(Update, 5/10/13: While at the U2 Conference last month, I learned that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has an entire new collection of U2 memorabilia on display. Larry’s shirt is no longer there and has been “returned to the original lender.” Perhaps it will show up in an exhibit in Dublin.)

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has some pretty remarkable U2 artifacts on display—ZooTV trabants, Bono’s Fly suit, his handwritten lyrics for “Bad” … But housed inside a glass case, next to a collection of rejection letters in response to the band’s early attempts to find a record deal, is a tattered t-shirt. It’s stained and stretched. It’s primitive—both in the sense that it’s the earliest of its kind, and in its rough, rudimentary craftsmanship. The logo is weirdly placed below the chest and off center, and the graphic’s two colors are poorly registered on a shirt that doesn’t quite match. The design is a larger ring encompassing a smaller ring, the former cut across by two diagonal lines. In the inner circle (a favorite phrase among U2 fans some 30 years later) are two abstracted figures built of rectangles: a “U” and a “2.”

The first U2 shirt, created by Larry and on display at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The shirt was created by U2 drummer and founder Larry Mullen, Jr. in a high school art class when he was a student at Mount Temple Comprehensive School in Dublin, I’m guessing sometime in early 1978—it’s most likely the first U2 shirt to exist. As a graphic designer-turned-professor and as a U2 fanatic, I’m fascinated with the intersection of these two realms—U2′s visual identity. When I saw the shirt on a visit to the Rock Hall in 2011 between two 360 shows, I knew I wanted to re-create this relic produced by the boy (Larry was probably 16 or 17 when he made it) who built the band from the ground up. In doing research for an upcoming presentation at the U2 Conference in Cleveland (“What You Don’t Have You Don’t Need It Now: How the World’s Most Iconic Band Got There Without a Logo”), I’ve been very interested in the history of the different symbols, icons and visual identities that have represented U2. This was the perfect time to explore what is perhaps the band’s earliest logo.

Graphic designer Steve Averill has worked with U2 since 1978—he’s responsible for renaming them from The Hype to U2, he designed posters for some of their early gigs, he created their first album sleeve (for “Boy”) and went on to help shape the band’s identity with iconic covers for “War,” “The Joshua Tree,” “Achtung Baby” and more. I reached out to Averill on Twitter, wondering if he’d had anything to do with this early shirt design of Larry’s: “I’m afraid that was all Larry’s own doing,” he responded. So, this first logo existed before U2 signed with anyone and before Averill (now of AmpVisual, who still does U2′s design work) became the creative force behind U2.

My vector re-creation of Larry's first U2 logo, including irregularities from printing and from shirt wear.

I’ve probably spent more time studying the shirt than Larry spent making it. The primitive nature of the graphic and the geometric composition is likely a result of the technological limitations. Larry probably cut the shapes by hand out of Rubylith masking film and then manually composited the graphic before burning it into a silkscreen with an exposure unit. Rectangles and circles could be easily drawn and cut using drafting instruments. Whether intentional or not, there’s a beautiful balance in the sections created by the diagonal lines that cut across the outer ring. The intersections create four pieces highlighted by the secondary color—perhaps representative of the four bandmates, as by the time they were “U2″ there were just four members. And a circle is always wonderfully symbolic, representing the ultimate state of oneness, unity, infinity. More likely, Larry probably just thought it would look good on a kick drum. The colors are a curious combination, but I’ve wondered if the green and sort-of-orange-but-sort-of-pink was a patriotic attempt at Ireland’s tricolor flag. And how’s this for some U2 poetry: The diagonal lines that cut across the circle are rotated at an angle of 33 degrees. No doubt a coincidence, but a lovely one.

VIEW A SLIDESHOW of my screenprinting and finishing processes to re-create the first U2 shirt. Or view images as a gallery.

The first U2 shirt—34 years later!

Designing the Shirt
While Larry most likely used physical materials like Rubylith and cutting blades to create the geometric shapes that make up the design, I skipped the historicist approach here and built the graphic in Adobe Illustrator. It’s not a complicated form, but it was a challenge to try to replicate the irregularity. The shape isn’t a perfect circle (though probably once was and was distorted as the shirt stretched), but I decided to re-create it as one. Also, the spaces between the green and the orange-pink are uneven—this most likely happened as Larry tried to register (or evenly match up) the two colors, which would have been printed separately. I knew I’d be able to get pretty accurate registration in my own printing, so I faked the misalignment when I created the graphic. The bars that make up the “U” and the “2″ are not uniform in length or width, so I traced the shapes from the Rock Hall’s photo.

Printing the Shirt
I teach at a university that has a great printmaking department, which meant I would be able to produce the shirt by hand, like Larry did. I appealed to fellow professor John Hutcheson, who is a Master Printer with nearly 50 years of experience, to show me around the print shop, as I’d never screenprinted before. He excitedly took on the task of guiding me through the process. With his instruction, I prepared the screen with photo emulsion, burned the image into the screen using an exposure unit, washed the screen and prepped it for printing, mixed the two ink colors and screenprinted the two separations (one for the green areas and one for the orange-pink areas.) By screenprinting the shirt myself, I was able to re-create the odd placement of the graphic on the original shirt.

Sewing the Shirt (and Not Sewing the Shirt)
The screenprinting was the fun part. But the finishing of the shirt was the real challenge. I wanted it to be as authentic as possible, which meant replicating the double ringer on the collar and sleeves. As best I can tell from an exhaustive Internet search, no one makes these anymore. Also, I do not sew. Not hems, not buttons, nothing. It was very frustrating to feel so limited by my own abilities. I was able to rope a friend into helping me stitch together a shirt. I bought fabrics for the two rings—the navy was an easy decision, but the other color was harder to place. At times I thought it looked red, then orange-red, then orange, then orange-pink. My friend worked her sewing machine magic on one version, and then I experimented with a no-sew option. For this one, I deconstructed other shirts that had collars and sleeve hems pre-existing in the colors I needed (a decade-old Old Navy ringer t-shirt and a new tank top from Target), and then used the magic of Stitch Witchery and an iron to bond them to the shirts, even down to the little admiral-shoulder-type detail. Larry’s original shirt has an unusually wide collar, so I cut my shirt’s neck opening down before adding the double-rings.

