album lyrically, but musically, this is maximalist. He wants to make a U2 album that is hard as nails and tender as can be but musically bare-boned. There is a place for that. This was the time for experimentation, wanderlust and finding other colors.”
Edge says they aren’t wed to any single formula.
“Rick is methodical, and I’m excited about working in that style as well,” he says, noting that the songs he and Bono have been writing for next year’s Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark Broadway musical require a more disciplined approach.
“There’s no strict route to a U2 song,” Edge says. “The only thing that’s consistent is the search for inspiration. It can start from a drumbeat, a guitar part, a title, a lyric. An entire piece of music can suddenly arrive. We subscribe to the idea that there’s no such thing as failure. There’s just giving up. We do not give up. We are relentless.”
U2’s tenacity and artistic daring pay off in Horizon’s towering splendor, says Blender editor Joe Levy.
“It combines two moments: the epic grandeur of The Joshua Tree and the experimental audio research of Achtung Baby and Zooropa,” he says. “They’re at a point where they can be the biggest band in the world and still be edgy, with a capital ‘E’ in this case. They haven’t come out swinging this hard and reaching this high since Joshua. On the surface, it’s classic U2. Put on the headphones, and you hear an album every bit as sonically ambitious as Achtung Baby.”
Horizon’s immediacy, nimble complexities and clear messages cement U2’s standing as the only veteran rock band with consistent artistic relevance and commercial clout, he says.
“They don’t do it by utilizing the same set of tricks or by having Justin Timberlake and Timbaland on speed-dial,” Levy says. “None of their ’80s contemporaries — Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Prince or Michael Jackson — managed to continuously keep the focus on new music.”
On the road, the band is eclipsed only by the Rolling Stones, whose Bigger Bang is history’s top-grossing tour with $558 million, according to Billboard Boxscore. U2’s Vertigo tour ranks second with $389 million, and the band will get another shot at the record book when it hits stadiums this summer, its first outdoor U.S. trek in 12 years.
“When U2 tours, it’s a major global live entertainment event,” says Ray Waddell, Billboard’s touring editor. “Only a handful of bands have achieved that sort of international touring superstar status. Though you hate to say anyone is recession-proof, U2 is about as close to that as you can get. It’s can’t-miss entertainment.
“That said, any band would be foolish not to take into account economic conditions when mounting a major tour, and the U2 team is anything but foolish.”
Mediocrity ‘would kill us’
Sinking CD sales and the crumbling economy didn’t dissuade U2 from gambling on stadiums (the band nearly went broke staging the extravagant 1997-98 PopMart tour) and plowing fresh turf on Horizon.
“The point was to get out of the comfort zone into uncharted territory,” Edge says. “We love it when we don’t know what we’re doing. We’re more alive. It has to be about discovery or we lose interest.
“Even so, no matter how far out we go, it always ends up sounding like U2.”
Fan loyalty, critical acceptance and the industry’s abiding support should fuel U2’s nerve, but the band says its self-confidence is the first casualty during months of studio skydiving and spelunking.
“You don’t get this much attitude if you’re not insecure,” Bono says with a laugh. “Insecurity is our best security, and the moment we lose that insecurity, we’re in deep trouble. It’s important to be out of our depth.”
He recites a line from Cedars of Lebanon, a somber tune from the view of a war correspondent: “Choose your enemies carefully because they will define you.”
It’s a sly cautionary tag on a character study that reflects a collective regret and despair in today’s uneasy world. And it’s a U2 mantra.
“U2 never took on obvious enemies — pretending to sneer at fashion or the establishment,” Bono says. “They’re useless enemies. The more interesting enemies are your own hypocrisy, the obstacles to realizing your own potential.”
More than 30 years after forming in Dublin, “U2 only survives as long as everyone is willing to totally commit,” Edge says. “As long as our agendas are aligned and the singular band ego is bigger than our individual egos, we can go on. If that ever is no longer possible, we’d pack it in. None of us could hack turning out mediocre records. It would kill us.”
Bono, the globe-trotting activist with demanding commitments worldwide, rediscovered U2’s value during a spate of separation anxiety.
“Because I’m on my own in my other lives, I had an epiphany about how much I need to be in this band,” he says. “Over the years, you perhaps take for granted the opportunity to make music. I’m very happy as an activist, but it’s a very demanding life, a slog, and it can be dirty work. This record put me back in the place I was as a teenager, working in a gas station, dreaming of getting to rehearsal with the band.
