半个多月前我就在翻译这篇U2 Biography ，断断续续地终于完成了。这篇U2 Biography 可以说很详细的列出了乐队发展的历史，我翻译的不是很好，不过希望能对和我同样希望了解U2的歌迷有所帮助。有什么不对的地方也请毫不犹豫的告诉我，3x.
U2的历史——U2 Biography

by Matt McGee  (translated by Chern)
     作为为数不多的在商业运作方面取得巨大成功的乐队，U2乐队20多年来始终如一，他们用自己特有的方式在音乐工业的艺术史和商业史方面写下了浓重一笔。这支乐队，自在爱尔兰的都柏林创立之后，到今天已经打破了对于一支传统的摇滚乐队所谓的“可以做什么，不可以做什么”的局限。U2乐队将他们独特的嗓音，感情真实的歌词以及对当今社会潮流的质疑完美地结合在一起，赢得了包括他们的同行，评论家以及全世界众多狂热歌迷的尊重和喜爱。


     U2乐队组建于1976年秋天的都柏林。14岁的Larry Mullen在他们学校的告示板上贴了张纸条，他说他正在为组建一支新的乐队寻找成员。那天Mullen家一共来了5个人，包括贝司手Adam Clayton(1960/3/13),主唱Paul Hewson(之后他曾使用艺名Bono Vox,Bono 1960/5/10),吉他手Dave Evans(之后他使用艺名：The Edge,1961/8/8),另一个吉他手Dick(Dave的哥哥，但后来他离开加入了另一支乐队)，以及作为鼓手的Mullen.乐队的名字最初不叫U2，而是"Feedback".

     乐队的名字很快变成了"The Hype"，稍后才最终定为U2.周末和每天放学后他们一有机会就聚到一起排练，在这个过程中几个颇具希望的年轻人建立了深厚的友谊，当然也少不了摩擦——这是不可避免的。将近18个月的辛勤排练后，1978年乐队在Limerick(爱尔兰)举行的才艺展示大赛上迎来了第一个转折点。这次比赛中U2乐队凭借精彩的演出胜出，并给当时作为评委的CBS公司的录音师Jackie Hayden留下了深刻的印象。这次比赛之后，Jackie Hayden让U2乐队到他的录音棚录制了乐队的第一张样片(demo).

     这次才艺大赛后不久，乐队说服了一个Dublin的名叫Paul McGuinness的商人作为他们的经纪人。从现在开始在都柏林和附近地区做尽可能多的演出，他们希望籍此来吸引和建立自己在当地的乐迷。1979年9月，U2乐队发行了他们的第一张单曲:U2:3。这张单曲仅仅在爱尔兰发行，并登上了排行榜的首位。同年12月，U2来到英国伦敦进行了他首次爱尔兰之外的演出。但是这次演出仅仅是费力去争取歌迷和当地评论家的注意，并不算成功。

     在之后的日子里，U2乐队继续将热目标锁定在赢得更多爱尔兰歌迷这一目标上，在成功发行了他们的第二张单曲后，1980年3月Island Record 公司与U2乐队签约，这是这支乐队第一份国际合同。同年10月，U2乐队发行了了他们的第一张专辑:Boy。这张专辑带来的全新声音，赢得了爱尔兰和英国媒体的一致好评。这张专辑由Bono负责作词，在他的歌词内容中包含了很多当红乐队都不敢触及的内容，例如：信仰，精神和死亡。这一年，U2进行了首次巡回演出，并在欧洲许多地方和美国造就了许多歌迷。他们在美国一些俱乐部的演出极具震撼力，并很快登上了美国唱片排行榜。

     但是由于在80年代初，综合舞台艺术以及舞曲风格的乐队奉行,U2乐队不得不改变他们的风格。1981年10月他们发行了第二张唱片，在这张唱片中，尤其是在"With a Shout"这首歌中，充分体现了他们对于基督教音乐的包容——在各种他们尝到:啊，主啊，如果我们有任何东西都会先给你。