Studying Larry’s shirt so intensely has spurred all sorts of research directions. While U2′s superstar team of designers, photographers and marketing people has created an iconic band with a rich visual history over the last three decades, it’s this earliest iteration of U2′s logo that intrigues me. The band was Larry’s vision—it’s very meaningful that the first shirt came from him. I’m looking forward to visiting the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame again in April during the U2 Conference—I can’t wait to examine the shirt in more detail and see how close or how far off I am. Perhaps a re-creation of the re-creation will be in the works.

Theologians estimate that Jesus was 33 years old when he was crucified. Add that to an extensive list of things I know because of U2, which includes the meaning of apartheid (though, for a long time I would pronounce it “apartitesss”), the translation of several German phrases, who B.B. King, Aung San Suu Kyi, Desmond Tutu and The Ramones are, when Martin Luther King, Jr. was (and was not) shot, what a Trabant is, and where to find Morocco on a map.

So, Jesus lived to 33. Bono was about 33 when he wrote “Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me” (the home of my title lyric). And I’m now 33, for a few more hours anyway. When you find yourself as old as Jesus, you start to do some thinking. The Christian/religious/spiritual presence in U2 is undoubted and well documented—dozens of books have been written on the topic and hundreds of articles explore U2’s spiritual identity. You would be hard-pressed to find a song that doesn’t include a quote from or an allusion to scripture. So how does a non-Christian, non-Jew, non-Muslim, non-Buddhist, non-FSM, non-anything find herself so at home with a band that loves to sing about God?

I feel as equipped to talk about religion as I do molecular biology. I didn’t grow up going to church (something my mother regrets) and I never pursued a religious education on my own (something I regret). My best childhood friend was Mormon, my college boyfriend was a Jew, my grandmother was a Turkish immigrant who converted from Muslim to Southern Baptist when she moved to America. I fall somewhere between spiritually perplexed and spiritually ambiguous. I’m not sure what I believe, because I’m not well educated in my options. I’m not an agnostic, an atheist, an infidel or a skeptic. I think I’m mostly just a non-committal procrastinator.

But, in my very rudimentary investigations, I think religions boil down to some common purposes: 1) Religion provides us with a sense of community. 2) Religion provides us with a set of ethical and moral guidelines that ground us, allowing us to operate within that community and to grow into better people. 3) Religion provides us with a way to ease the distress of what’s unfamiliar, uncertain and unknown. U2, it seems, has become a sort of worship for me—a substitute religion. Or maybe just a religion, period. The band provides me with all three things: a community, a moral and ethical grounding, and comfort in the face of the unknown. And if Christianity revolves around Jesus, U2-ism—for me—revolves around Bono.

Since Facebook first poked its nose into my religious views many years ago, I’ve facetiously kept “What Would Bono Do?” as my answer. A little sacrilegious, yes, but maybe not all in jest. Bono is a good man. He does good things. He helps the world’s poor and hungry and sick. He sings songs for his mother and his father. He protects and celebrates his children. He’s been in love with and committed to the same woman since he was a teenager. If there have been transgressions, they’ve been kept appropriately private. He’s remained devoted to his band of brothers for more than 30 years. He is reverential of women in his songs, never misogynistic. He is on a lifelong voyage of discovery, always learning, exploring, creating new things. In terms of a moral compass, I don’t know much about Jesus, but I have a keen understanding of what Bono would do. There are certainly less worthy idols.

I’m doing my best not to equate Bono with Jesus (though it has been done, by critics and by fans), but he and U2 have certainly helped me fill that God-shaped hole. I’ve made great pilgrimages to be in the presence of U2—going to concerts all over the country or to sites relevant to the band’s history. Much of the excitement and fulfillment comes from getting to commune with likeminded followers at shows—happily talking to my neighbors, complete strangers, on the rail about their own U2 stories. I raise my hands and rejoice, unconcerned with how I appear to anyone else, as we all speak in tongues along with Bono’s various “oh oh oh ohs.” When Bono splashes or, even better, spits his holy water out onto us at concerts, it’s a sort of baptism. As he stands in place at his pulpit, I hear his message, I sing his songs, I pray. It may be for Bono to pull me up on stage. But I pray. The spirit is in the air and I am a witness, along with my sisters and brothers. I am in my purest form, my most authentic self. There is nothing that moves my heart and soul like listening to U2.

But these same religious actions make me awkward and uncomfortable in other venues—specifically the ones created for them. The few times I have gone to church, I’ve felt like a sore thumb. I don’t know when to kneel and when to stand and when to sing and when to say “Amen.” When the preacher asks us to stand up, shake hands and pass the peace, I never know what to say to these people, these complete strangers. When it’s time to sing the gospel, I keep my head bowed in the Psalm book and mouth the words to these songs I don’t know and I don’t feel. I even tried the U2 version of church: I went to a U2Charist last spring. Unlike the Psalms from before, I knew every word to these songs as “Pride,” “Beautiful Day,” “One,” “When Love Comes to Town” and “I Will Follow” played over the PA system, but I still found myself just mouthing along. I felt out of place at the Eucharist that was using U2 to worship God. I’m used to using U2 to worship … U2? Or maybe to worship life and happiness and joy. I was in church, but I wasn’t in my church.

While I’m disappointingly unfamiliar with the Bible, I quote U2 lyrics as others quote scripture, as they relate to or inspire my daily goings-on. There is not a moment in my life U2 can’t guide me through. Heartbreak? “Walk On.” Hating the world? “Acrobat.” Loving the world? “Beautiful Day.” Hating a boy? “So Cruel.” Loving a boy? “In a Little While.” Overwhelmed? “Zooropa.” In the mood? “Velvet Dress.” Feeling fat? “Big Girls Are Best. Sexy ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma-ma.” Lonely? “Promenade.” Invincible? “Streets.” Whatever the feeling, U2 helps me feel it. In any moment, I’m mentally flipping through the pages of my Psalm books—my U2 album liner notes—helping me find the right expression, make the right decision, say the right thing.

Religion helps us cope with what we don’t know, what we can’t predict and what we can’t understand. It provides comfort in the face of uncertainty. The biggest uncertainty, of course, being death. I find “One Step Closer,” off How to Dismantle An Atomic Bomb to be U2’s most emotionally wrenching song. In U2: The Stories Behind Every Song, Niall Stokes writes that “Bono had been talking to Noel Gallagher of Oasis about the fact that his father, dying at the time, seemed to have lost his faith—that he no longer believed he knew where he was going in the after-life, if indeed there was one. ‘Well, he’s one step closer to knowing,’ Gallagher had drawled.” Bono’s lyrics paint a picture of surreal paralysis as he slips into unconsciousness one final time. The song is so big, yet so quiet and understated. It’s both sadness and solace. It’s a song that reminds me of my own mortality and, even worse, Bono’s. But it’s also a song that reminds me we all share a common fate—and hearing Bono cope with it soothes my own angst. If anyone’s keeping track, I’d like it played at my funeral.

