Within the hourlong particular, listeners hear about their musical influences and inspirations, reminiscences of recording earlier U2 classes at Maida Vale, their love of radio as a medium, the current anniversary of their album Warfare, the improvisation behind their track recordings and extra.
From the prolonged interview on BBC Sounds:
On radio as a medium
Bono: We’re believers in radio significantly right now as an immersive medium. […] Individuals stand up, they dress, they’ve their breakfast, they transfer round. They’re not watching the telly once they do this or on the pc, YouTube, all of that stuff. Now, the time that individuals are most susceptible to being moved, [it’s] not data, is of their ears. Earbuds, on the subway, on the Tube, listening to music and listening to the radio of their automobiles.
On their work with Steve Jobs
Bono: Would your listeners be excited about – it’s not even a grimy secret, however I’ve a number of personalities… one in every of them is certainly travelling salesperson. I come from a protracted line of them on my mom’s facet. And I bought, together with Edge, this track to Steve Jobs, the founding father of Apple. We have been invited to his home and we mentioned, ‘We’d actually like to offer you a track for one in every of your Apple commercials.’ That is when Apple commercials have been simply essentially the most vivid, most extraordinary, vibrant silhouettes, for those who bear in mind them again then. He mentioned, ‘Thanks! You’re giving me this track?!’ [And we said] ‘We don’t do commercials, however we’d give it to you.’ And he mentioned, ‘Properly that’s wonderful. Thanks very a lot. Any catches?’ and I mentioned, ‘Properly, we need to be within the business.’ And he mentioned, ‘What do you imply? Now we have silhouettes of followers.’ And I mentioned, ‘yeah, but it surely’s time to even have artists in these commercials. We’ll be the silhouettes.’ He mentioned, ‘What?!’. I mentioned ‘Yeah, we’d wish to be in your business with our new track. Thanks very a lot.’ And he went: ‘Okay’.
Edge: We didn’t receives a commission or something, it was not like an endorsement the place you get cash. […] We thought it is a saviour, as a result of music was being despatched on the web spherical totally free. Individuals have been downloading. And [Steve Jobs] was going, ‘No, musicians ought to receives a commission.’ So we have been supporting that.
On Bono’s e-book and their album
Gary: Which got here first, the e-book or the album concept?
Bono: The e-book.
Edge: It was a little bit of opportunism as a result of we had this considered [an acoustic album] for some time, however when Bono got here out with the e-book and it had 40 chapters, we thought maintain on, there’s an inner rhyme right here we will use. So we loosely tied the 2 collectively – 40 chapters within the e-book and 40 songs on the report. However they don’t correspond precisely.
Bono: Edge and I had this phrase that we have been throwing round, ‘Intimacy is the brand new punk rock’. And I do know it sounds a bit pretentious now saying it on the BBC, however essentially the most harmful music for me for the time being is essentially the most susceptible. And we let artists that we love into our life in ways in which we don’t let our closest buddies or lovers generally.
On ABBA
Edge: We’re huge followers of this Scandinavian band, appreciators of their work in a means that grew over years. We’re followers of the Bee Gees which individuals wouldn’t have imagined. We’re followers of a lot of nice songwriters who aren’t essentially seen as very hip, and I assume we’re simply appreciators of their work.
Bono: I used to be saying to one of many cellists at present that I didn’t have the braveness to come clean with this subsequent band once I was 16 in the midst of punk rock, however I did get to the Bee Gees and I used to be able to come clean with Massachusetts and Tragedy, I imply these are simply loopy good. John Lennon owned as much as loving the Bee Gees. However there’s a little bit of a macho, ‘I don’t need to come clean with ABBA.’ However I’ll let you know what, they’re simply higher songs. You possibly can’t be empirical about every little thing in artwork.
Bono: There’s something about ABBA. I can bear in mind ABBA as just like the nationwide anthem for younger moms. Actually at closing time at our native pub, typically younger ladies would sing Thank You For The Music, and I’d sing it and I used to be very grateful for the music! However I used to be like, what is that this phenomenon? That is earlier than their musicals and all that. What’s going on with ABBA? After which Benny [Andersson] got here to one in every of our reveals, after we murdered Dancing Queen. And [they] performed with us on stage. However this isn’t Dancing Queen.
Gary: Which one is it?
Bono: That is the nice ABBA. And it is a advertising and marketing gimmick from U2 referred to as SOS!
On celebrating the fortieth anniversary of their album, Warfare
Gary: Any particular celebrations lined up for that?
Edge: A pint of Guinness most likely down in Finnegan’s on the very least!