     在乐队的4个成员中，除了Adam不是正式基督徒外，Bono,The Edge和Larry 都是都柏林一个叫Shalom宗教组织的信徒，这使得他们总是在对基督教、信仰、摇滚和生活方式之间的关系提出质疑。在几乎放弃U2之后，他们意识到他们可以融合两种信仰并且继续做音乐而不必抛弃自己的信仰。乐队思想上的混乱使得他们的专辑:October不知所云。尽管由于U2与日俱增的名气October销售量相对来说有所上升，但是并没有像音乐节多期待的那样有一首打榜歌曲。

     情况在1983年U2发行了第三张专辑War之后有了转机。这张唱片中的音乐竭尽全力的键盘和鼓乐演奏均发挥到极致，自从War开始，U2奠定了他们具有震撼力的曲风。在"Sunday, Bloody Sunday"一歌中Bono第一次尝出了北爱尔兰长久以来的"冲突"。由于怕被看作是一首支持冲突中任何一方的歌曲，在演出这首歌时Bono总是声明:"这不是一首反动歌曲",并且审批一面白色旗帜以表示对和平的呼唤。专辑中的第一首歌："New Year's Day"是U2的第一首正式打榜歌曲，并最终获得英国音乐排行榜第十名，而且差一点儿挤入美国排行榜的前五十。MTV公司也大力推广U2的音乐录影带，以期得到更多乐迷。而他们在美国和欧洲为宣传War而进行的巡回演出也常常是座无虚席。在这一时期，U2的"Under a Blood Red Sky"唱片和录影带是最受欢迎的，包括MTV在内的众多电视频道在欧洲大力宣传和传播这一歌曲，使得人们对U2乐队高质量的现场演出留下深刻印象。由于"War"和"Under a Blood Red Sky"的成功使得乐队可以和Island Records讨价还价，结果使他么获得了更多的创作自由和财力支持。

     正当大家都认为U2已经找到通往成功的道路时，U2乐队突然变速并调转到一个全新方向。他们选择了Brian Eno 和 Daniel Lanois做他们第四张专辑的监制，这的确是一个很让人吃惊的决定，而Bono却解释说："我们的新音乐将更加另类，因此需要一个合适的向导来控制"。

     1984年U2的第四张专辑专辑:"The Unforgettable Fire(可怕的烈焰)"（名称取自广岛和长崎原子弹爆炸幸存者的一系列绘画作品），给世人以焕然一新的感觉。虽然战争在早已过去，但在乐队的歌曲中我们仍能找到乐队的社会和政治意识。例如"Pride(In the Name of Love)"是为Martin Luther King而创作的，而"Bad"一曲则是为回应Bono朋友们和毒品的斗争而作的。"Bad"一曲在乐队的现场演出中最受欢迎，而"Pride"则将乐队带入了排行榜的另一次巅峰——他们不仅荣登英国排行榜前五，而且进入美国排行榜前五十。为宣传"The Unforgettable Fire"U2到了更多的国家演出，并在美国首次在体育场演出。Rolling Stone杂志称U2是"80年代最佳乐队"，他们评论说：“对于越来越多的摇滚音乐迷来说，U2是最棒的，也可能是仅有的最出色的乐队。”

     随80年代中期的四年，U2乐队马不停蹄的灌制唱片和巡回演出，在唱片和单曲销量越来越多的同时，同时又由于他们参加了多场慈善演唱会从而在国际上名声鹊起。全球超过10亿人观看了1985年7月为埃塞俄比亚饥荒而举行的慈善演唱会Live Aid。在这场演唱会上，本没有期望时当场明星的U2乐队却成了此次演唱会最耀眼的明星——在演奏长达13分钟版本的"Bad"时，Bono跳下了温布利大球场（英国）的舞台，和人群中的一个歌迷一起起舞。这次演出也使得U2乐队成为大赦国际组织的“希望计划”巡回演出中的新闻人物。“希望计划”巡回演出在美国共演出了六站，每一盏都是在体育场馆里进行的——这次演出之后大赦国际成员增加了三倍。这些演出也更加巩固了U2在到达顶峰之前的国际明星的地位。