I believe the three purposes of religion I mentioned before all tie into something even bigger—the acknowledgement of something greater than ourselves. Maybe it’s Heaven, maybe it’s nirvana, maybe it’s karma or kismet, or the Harmony of the Spheres. Or maybe it’s simply an awe of nature and the universe and the scientific systems at work. Bono constantly encourages us to get “outside of ourselves in order to discover ourselves,” an idea he espoused before performances of “Elevation” early in the 360 tour. My favorite U2 iteration of this notion, though, is on Pop. In fact, they are the first words we hear on what is one of U2’s most spiritually invested albums. “You can reach, but you can’t grab it”—these lyrics start off Discothèque, a playful song about the pursuit of love. But, I think that Bono regularly and reliably uses the idea of love and God as synonyms. I think these opening lyrics are an allusion to the poet Robert Browning’s quote, “Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?” To achieve what’s worthwhile—love, success, salvation—we must attempt what may turn out to be impossible. Like any religion, U2 pushes us to strive beyond certainty.

When it comes to U2, I am an admitted fanatic—a word whose etymology includes a range of meanings from “insane person” to “mad, enthusiastic, inspired by a god” to “pertaining to a temple.” It’s no stretch to liken music fanhood to religious worship. My denomination happens to be U2. Some people get it, some people mock it, some people begrudgingly indulge it. At times I’m a little embarrassed at my own fervor for this band. Other times I’m grateful I’ve found something that makes my life more meaningful. And then I realize that most everyone has some sort of religion, everyone’s looking for to fill that God-shaped hole—whether it’s with actual religion, their children, their job, their spouse, sex, drugs, rock ’n’ roll, food, travel, anime… In the absence of an actual religion, I’ve still managed to foster a great sense of spirituality and faith with the help of U2. Maybe I’ll get it more figured out, or maybe this is as figured out as I’ll ever get it. In the meantime, I’m grateful Bono has bestowed upon us blessings not just for the ones who kneel … luckily.

Fifty-two years ago, Paul David Hewson was born to sing for us. By the time he reached his 18th birthday, he had a new name — Bono, dubbed so by his BFF Guggi (Derek Rowen) as part of the ritual of nicknaming within their Lypton Village street gang — and he had written U2′s first single: Out Of Control.

Out Of Control appeared first on U2-Three, a 3-song EP available only in Ireland upon its 1979 release. In 1980, it would wrap up the A-side of U2′s first studio album, Boy (which featured Guggi’s little brother, Peter, on non-U.S. covers). I didn’t get around to discovering Boy until many years after my Achtung Baby entry into U2, and didn’t pay much attention to Out Of Control until seeing U2 perform it on the U2 Go Home: Live from Slane Castle DVD in 2003. I don’t know what took so long, but the song eventually, rightfully grabbed hold.

It was a rudimentary attempt at songwriting for Bono, who was determined not to front a cover band, and yet he nailed it — at just 18, he wrote an anthemic, emotional, universal power song that still ignites an arm-pumping crowd 34 years later. He had things to say, and U2 was how he was going to say them. The song is about waking up on your 18th birthday and realizing that the bookends of your life, your birth and your death, are out of your control. He voices a crying child’s involuntary arrival to joyful parents (“I was so sad, they were so glad”) and awareness of his fated exit (“One day I’ll die, the choice will not be mine”). It’s in the same vein as another awesomely distressing lyric, by way of Freddie Mercury and Queen: “Mama, I don’t wanna die. I sometimes wish I’d never been born at all.” These are the big, existential, angsty ideas of someone just crossing the threshold into adulthood, though that rite of passage was forced prematurely on Bono when his mother died suddenly when he was just 14 years old.

Bono talks about the song in U2 By U2:

It was the morning after my 18th birthday I wrote ‘Out Of Control.’ Monday morning, eighteen years of dawning, I said how long? / It was one dull morning, I woke the world with bawling. They were so glad, I was so sad. There is a birthday song for you: objecting to being born. It is funny, it is teenage, I know, but it is an interesting idea for a song. And realizing that you have no say in the two most important things that happen to you: when you arrive and when you depart the planet. ‘I was of the feeling it was out of control …

Lyrically, “out of control” relates to the unconsciousness of birth and the inevitability of death, and hints at the spiritual question of whether we really have any control over what happens in between. But the music brings in another sense of being “out of control” — it’s wild and raucous and defiant, like Bono as a teenage boy. It’s early U2, before they’d completely shaken the punk identity that inspired their creation, and that high-voltage sound is even more pronounced on the U2-Three version. The song is incredibly fun on the surface, and incredibly burdensome beneath. Our lives are entirely out of our control, and that realization is, itself, outta control.

This song is the favorite for so many reasons. But mostly, it’s just fascinating that all the Bono-isms have been there from the beginning. The non-verbal vocalizations — Bono’s ohs and whoas and heys and howls that are sometimes frolicking (Fast Cars’ “waoh, wooh!”) but mostly entreating or yearning (Moment of Surrender’s “oh oh ohhh ohhh ohhh ohhh,” With or Without You’s “ohhhh ohhhh ohhhh ohhhh,” Electrical Storm’s “hey-eyyy eyyyyy eyyyyyy”) — show up as a playful mid-song “ohh wey ohh wey ohh wey ohh wey ohhh.” Even the scat-singing we know now as Bongalese is there in the form of breathy whispers that we can’t quite make into words.

I decided the day of my first 360 show, in Charlottesville, VA, that I needed to hear Out Of Control live. On a shower break from the GA line I sat at my brother and sister-in-law’s kitchen table and quickly Sharpied out the simple statement: “U2 IS OUT OF CONTROL.” I didn’t get to hear it that night but, as a Stage 1 hoarder, I kept the sign. When U2′s U.S. tour dates picked back up in 2011, the sign ended up accompanying me to all of my 360 shows. The sign even made an appearance in between the two legs, on U2.com’s front page the day they announced the rescheduled U.S. dates after Bono’s back injury. U2 pulled out Out Of Control for six shows on the entire 360 tour, plus their Glastonbury performance. I was fated to hear it at the July 5 show in Chicago. It was, indeed, outta control.