“It was so intoxicating to hear an electric guitar or the silver sound of a cymbal. Maybe I needed to be reminded of that.”
- USAToday
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‘Horizon’ evolves with U2’s audacity, creativity, innovation
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U2 waxworks go on display in store
Wax models of members of U2 have gone on display in a music shop in their home town to mark the release of the band’s long-awaited new album.
The life-size figures, which are on official loan from the National Wax Museum, will remain in the front window of Celtic Note in Dublin’s Nassau Street for the next month.
U2’s album, No Line On The Horizon, will be released in Ireland at midnight on Thursday and queues of hardcore fans began to form earlier this week at Dublin’s HMV store.
-UKPress
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U2 waxworks go on display in store
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The Edge: ‘Album Leak Was Good’
U2’s guitarist tells Xfm that the leaking of new album ‘No Line On the Horizon’ was partly a good thing.
The Edge has told Xfm that a good thing has come from the leaking of the band’s new album, No Line On The Horizon. U2’s twelfth album had allegedly been leaked from the Australian division of the band’s record label.
The guitarist, however, has taken a few positives from the incident. Speaking of the album’s new sound and direction, he said that it had allowed fans to give them their seal of approval way in advance of the official release date.
“Unfortunately the album leaked a few weeks ago out of Australia”, said The Edge. “The one good thing about that is a lot of our fans have already given us their thumbs up. Even though it was fans getting it for free.”
The Edge’s full revealing interview will be played by Ian Camfield on Xfm Monday afternoon, March 2.
- XFM
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The Edge: ‘Album Leak Was Good’
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‘Horizon’ evolves with U2’s audacity, creativity, innovation
By Edna Gundersen, USA TODAY
HOLLYWOOD - Trading a woozy tingle for a restorative jolt, Bono and Edge abruptly switch from margaritas to coffee as they prepare to leave their hotel for a rehearsal stage in downtown Los Angeles. They grew accustomed to such giddy and pronounced mood swings while recording U2's 12th album, No Line on the Horizon, a kaleidoscopic quest that rivals 1991's Achtung Baby for audacity and innovation.
"We had to learn a lot before we could do this," Bono, 48, says. "Normally, you zone in on a particular area and make it your own. On this, we seemed to be able to meander from joy to despair, from introspection to exhibitionism. And there's a lot of humor. I'm surprised, because people don't generally buy a U2 album for the laughs.
"There's fun and frolics here. Real joy, and that's the essence, the life force, of rock 'n' roll."
One of the year's most eagerly anticipated albums, Horizon is garnering raves for brazen and byzantine sonic architecture that rises from U2's familiar foundation of heartfelt rock. The 11-track disc, out Tuesday, found the Irish foursome recording in Morocco, then in Dublin and later in New York and London. The album closes the band's longest gap between studio albums, following 2004's How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, which sold 9 million copies worldwide and generated eight Grammys.
Edge, 47, is relieved to emerge from what he calls the "oil rig" after a long spell of concentrated but isolating creativity with Bono, drummer Larry Mullen Jr. and bassist Adam Clayton. Horizon's lengthy gestation wasn't the result of setbacks or writer's block, but rather a geyser of impulses and detours.
"We would have loved to finish the album last summer, but the songs weren't finished with us," says Edge, sharing a couch with Bono in a Chateau Marmont bungalow cluttered with video gear. "Realizing there was more to this album than what we had, we kept going. We dropped two or three songs, finished up others. It would have been a darker record before."
At Mullen's urging, the band had no timetable and missed the lucrative fall release schedule.
By briefly considering a late 2008 release date, "we lost our way a bit, but when we blew out the deadline, we came back," Bono says. "When anyone said, 'Look, we have to put this out,' Larry said, 'Oh, it's going to ruin everything.' We were making music for its own sake and for each other, and Larry wanted to keep that as long as we could. It was a lovely thing to be lost in."
More cloistered than on past efforts, the band "wasn't thinking about who would be listening to the music in the future or how it would go over live," Edge says.
Second disc on the horizon
After a leisurely recording pace, the band spent a frenzied 48 hours in London rotating seven final mixes, eight vocal versions and lyric rewrites.
Tunes left behind, including the soulful "Every Breaking Wave," are slated for a more meditative album due possibly by year's end. U2 also is sitting on material from early sessions with Rick Rubin, benched after the band reconnected with longtime collaborators Brian Eno and Danny Lanois, who produced Horizon with Steve Lillywhite.