     1987年U2发行了他们的第五张专辑The Joshua Tree，乐队的事业也登峰造极。这张专辑达到了U2音乐词曲创作的顶峰，并最终使得他们和"有社会良知的乐队"这一称号名副其实——四年前"War"专辑第一次为他们赢得这一荣誉。U2乐队一扫美国乐坛80年代中期的精神道德空虚，带来了他们从曼激情并发人深省的音乐作品。Bono在"Bullet the Blue Sky" 和 "In God's Country."两首作品中抒发出他的美国情感的矛盾性。在唱片中Bono以"圣经"的形象出现，他质疑信仰，社会公平，政府压迫，恐怖主义以及毒品泛滥。这张专辑在英国已发行就登上了排行榜首位，并迅速登上了美国排行榜的王座。U2乐队也凭借"With or Without You" 和"I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" 两首歌第一次登上了美国单曲排行榜首位。甚至时代杂志也以U2乐队为封面，并宣称U2为"摇滚界最红的乐队"。The Joshua Tree进行了世界范围的宣传巡回演出，U2也成为世界上最出名的乐队。

     88年U2推出现场演出双碟唱片Rattle and Hum(嘎嘎嗡嗡)和同名纪实电影，其中收录了许多现场演出作品以及一首新作Under a Blood Red Sky。在张专辑中的词曲和画面中U2乐队均表现出对影响他们走到今天的美国音乐前辈的尊敬。

     这张专辑，U2和B.B. King合作演奏并在著名的Sun Studios灌制。另外他们和Bob Dylan一起作词，并和布鲁斯大师Billie Holiday合作演唱and covered The Beatles.作为一部摇滚音乐电影attle and Hum受到了广泛好评，但对于乐评家来说U2背离他们的风格太原，并且过于矫揉造作。很多人认为这张专辑中U2过于自恋。自此，U2开始掉入事业的低谷，他们决定从公众的视线中消失一端时间。短暂的1989年"Lovetown"巡回演出持续了仅仅不到四个月，U2就从北美闪开了。

     乐队解散后，大家各自休整。次年末，U2在柏林重新集结并开始为他们的下一张专辑工作。他们再次邀请Brian Eno 和 Daniel Lanois录制了二重唱，但这些段仅仅是歌曲听上去更舒服，而无特别之处。U2意识到他没不得不"走开并且重新构造"——Bono1989年在都柏林的一场音乐会上曾经说过的——他们开始共同努力塑造一个新的声音和乐队。1991年11月U2发行了新的专辑Achtung Baby，用Bono的话形容就是："四个男人砍倒Joshua树的声音"。

Achtung Baby是U2最冒险的一次尝试，他们将电吉他，回音，变声和电子舞曲节奏带入了混音。这是U2迄今为止最电子风格的一张唱片，但是却非常受歌迷和乐评家喜爱。这一次，U2不再怀念过去，他们进行了大胆尝试：引进新的声音，编曲，超越过去并以自己的风格继续向前。Bono的歌词没有描写世界问题，而是更加关注自身和内省。在"Acrobat(杂技演员)"一曲中，Bono剖解了自己80年代的虚伪虔诚的形象，写到：

我应该是个杂技演员
口里说一套左右是一套
你可以想象，可以任意想象
但你不能让这个尤物将你击倒

     92年U2踏上了他四年来第一次美国之旅。 "Zoo TV"巡回演出简直难以想象，舞台上众多的电视屏幕不间断的播放着从舞台摄像机，Bono的手持摄影机甚至人造卫星传来的影像，绚丽夺目使得观众们目不暇接。Bono在舞台上扮演了两回，演唱"The Fly"时穿了长及脚后跟的皮衣，而演唱"Mirrorball Man"时他则穿了一件金属制的银色服装。"Zoo TV"巡回演出中U2试图模仿引入更多的摇滚乐因素，他们成功的做到了这一点而很多歌迷没有察觉。当U2装作堕落和颓废时，他们仍然声明支持绿色和平组织反对在演格兰建立Sellafield核电站的行动。

     在这次长达两年的巡回演出的间隙，U2在录音棚里尝试了他们巡回演出开始是想到的主意，这部分作品最终收录到Zooropa(欧共体动物园)中——U2的第七张专辑，1993年7月发行。Zooropa继承了Achtung Baby的实验主义，并将它放达到更高的级别。专辑的第一首单曲Numb中，Edge作为主唱，整首歌曲Edge在一段吉他和弦的重复伴奏下，独自在陈述一些醒世恒言。但和他的上衣张专辑一样，这张专辑仍然试图在排行榜称雄甚至为余下的演出提供了更多选才。不过Zooropa并没有像Achtung Baby一样能在排行榜上待很长时间。