Happy Birthday, Bono. “You take my heart away.”

A Filament Project bracelet made with a string from Bono's Gibson acoustic used during the Achtung Baby re-release sessions at Hansa Studio in 2011.

I get asked a lot if I’ve met Bono. Surely someone who’s devoted 20 years of her life and a URL to the man has met him, right? Wrong. Wrong wrong wrong. I haven’t met him, haven’t touched him, haven’t smelled him, haven’t been rendered stupidly speechless by his presence. And it’s probably for the best, as I still don’t know what I’d say to the man. “Thank you” is my best guess. It’s simple, sincere, all-encompassing. But it’s the same thing I say to the pizza delivery guy and the pedicurist. The man whose voice has been in my head for a couple of decades probably warrants a little more inspiration.

But, this week I did manage to get a little closer to him thanks to The Filament Project, an organization that collects donations of guitar, bass and other musical instrument strings along with various electrical and telephone cables to create bracelets and other jewelry. U2 fandom’s EdgeFest, knower of all things The Edge, spotted and won and shared an auction on eBay for one of these guitar string bracelets. It was for a string from Edge’s Fender Stratocaster guitar, played during With or Without You at the 360 tour’s finale in Moncton (totally thought I was done saying that word) last July. I quickly clicked on “seller’s other items” and saw a listing for another bracelet — one made of a string from Bono’s acoustic Gibson guitar, used during the 2011 Hansa sessions, when U2 went back to the famous Berlin studio where they recorded 1991′s Achtung Baby. The listing included a photo of the packet of strings donated to The Filament Project, on which Dallas Schoo, U2′s beloved (by fans as much as the band) guitar tech had written, “This is a packet of used guitar strings off of Bono’s Gibson acoustic guitar from the re-release of “Auchtung Baby” [sic] in “From the Sky Down.”

[Bono's solo performance of So Cruel with the Gibson acoustic during From the Sky Down at Hansa Studios.]

I’m not a huge spender on eBay when it comes to U2 collectibles. There’s just so much stuff. There are shirts and singles and box sets and pins and promo materials (PopMart condoms), and once you have one of the things you have to have all of the things. It’s mentally exhausting and financially debilitating. I stick to items that overlap with my interests. I’ve been involved in publication design since middle school and am now a graphic design professor trying to cheaply decorate her apartment — I focus on U2 magazine and tabloid covers, as well as any interesting advertisements. The purchases usually stay below $10. (However, the ultimate goal is to own a copy of the rare and really expensive U2-3.)

But the vision of Bono seducing those strings to the sounds of One, So Cruel, The Fly and Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses during the anniversary session at Hansa led to the resolution that I couldn’t not have the bracelet. The vision sadly dissipated, though, when I saw “The Buy It Now listing has ended.” I learned on Facebook that EdgeFest had bought a matching pair — Edge’s string for herself, Bono’s for her husband. The girl doesn’t do anything halfway. But through her, I starting following The Filament Project on Facebook and Twitter and learned that another Bono bracelet would be listed later in the week.

“Later in the week” was so ambiguous, and resulted in even more time spent on my smartphone than I’m proud to admit, obsessively refreshing eBay pages. But after a few anxious, sleepless nights, and with the goodness and grace of two of my other U2 girls (Lilah, who’d already bought one of the very limited Bono bracelets and alerted me as soon as an auction for a new one went up, and Beth, who purposely didn’t buy it because she knew I was pining for it — I’ve not yet met either in person), the bracelet was mine. It seems more than a little silly — guitar strings that get thrown away every day wrapped up in discarded telephone wire. But knowing I have circled around my wrist a guitar string on which Bono played songs from my favorite U2 album in the place they were originally recorded makes it the most stunning, most precious piece of jewelry I own. One of Bono’s recurring quotes is something along the lines of, “If I am close to the music and you are close to the music, then we are close to each other.” We don’t need physical proximity to feel connected to our favorite music and musicians. I suppose wanting the bracelet may seem a little contrary to that, but it makes me feel more connected. It’s like an oversized wedding band. I don’t need it to prove the monumental role this band’s music has had in my life, but it’s a lovely symbol of a bond that can’t be broken — an everlasting love, if you will.

Me holding Bono's guitar string while watching him play it.

The soul behind The Filament Project (on Facebook, Twitter, eBay) is Jo Adell, a fourth-generation artisan and second-generation jewelry maker. She started the project in February after enduring a series of unfortunate personal events, including a robbery the same night she attended a benefit in support of Sweet Relief Musicians Fund, a group that “provides assistance to all types of career musicians who are struggling to make ends meet while facing illness, disability or age-related problems.” After the benefit, she decided to transfer the self-pity she was feeling into support for a greater cause.

Jo’s U2 is the band Moonalice, who opened for U2 at the 360 show in Oakland, Calif., on June 7, 2011. She spends a lot of time with them, and got a bag of used strings from their guitar tech, which she started turning into jewelry, mostly as gifts for other Moonalice fans. After the benefit, she started working her connections to get hold of strings that might bring in a little profit, which she could then donate to Sweet Relief. Moonalice frontman Roger McNamee is a co-founder of Elevation Partners, along with Bono, and when Jo and her Filament Project partner, Deb Grabien, told him about the project, Roger (who “has the biggest heart in the world”) called Dallas on the phone in Dublin and asked for strings. Jo and Deb have since been rounding up contributions in the San Francisco Bay area and beyond, including Richard Thompson, The New Riders of the Purple Sage/David Nelson Band, David Lindley, Heart, Ani Di Franco, Amanda Palmer and more. They’re working on contributions from Stephen King (yes, that Stephen King), the Rolling Stones, Sir Paul McCartney, Bruce Springsteen and Tom Petty. And if you’re interested in a Bono or Edge bracelet, keep an eye out — I think she’s got a very limited few more in the works. She’s also putting in a request for some of the bass boy’s strings.

Right now, the proceeds from the sale of the guitar string bracelets are earmarked for Robin Sylvester, bass player for Ratdog, Rubber Souldiers and other bands. He is in kidney failure and awaiting a transplant. He’s currently doing well enough that his doctors are allowing him to perform, but has been instructed to take it easy. After June 15, the proceeds will go into a general fund.