"Rick is a minimalist, which is about getting back to pure essence," Bono says. "That's the theme of this album lyrically, but musically, this is maximalist. He wants to make a U2 album that is hard as nails and tender as can be but musically bare-boned. There is a place for that. This was the time for experimentation, wanderlust and finding other colors."
Edge says they aren't wed to any single formula.
"Rick is methodical, and I'm excited about working in that style as well," he says, noting that the songs he and Bono have been writing for next year's Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark Broadway musical require a more disciplined approach.
"There's no strict route to a U2 song," Edge says. "The only thing that's consistent is the search for inspiration. It can start from a drumbeat, a guitar part, a title, a lyric. An entire piece of music can suddenly arrive. We subscribe to the idea that there's no such thing as failure. There's just giving up. We do not give up. We are relentless."
U2's tenacity and artistic daring pay off in Horizon's towering splendor, says Blender editor Joe Levy.
"It combines two moments: the epic grandeur of The Joshua Tree and the experimental audio research of Achtung Baby and Zooropa," he says. "They're at a point where they can be the biggest band in the world and still be edgy, with a capital 'E' in this case. They haven't come out swinging this hard and reaching this high since Joshua. On the surface, it's classic U2. Put on the headphones, and you hear an album every bit as sonically ambitious as Achtung Baby."
Horizon's immediacy, nimble complexities and clear messages cement U2's standing as the only veteran rock band with consistent artistic relevance and commercial clout, he says.
"They don't do it by utilizing the same set of tricks or by having Justin Timberlake and Timbaland on speed-dial," Levy says. "None of their '80s contemporaries -- Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Prince or Michael Jackson -- managed to continuously keep the focus on new music."
On the road, the band is eclipsed only by the Rolling Stones, whose Bigger Bang is history's top-grossing tour with $558 million, according to Billboard Boxscore. U2's Vertigo tour ranks second with $389 million, and the band will get another shot at the record book when it hits stadiums this summer, its first outdoor U.S. trek in 12 years.
"When U2 tours, it's a major global live entertainment event," says Ray Waddell, Billboard's touring editor. "Only a handful of bands have achieved that sort of international touring superstar status. Though you hate to say anyone is recession-proof, U2 is about as close to that as you can get. It's can't-miss entertainment.
"That said, any band would be foolish not to take into account economic conditions when mounting a major tour, and the U2 team is anything but foolish."
Mediocrity 'would kill us'
Sinking CD sales and the crumbling economy didn't dissuade U2 from gambling on stadiums (the band nearly went broke staging the extravagant 1997-98 PopMart tour) and plowing fresh turf on Horizon.
"The point was to get out of the comfort zone into uncharted territory," Edge says. "We love it when we don't know what we're doing. We're more alive. It has to be about discovery or we lose interest.
"Even so, no matter how far out we go, it always ends up sounding like U2."
Fan loyalty, critical acceptance and the industry's abiding support should fuel U2's nerve, but the band says its self-confidence is the first casualty during months of studio skydiving and spelunking.
"You don't get this much attitude if you're not insecure," Bono says with a laugh. "Insecurity is our best security, and the moment we lose that insecurity, we're in deep trouble. It's important to be out of our depth."
He recites a line from "Cedars of Lebanon," a somber tune from the view of a war correspondent: "Choose your enemies carefully because they will define you."
It's a sly cautionary tag on a character study that reflects a collective regret and despair in today's uneasy world. And it's a U2 mantra.
"U2 never took on obvious enemies -- pretending to sneer at fashion or the establishment," Bono says. "They're useless enemies. The more interesting enemies are your own hypocrisy, the obstacles to realizing your own potential."
More than 30 years after forming in Dublin, "U2 only survives as long as everyone is willing to totally commit," Edge says. "As long as our agendas are aligned and the singular band ego is bigger than our individual egos, we can go on. If that ever is no longer possible, we'd pack it in. None of us could hack turning out mediocre records. It would kill us."
Bono, the globe-trotting activist with demanding commitments worldwide, rediscovered U2's value during a spate of separation anxiety.
"Because I'm on my own in my other lives, I had an epiphany about how much I need to be in this band," he says. "Over the years, you perhaps take for granted the opportunity to make music. I'm very happy as an activist, but it's a very demanding life, a slog, and it can be dirty work. This record put me back in the place I was as a teenager, working in a gas station, dreaming of getting to rehearsal with the band.
"It was so intoxicating to hear an electric guitar or the silver sound of a cymbal. Maybe I needed to be reminded of that."
© 2009 USA Today.