     Zoo TV巡回演出之后，乐队进行了长时间的休息，其间，只在95年为电影《Batman Forever》(《永远的蝙蝠侠》)和《Mission Impossible》(《碟中谍》)写了一些歌曲分别是Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me和？。 同年，乐队与Brian Eno合作并以Passengers(旅客)的名字录制了专辑Original Soundtracks,Vol.1(原声音乐，第1集)。但是这张专辑几乎被评论家和市场忘却。

     1996年初U2开始制作他们的下一张专辑，并计划在年末正式发行。U2乐队承认他们很想将像Prodigy乐队和The Chemical Brothers乐队里那样的电子声音引入他们90年末代的作品。尽管唱片推迟到97年初才发行，但在更早的时候几个泄漏的音轨已经被乐迷们通过因特网上在世界范围传播。 其中的一曲Discotheque，肯定了U2乐队正试图灌制一张舞曲唱片。

     但是当专辑Pop于97年5月最终开始正式销售时，电子和舞曲曲风却并不像先前谣言所说的那样充满专辑。相反，"Staring At the Sun" "Do You Feel Loved"和"Gone"却代表了U2乐队一贯的饱满和直接曲风。这张专辑中的词看上去更像是在多年之后对以前专辑中某些词的扩充：例如"Please"一曲是"Sunday, Bloody Sunday"的升级版，歌词中流露出更强烈的对爱尔兰和平的渴望；而在"MOFO"，写的是Bono和他已去世的母亲对话， 在1981年的"I Will Follow"中他也曾经有过类似对话。Pop专辑发行后登上了28个国家排行榜的冠军宝座，并为U2带来了一些乐队历史上最耀眼的荣誉。但是Pop的实力不足以和以前匹敌，他在排行榜上停留的时间并没有以前长。

     与此同时乐队踏上了1997年PopMart巡回演出的旅程，这一次他们试图做的比Zoo Tv更成功。但这一次他没有了不同前者的目标,Bono在乐队的官方歌迷俱乐部Propaganda上说：我们不会像Zoo TV巡回演出那次那样自作聪明，我们将为歌迷奉献一次耳目一新，有趣，新颖而又感人的演出——正如我们自己所期待的那样。PopMart的舞台道具包括一个10英尺高的亮黄色拱顶，当时世界上最大的150x150英尺的巨型屏幕，一个架在100英尺高的旗杆上的12英尺宽的会发光的橄榄，以及一个电动的35英尺高的玻璃表面的柠檬。虽然批评者很快指出PopMart并没有每一站都有100%上座率，但U2的乐迷仍然觉得这是一次精彩的演出。PopMart是1997年票房第二高的巡回演出，这一年获利近100万美元。1998年年底U2即将结束他们此次巡回演出时他们的足迹已经踏遍地球上每一个有人居住的大陆。

     PopMart全球巡演之后，U2继续停留在公众视线中。为表达他们对北爱和平协议的支持，98年5月在协议公投前乐队在贝尔法斯特举行了一场小型演唱会。时隔不久，U2又在爱尔兰的一次为北爱奥马爆炸案（这次事件中有28人死亡，数百人受伤）中的受害者而举行的公益电视表演中献唱。1998年末，U2推出了他们的首张精选集"The Best of 1980-1990",其中的一首"Sweetest Thing"是The Joshua Tree专辑中b面的一首老歌，不过他们将之重新演绎。
99年年初U2乐队以及Brian Eno 和 Daniel Lanois91年Achtung Baby之后再次合作，他们的作品最终出现在The Million Dollar Hotel这部由Bono编剧的电影中。其中一首"The Ground Beneath Her Feet"作家Salman Rushdie作的词，而歌的名字也与他的一部小说同名。

     而Bono几乎将不在录音棚的所有空余时间都献给了减免第三世界国家负债和救助非洲艾滋病患者等慈善事业。仅在1999年一年时间里，Bono先后在G8峰会期间的德国，教皇约翰保罗二世的故乡，NetAid慈善演唱会，美国千年庆典，以及其他许多集会中为“千年欢庆/接触第三世界国家负债（Jubilee 2000/Drop the Debt）”这一运动献演呐喊。