In an interview at the 1983 US Music Festival, Bono — just 23 at the time and already a head full of urgent, impassioned ideas — said, “Music can change the world, because it can change people.” I’ve made several U2-inspired purchases this week, none of which benefitted U2 — $25 went to the African Well Fund for their 10th annual Build a Well for Bono’s Birthday Fundraiser; $15 went to Every Mother Counts when I picked up the organization’s special release CD at Starbucks, featuring an unreleased acoustic version of Original of the Species; and an amount that a sane girl might spend on a Tiffany bauble — but Tiffany doesn’t sell anything this magnificent — went to this bracelet, 40 percent of which will go to Sweet Relief. I’m doing nothing noble — just selfishly waving my credit card to feel a little closer to my band. But these people and these organizations are doing extraordinary things — changing the world through music. My thanks go to all involved for giving us fans a way to connect with the music even when it’s not playing, and to connect with causes bigger than ourselves.

(I do find it pretty humorous, though, that Bono’s strings go for more than guitar-god Edge’s on eBay. In U2 By U2, the other band members never tire of mentioning what a crap guitar player Bono was. According to Larry:

“It was obvious from the beginning that Bono was going to be the singer, not because of his great voice but because he didn’t have a guitar, an amp or transport, what else was he going to do? He had delusions that maybe he was a guitarist but without the equipment it wasn’t possible. He could strum a guitar but he was no guitar player and it could be argued that he’s still no guitar player.”

Even Bono has gone in on the ribbing: “I want to play the guitar very badly. And I do play the guitar very badly.”)

[Bono's solo performance of The Fly with the Gibson acoustic during From the Sky Down at Hansa Studios. Boss chair kick at 1:07.]

[U2 play One during From the Sky Down at Hansa Studios, with Bono on his Gibson acoustic.]

U2’s The Joshua Tree was released 25 years ago today: March 9, 1987. It’s not my favorite U2 album; it’s not the album of my U2 discovery; and it didn’t radically change my life (well, beyond the general profundity U2 has had on my life). But it’s just so perfect—arguably their best album, inarguably a masterpiece. And it knows it. As the opening crescendo of “Where the Streets Have No Name” plays, ushering in Edge’s shimmery guitar, the gates of Heaven open, light shines down, and you know you are about to experience something spectacular. “Streets” is a glorious awakening—not just to the song, or the album, but to a band that would change America, and an America that would change the band. (The album’s working title, The Two Americas, references U2’s simultaneous infatuation and frustration with the United States at the time.)

To celebrate the occasion, and because it’s been a long-time goal to take this trip, I’m headed out west for six days to find and visit several sites relevant to the Joshua Tree era of U2—places the band saw as they drove through Death Valley from Reno to Los Angeles in 1986. The topic of spring break plans has naturally come up recently with friends and family and colleagues. What follows is a piecing-together of the many conversations I’ve had about this with people in the last week, months and year.

So, got any plans for spring break?
Yep. I’m headed out to Vegas for a week.

Wow, Vegas! Sounds like fun. Have you seen The Hangover?
Yes, but this trip is less Mike-Tyson’s-tiger-and-roofies and more driving-and-desert. I’m going to visit the site of the actual Joshua tree that inspired the title of U2’s album.

Is the tree still there?
Yes, but it’s dying. The Joshua tree fell in 2000, according to evidence pieced together by fans posting and blogging about their visits. I’ve read estimates that the tree was perhaps 200 years old, so I imagine it’s got a while before turning to dust. But between the ravages of time and of disappointing scavenging U2 fans (tsk tsk), the tree is disappearing. Or at least dwindling. The position of the remains suggest that the large branch fell off, and unable to support its newly imbalanced state, the tree fell over—a fate the band has managed to avoid for more than 30 years.

Ask any fan why he or she likes U2, and the boys’ loyalty to one another and to the band is high on the list. We love them because they love each other. And it’s been the exact same line-up for 99.99999999 percent of the time. If one of them had decided to leave, they would have been felled by their imbalance. Last year’s documentary by Davis Guggenheim, From the Sky Down, revealed how close U2 was to losing a limb after The Joshua Tree and subsequent album, Rattle and Hum—not any one of the members in particular, but each of them, all of them.

So, you’re flying cross-country and spending your entire spring break in the desert looking for a dead tree?
Yes. Most of us put up a dead tree in our houses for two to six (OK, eight) weeks every winter. So, back off. One explanation of the Christmas tree tradition is that the triangular shape of the evergreens represented the Holy Trinity.

Did you just compare visiting a rock band’s dead tree to celebrating Christ’s birth?
Kind of.

Why are you going?
I spend a good deal of my time trying to get closer to U2, or the U2 feeling. During the touring season, I throw a lot of time and money at those spots on the rail. In the off season, I go through rotations with their albums, hearing new sounds and lyrics and meanings every time—few days go by that I don’t listen to a U2 song. I reasearch their history, looking for insight into who they are, why I like them so much and, in turn, who I am. In the last few years, I’ve been trying to visit as many U2 sites as I can. Bono is endlessly inspiring to me, beyond the sex appeal of a successful, foreign-accented, blue-eyed lead singer. He is a good, good person. He has good, good ideas. He has a way of viewing the world and expressing its beauty, its paradoxes and its pains. I think it’s only natural to want to feel connected with someone you admire that much, and to feel connected with others who know the same inspiration. I try to do that by seeing what he’s seen, and standing where he’s stood. This trip is a pilgrimage—one many U2 fans make, knowing good and well the tree fell long ago.

Did you just compare your trip to see the dead tree to a journey of religious devotion?
Yes. Jews, Christians and Muslims have their holy lands. The Greeks made their way to Delphi. I’m going to the tree. They were all making spiritual journeys to places important to their beliefs and their faiths. I’m doing the same.

Do you think you’ll *ahem* find what you’re looking for?
Very clever. And no. The point isn’t to find “it”; it’s to never stop looking. Bono might well have titled that song, “I still am not sure what it is I’m looking for,” but that’s not as catchy.

Are you going alone?
No, I’m going with two girlfriends I met in lines to see U2 shows.

So, you would not know these people any other way except for through U2?
Right. They’ve already been vetted. We all understand the significance of the trip. They are two of the loveliest, purest-hearted girls on earth.

Are you going to do anything else while you’re out there?
Yes. We’re making day trips to see a few other sights relevant to this U2 era. One trip will be to the Harmony Motel in 29 Palms, Calif., where Anton Corbijn photographed the band in front of the motel sign. The motel is right next to the Joshua Tree National Park, home to thousands of still-living Joshua trees. Many people think U2’s tree is at this site, but that’s part of the mysticism and symbolism of its actual location. Joshua trees usually grow in groups; the lone tree in the album imagery caught Corbijn’s eye because of its solitude. Graphic designer Steve Averill has been working with the band since the beginning. It’s exciting to hear him talk about the graphic identity of The Joshua Tree, which was a huge factor in the album’s iconic status.

On our way to the tree, we’ll stop at Zabriskie Point, the mountain range featured on the actual cover of the album. The next day, we’ll drive up to Bodie, a mining town that was abandoned in the 1920s and has been left unchanged. Many of the shots staged here were used in the artwork for the Joshua Tree singles.

Bono in Bodie

Once we get back to Las Vegas, we’ll take a stroll down Fremont Street, where the video for “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” was filmed. (A bit of bethandbono trivia: this is the only song I have ever Karaoked.)

Are you taking a camera?
I’m taking three.

Are you going to blog about it?
I hope to, sometime before the album’s 30th anniversary.

Watch out for rattlesnakes.

At the top of the Rhodes acropolis with a photo of my nana, on a trip I wouldn't have taken had Bono not broken his back in 2010.

It’s Super Bowl Sunday — a day of little present interest but much past significance to me. Of course, in terms of U2 (as most things in my life are), it was 10 years ago today that the band performed at Super Bowl XXXVI. It was the first Super Bowl after 9/11, and U2′s halftime show uplifted a nation still very much in pain and uncertainty. It was a poignant tribute to the lives lost, as well as a sounding bell that it was time to move from mourning to healing.

But, six years ago, on Feb 5, 2006, I watched an even more unforgettable Super Bowl. I can’t tell you which teams played or who performed at halftime, but it was during the game that I learned my grandmother had passed away earlier that day. Nana was a remarkable woman who lived 93 years’ worth of stories that fascinated her grandchildren. She was a Turkish immigrant who came to America at the age of 19, eventually landing in Jacksonville via Ellis Island. I think she headed south as soon as she got here in search of warmer climes — she was born on the island of Kos and grew up on Rhodes, both off the coast of Greece. New York in December probably wasn’t selling her on the States. When Bono (yes, it always comes back to Bono) broke his back in 2010 and U2 postponed their summer U.S. dates for the 360 tour, I took the opportunity to instead travel to Greece and Turkey. My trip included a stop on Rhodes, and while I had no luck in tracking down relatives on the tiny little island, it was exciting simply to walk the same terrain I know she walked.

For a 9th grade English assignment, my class was instructed to interview a family member and write about him or her. I naturally chose my nana, “The Turkish Lady.” While my children and grandchildren will have to settle for tales of a life spent chasing Bono, my grandmother’s stories always left me wide-eyed, and proud to be her granddaughter. What follows is the essay I wrote about her when I was 15. I may watch the Super Bowl later, “for the commercials,” but I will mostly spend the day remembering this extraordinary woman.

As the shipped pulled into the harbor, a young bride stood anxiously on the deck, trying to get her first glimpse of the country that awaited her. She stared at the enormous statue, which seemed to welcome her to her new beginnings — a new husband, a new home, and a new life in the United States of America.

Nimet Fatima Nabi came to America in 1931, when she was 19 years old, leaving behind her family and friends in Turkey. She was born on the island of Kos and grew up on the island of Rhodes, both off the coast of Turkey. As a young girl, she wore a black and white uniform to school, as did all the children. The boys and girls attended separate schools, and Nimet remembers several times when the boys would build a human ladder to look over the wall of the girls’ school. She studied history, geography, biology, penmanship, diction, language, and home economics. During the day, the students stayed in the same classrooms, while the teachers rotated. Nimet skipped the third grade and jokes, “Whether it was because I was so smart or that I was so bad that the teachers wanted to get rid of me, I don’t know!” Along the way, she also mastered Turkish, Italian, and Greek.

Her early family life lacked many of the modern conveniences we take for granted. They drew water from a well, cooked on a wood stove, made their own bread, and because there was no refrigeration, the meat was slaughtered daily. Although they had help with the washing, Nimet was expected to do her own mending and ironing along with that of other family members. Being the second to the oldest child, she helped raise her younger brothers and sisters.

At home and at school, obedience was a major expectation. Neither her parents nor her teachers would have tolerated backtalk. Although her father was stern, he was never abusive; while he was a disciplinarian, her mother was a “pussycat.” For reasons I am not allowed to mention, Nimet did get one spanking in her life.

This is the life she left behind to come to America with her new husband, Fevzi. After a honeymoon in Greece, the newlyweds took the famous Orient Express from Istanbul to Paris. Then they crossed the Atlantic in an ocean liner named the Leviathan. Upon their arrival in New York, three days before Christmas, Nimet was bewildered with all the bright lights. Back home they had only used kerosene lamps. Because she didn’t know any English, her husband told her that everyone would be saying “Merry Christmas,” and that she should say this back. These were the first words Nimet learned in America and from these words, she has mastered the English language. After going through all of the tests at the immigration center, and a short stay in New York, she and her husband moved to Jacksonville, where, now a widow, she still lives.

All of her names have a special significance. “Nimet” means “gift of God.” “Fatima” is the name of the daughter of the prophet Muhammed; she was revered by all Muslims. “Nabi” is a Hebrew word for “prophet” or “seer.”

Nimet seemed to have a knack for being in the right place at the right time. When she was in the seventh grade, in Rhodes, the Prince of Italy visited her school. Because she was the only student able to welcome him in Italian, she was chosen to present flowers to him. He then patted her on the head and thanked her. Many years later, on another island, Hawaii, she was in the audience of a popular television show. After noticing that Nimet was gleaming with joy, the host, Don Ho, asker her what she was so happy about. She got to announce the arrival of her new grandson (my brother) on national television. Don Ho then congratulated her with a lei around the neck and a kiss on the cheek.

Now Nimet enjoys seeing people, cooking, doing crossword puzzles, and playing cards with her grandchildren. She cooks wonderful Turkish dishes and snow cookies, which are a favorite in any country.

This unique lady even has a unique birthday — December, 12, 1912, or 12/12/12/ This year, she celebrates her 81st birthday. In the long span of her life she was never lost her adventurous spirit, her love of learning, nor her eagerness to share and make new friends. I hope someday I can be like this remarkable Turkish lady — my grandmother.