     All That You Can't Leave Behind这张专辑中唱的就是这个。在花费了90年代的大半试图使自己听起来不像U2之后，乐队决定停止这种尝试。这张专辑在2000年10月底已推出就登上了22个国家排行榜的首位，并且带来一首全世界都欢迎并荣获格莱美三项大奖的单曲“Beautiful Day”。在这张专辑中，U2在包括现场演奏等很多方面都有提高，他们试图以此推动专辑销售并应会近年来已经将他们抛在脑后的主流乐迷。

     2001年春天U2为推广 All That You Can't Leave Behind 专辑开始了一次足迹遍及全球的巡回演出——Elevation。U2乐队自1992年Zoo TV巡回演出后首次得以在体育场开演唱会。与舞台绚丽无比的Zoo Tv和97年的PopMart相比，这一次舞台布置更加朴实，他们在一个心形舞台上演出，因此可以和歌迷更近距离接触。这次巡回演出的亮点是在都柏林城外的Slane Castle史无前例的举行了两场演唱会，而其中的第一场是在Bono父亲去世后几天举行的。9月11日的恐怖袭击事件使得乐队不得不重新考虑要不要继续巡回演出，最终乐队决定整个10月和11月继续进行，而时间则有所调整。 Elevation几乎场场爆满，也成为北美最具人气的演唱会。乐队在北美的80场（这次巡演共113场）演出共赚得？百万美元，成为历史上票房第二高的巡回演出，仅排在1994年“滚石Voodoo Lounge”之后。

     这次巡演最终在2001年底结束。2003年初乐队在美国全国美式橄榄球联盟年度超级杯决赛中场时献演了三首歌曲，几个星期后他们又登上格莱美的舞台献艺，同时All That You Can't Leave Behind又赢得四项大奖。

     2002年欧洲夏季巡回演出的计划流产之后，Bono继续为减免债务和救助艾滋病患者事业奔波，期间他曾和美国总统George W. Bush有过会面，并和美国财政部长Paul O'Neill一起在非洲停留了11天。在Oprah Winfrey and Larry King TV的演出中，他呼吁全世界救助非洲。他的为政治也为音乐的有力的鼓点使得同年10月的Q杂志授予Bono"最有力的音乐人"这一称谓。

     一个月之后，U2发行了他们的第二张精选集“The Best of 1990-2000”。其中歌曲收录自Achtung Baby 和 All That You Can't Leave Behind以及两支新曲："Electrical Storm" 和 "The Hands That Built America"。"The Hands That Built America"一曲是为Martin Scorsese导演的《Gangs of New York纽约帮》而作的主题曲，作为2003年奥斯卡？最佳原声音乐赢得了金球奖。

     20多年来，U2似乎一直充满动力。乐队最初的四个成员一直是非常亲密的朋友和音乐明星，他们共同的目标似乎永远都那么坚定。U2也是世界上仅有的几只配的上“世界上最棒的乐队”这一称谓的乐队。他们还在继续用自己的方式创作和思考，他们未来的音乐仍然很值得我们期待。

原文English Version
U2 Biography
by Matt McGee

One of only a few bands to achieve consistent commercial and critical success across more than two full decades, U2 has charted success on its own terms on both the artistic and business sides of the music industry. From the band's earliest days in Dublin, Ireland, to the present, U2 has broken free from the traditional limitations of what a rock band -- and rock music -- could and couldn't do. By combining an original sound with honest lyrics and a challenging social message, U2 has earned the respect of their peers and critics, and an almost fanatical following of fans around the world. This is their story.

U2 formed in Dublin in the fall of 1976 after 14-year-old Larry Mullen, Jr. posted a note on the bulletin board at his high school seeking musicians for a new band. From the group of hopefuls that showed up at Mullen's home that first day, a 5-piece known originally as "Feedback" formed with Mullen (born October 31, 1961) on drums, Adam Clayton (b. March 13, 1960) on bass, Paul Hewson (later nicknamed "Bono Vox" and eventually just "Bono", b. May 10, 1960) on vocals, and Dave Evans (later nicknamed "The Edge", b. August 8, 1961) on guitar. Dave's brother Dick also played guitar for a while, but left Feedback very early on to join another Dublin band.