From this interview, I have learned that my generation takes so many luxuries for granted. We have fewer hardships and more opportunities than my grandmother did. We are not expected to do as much and we show less respect to our elders. I have also learned that my grandmother and I have the same adventurous spirit. Just like she did, I long to travel around the world and try new things. I hope that someday I can lead as interesting a life as she has done.

Way behind on the blog. (New Year Resolution No. 1: Catch up on blog.) Just a quick post to celebrate the new year, and to celebrate the incredible old year I just had. I took a lot of chances, made a lot of changes, and dreamed up the world I wanted to live in, and much of that revolved around U2. My life is richer and my heart is bigger for the summer I had, the people I met, the songs I heard.

In addition to the obvious song choice, I like to celebrate New Year’s Day with Bono’s speech before I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For from U2′s 1989 concert at The Point Depot on New Year’s Eve in Dublin:

Seeing as it’s New Year’s Day, you probably expect me to get all sentimental, yeah? Well, you’re exactly right. Here’s to the future. The only limits are the limits of our imagination. Dream up the kind of world you want to live in. Dream out loud, at high volume. That’s what we do for a living — lucky bastards!

Happy 2012!

(The headline quotes ‘Babyface’ (Zooropa, 1993). Bethandbono trivia/dirty little secret: It’s the one U2 song I don’t like.)

The December 2011 issue of Q Magazine has finally hit newsstands in the United States, but without the Ahk-Toong Bay-Bi Covered CD, to many U2 fans’ disappointment. But, the CD is available in its entirety on iTunes ($7.99 US), with proceeds benefiting Concern Worldwide’s work in famine-stricken areas of East Africa. The issue celebrates U2 as the greatest act of the last 25 years (as voted by the readers of Q) and coincides with the 20th anniversary of Achtung Baby’s release.

http://www.concern.net/news-blogs/concern-blog/u2-covers-album-help-east-africa

It appears that three versions of the magazine are in circulation. Q subscribers got the cover with a close-up of a wild-eyed Bono while non-subscribers got the cover with all four band members, three of whom are hiding behind the flap that hosts the CD. The version showing up Stateside has the same full-band cover, sans the CD flap. It became a little obsessive-compulsive scavenger hunt for me to get my hands on one of each, but I succeeded. I’ve compiled the three covers, as well as any U2-related pages in the issue (including a series of quarter-page ads for the deluxe re-releases), into a PDF (about 8 MB): U2 in Q Magazine, December 2011. It’s pretty low-res. Go grab a copy before they disappear from the racks.

I love the group cover. Mostly because I’m convinced the way Bono was photographed by John Wright for Q is a deliberate homage to the Rolling Stone cover (March 4, 1993) that defined The Fly era, photographed by Andrew McPherson in 1992. Bono reinvents his look regularly. And guyliner phase excepting, I’m a fan of all his iterations. But the 1993 Rolling Stone cover boy is quintessential Bono for me. I stared at that cover a lot when I bought the magazine in ’93. I (stupidly) hacked it up and stuffed Rolling Stone’s once-luxuriously oversized cover into an 8″ x 10″ frame and took Bono off to college with me in 1997. Each May 10, the cover makes an appearance as my profile photo on Facebook to honor the birthday boy. I own two of the $5 WalMart bags that feature the cover, one for use and one that stays in the touch-and-die drawer. And as of today’s mail delivery, I’m an owner once again of the original magazine, thanks to some eBay auction sniping.

It could be accidental. Shades plus earrings plus oozing sexiness are standard Bono-cover-photo fare. But the shades are darker and more Fly-like than what he’s been wearing on tour and at appearances lately. And the slight head cock to the right along with his pulling down his collar to reveal a cozy little patch of chest hair, and his gorgeous-even-if-they’re-dyed locks especially moussed up to resemble that jet-black pompadour … It’s all alluding to the iconic Rolling Stone cover, which celebrated U2 as artist of the year then. Two decades later, Q’s justly celebrating them as artist of the last quarter century.

Guest Blog: Tim C.

In 1999, Tim C. patented the first ever bicycle for fishes.

It was probably 1993. Maybe 1994. I was young, only 11 or 12 years old. Back then, in the summer, we’d leave the windows down on the family station wagon so as to prevent a greenhouse effect from rendering the interior of the car uninhabitable for the start of a drive. It would sit open all day and at night the fear that a family of opossum would take up residence under the dash required that the windows be rolled up. So, my brother or I would wander out to the driveway sometime after dinner, when the sun had slipped away and the tree frogs and crickets were producing their ambient white noise, tasked with turning on the car, pushing the switches and rolling the windows up. It should have taken just a few seconds. Being young boys, we managed to make it take hours. We’d get in that car, turn the key the two notches to “ACC” and reach over to the radio and have complete control of the music.

One night, a slow, somber song came across those speakers and somehow tapped into the exact mood I was feeling at the moment. It fit whatever my day was. It fit whatever the sky looked like. It fit whatever the air felt like. It just fit me. I remember listening until the end of the song and hearing the deejay come on and announce that it was a U2 song. At the time I forgot the name of the song, it was a long title after all, but I remember it was U2 and I remember I liked it. Years later I’d realize the song was “Trying to Throw Your Arms Around the World.”

That is my first memory of Achtung Baby.

Achtung Baby is now 20 years old. Reason enough to celebrate. A child born in 1991 is driving, voting, fighting in wars, eagerly awaiting the arrival of their own baby, or maybe packing their old minivan with band equipment and trying to write the next Acthung Baby. To many people — my family and friends chiefly — the idea of celebrating the 20th anniversary of an album release is completely ridiculous. Most of them would be hard pressed to date the year their favorite album was released, let alone recognize and wax poetically about it. Would there even be this big of a deal made about the anniversary if it weren’t for the impressive marketing U2 has put forth in the past six months? U2 360 essentially became a tour to support an upcoming re-release, a box set worth nearly half a mortgage payment made headlines, a documentary searching to find meaning and significance of accidents more than 20 years ago is making its way around the Internet. Yes, it would elicit this large of a response. Achtung Baby launched the 90s and set a standard for all things to come. It influenced music, music videos, marketing, fashion; it is without hyperbole that I say the concert industry would never be the same after ZooTV.

I have a lot of memories of Achtung Baby now. The music, the tour, the stories. Almost all of them are more vivid than the night described above. When I hear “Tryin’ to Throw Your Arms Around the World,” I don’t hear the crickets and tree frogs I heard that night. I think of the baritone spoken word, low in the mix during the chorus and I always try to pick it out. I think of how beautifully simple the guitar line was during the ZooTV tour. I think of how the song was cut from the Sydney video because the girl who Bono brings on stage was under the legal drinking age and he gave her champagne. I think of the time I saw a question on “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire” that challenged, “A famous feminist quote states that a woman needs a man like a fish needs a _______.”

A lot of people, far more intelligent than I, have tried to find deep meaning in the songs. They’ve tried to extrapolate the reason and impact of a phrase, of a guitar effect, of an image. They’ve tried to align it with whatever was going on in the world at the time or was going on in their world at the time. As for me though, tonight, I’m going to take the album as a whole — for we know the whole had better equal much more than the sum of its parts — and I’m going to listen to it as that kid again, sitting in a Buick station wagon, naively exploring the world of music around me. Not searching for meaning or direction; just trying to figure out what’s going on. Only this time, I’ll know the names of all the songs. And I’ll be sitting in a Trabant.

Twenty years ago today, on Nov. 19, 1991, Achtung Baby was released. It was my U2 entry point. I knew a few earlier songs from radio play — mostly The Joshua Tree hits of “With or Without You” and “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” — but U2 was not yet Beth’s Favorite Band. Until late 1991, early 1992. I was 12 going on 13. These were formative years, for the band and for me. A boy I had a crush on was walking in our apartment complex singing “Mysterious Ways,” a song I recognized from the radio.

Johnny, take a dive with your sister in the rain …

I paid a little more attention to it the next time I heard it, and wanted more. I got the “Mysterious Ways” single and eventually the Achtung Baby cassette tape (that’s my actual copy pictured above), which I wore thin before replacing it with the CD a few years later. (The CD has not yet been replaced with the Über Deluxe edition of Achtung Baby, but it will be. Yes, I need those Fly shades.)

I had no previous knowledge of U2. I know now what a momentous work the album was. But then, I didn’t know its significance — that it was a rebirth, a reinvention and re-envisioning of a band. I just knew I couldn’t get enough of the heady sights and sounds of Achtung Baby. They didn’t put their name or title on the cover; that automatically equaled cool. And my headphones did strange and wonderful things on the first song when I popped the tape in my Sony Walkman, as industrial “Zoo Station” noises bounced from right to left to right again, and sounds played that I didn’t even know were sounds. There was the whisper of a naked woman on the front cover and a figure of a naked man on an inside panel (a symbolic Eve and a literal Adam). There were photos of men in drag and in other foreign places. I didn’t even know how to say the name of the album — my ever-smarter older brother informed me: “Ahk-toong. It’s a warning in German. ‘Watch out, baby.’ Or ‘Look, baby.’” And they spelled “’cause” as “cos” in the lyrics. It was so exotic and European and mysterious. It was so cool — something I wasn’t at that age, and still am not. But it made “cool” accessible to me.

And then there was the music. It was light and dark, deep and shallow, all at the same time. At some point, every track has been my favorite on the album; to this day, I still can’t pick. “Mysterious Ways” became so familiar after hours of radio and MTV play. The video hypnotized me: the swirling, twirling images of a faraway city, the lead singer’s distorted silhouette, the kaleidoscope colors, the bellydancer. I memorized this image of Bono from the video, and still see it every time I hear the song.

And then there was “One.” I remember the first time I heard the song — a deejay introduced “Irish rock group U2′s new single” on Z103 while I sat in my brother’s wood-paneled Chrysler LeBaron station wagon at a stop light on Thomasville Road in Tallahassee. “One” is rarely a U2 fan’s favorite song, probably because it became ubiquitous, with its frequent radio play and ability to be widely interpreted, but we all know it’s the most important one. And the Phil Joanou video presented a swoon-worthy brooding front man. So I now give you … The Moment I Fell In Love With Bono:

“Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses” was probably my first true favorite from the album. The music was dramatic and the lyrics were melodramatic, as I certainly could be at that age. The black and white video showed us a still-vulnerable Bono, not yet completely masked by the Fly shades. There was lots of eye contact and black leather as he perfected his signature stop-lip-syncing-the-words-even-as-the-music-continues move (or the famous “you say” moment from “One”).

I remember scribbling lyrics on my book covers in high school: A woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle, from “Tryin’ to Throw Your Arms Around the World.” A pesky boy in my freshman Biology class who liked to pull my metaphorical pigtails would cross out “bicycle” and replace it with “water.” But Achtung Baby was my earliest source of girl power. Bono idolizes woman, puts her on a pedestal, suffers at her feet. He is tormented by her, but always reverential of her. These were good lessons for a 13-year-old girl. They’re good lessons for a 30-something girl.

“So Cruel” was a comfort as I started to move beyond crushes and fall in and out of love with boys. The trio of “Ultraviolet,” “Acrobat” and “Love Is Blindness” became this beautiful black hole at the end of the album that was just immense enough to accomodate my growing teenage angst. Don’t let the bastards grind you down. “Zoo Station” and “Until the End of the World” offered more adult sounds and ideas as I headed off to college and needed a new soundtrack.

“Even Better Than The Real Thing” wouldn’t become my favorite until 2011, when it started launching the 360 shows, though in it Bono sings my all-time favorite lyric: Give me one last dance, we’ll slide down the surface of things.

In U2 By U2 (2006), Bono says of the song: “It was originally called ‘The Real Thing,’ which is a dumb title for a song. ‘Even Better Than The Real Thing’ is much more reflective of the times we were living in, when people were no longer looking for the truth, we are all looking for instant gratification. It’s not substantial as a lyric but it suggests a certain sexual tension and desire to have some fun playing in the shallows. Sliding down the surface of things. There is a moment when you want to read a magazine, not a novel.”

“The Fly” also had a recent renaissance in my world, thanks to the 360 shows. When I hear it now, it evokes the image of Bono, Edge and Adam all gathered around Larry’s drum kit playing for each other, as I imagine they did in the early days in Larry’s parents’ kitchen, and not for the crowd of 70,000 watching.

Now I’m 32, but still going on 13, as this album moves me the way it did then. It is the perfect album to me. It’s the album I play start to finish, and over again. It is the album I take to the deserted island. I know a lot more about it now. I know it was U2′s salvation, not in terms of critical and commercial success, but in terms of the band’s existence. I could write a dissertation on this album, and may someday. But for now, I just want to wish it a happy birthday, and thank U2 for daring to risk it all to make it.