Feedback quickly changed their name to "The Hype," and began rehearsing on weekends and after school as often as possible, forming genuine friendships and developing an undeniable chemistry in the process. After nearly 18 months of rehearsing, the band's big break came at a talent show in Limerick, Ireland, in March, 1978. With CBS Records' Jackie Hayden judging, U2 (they had just changed their name again) won the contest, earning a £500 prize and impressing Hayden enough to be given studio time to record their first demo.

Shortly after the talent show contest, the band convinced a Dublin businessman named Paul McGuinness to manage them. Now out of school, the band played as many shows as possible in and around Dublin, trying to build up a local fan base. In September, 1979, U2 released its first single, an Irish-only release called U2:3 which topped the national charts. In December of that year, U2 traveled to London for its first shows outside Ireland, but struggled to get attention from music fans and critics.

After continuing to build a large following inside Ireland, and after the success of a second Irish-only single, Island Records signed U2 to its first international contract in March, 1980. The first album to come from that agreement was Boy, released in October of that year. The album offered a fresh, new sound that earned rave reviews in both the Irish and UK press. Bono's lyrics tackled subjects like faith, spirituality, and death -- subjects generally avoided by even the most seasoned rock acts. U2's first tour outside the UK helped develop new fan bases in other parts of Europe and in the United States, where strong club shows helped propel Boy briefly onto the U.S. album charts.

But while synthesizer acts and bubblegum pop bands dominated the early 80s, U2 went off in their own direction. Their second album, 1981's October, witnessed an open embrace of Christianity, especially in songs such as "With a Shout" and "Gloria":

Oh, Lord, if I had anything
Anything at all, I'd give it to you

Of the four band members, only Adam Clayton wasn't an admitted Christian. Bono, The Edge, and Larry joined a religious group in Dublin called Shalom, which led all three to question the relationship between the Christian faith and the rock and roll lifestyle. After nearly throwing in the towel on U2, they decided it was possible to reconcile the two and continue making music without shedding their personal beliefs. But the band's confusion led to an unfocused record: October sold relatively well on the growing strength of U2's name, but failed to yield the hit single many in the industry expected.

That changed in 1983, with the release of War, U2's third album. An all-out attack against the keyboard- and drum machine-based songs that made up the song and album charts, War featured the band's most aggressive songwriting to date in both music and lyrics. For the first time, Bono addressed the long-standing "troubles" in Northern Ireland with the song "Sunday, Bloody Sunday." Fearful to be seen as taking one side over another, he insisted on introducing the song during concerts by saying "This is NOT a rebel song!", and wrapped himself in a white flag while he sang it, to symbolize the song's call for peace. The album's first single, "New Year's Day," was U2's first legitimate hit single, reaching the #10 spot on the UK charts and almost cracking the Top 50 in the U.S. MTV put the song's video into heavy rotation, and helped introduce U2 to a new audience of fans. Tours that supported the War album in the U.S. and Europe included sold out shows at many stops. The band captured this era with the Under a Blood Red Sky mini-album and video, which also received heavy airplay on MTV and other TV channels in Europe, and only served to add to U2's reputation as a top-notch live act. The success of War and Under a Blood Red Sky allowed U2 to renegotiate their record deal with Island Records, and the band gained more creative control and financial rewards for the future.

Just when it appeared U2 had found the formula for success, they switched gears and took off in an entirely new direction. For their 4th studio album they chose Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois to produce it, a surprising choice Bono explained by saying the band members felt their new music would be more "ambient," and needed an appropriate guiding hand in the control room.



1984's The Unforgettable Fire -- named for a series of paintings drawn by survivors of the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki -- introduced the world to a new U2, a more experimental and unfocused U2. Gone was the aggression of War, but the band's social and political messages stayed alive in songs such as "Pride (In the Name of Love)," which was written for Martin Luther King, Jr., and the mesmerizing "Bad", written in response to the struggles Bono's friends had with drugs in Dublin. While "Bad" quickly became a highlight of the band's live set, it was "Pride" that took U2 up another rung on the charts. The single cracked the UK Top 5 and the U.S. Top 50. The tour that supported The Unforgettable Fire saw U2 expanding its itinerary to more countries than ever before, and saw them playing to sold out sports arenas in the U.S. for the first time. Rolling Stone magazine named U2 its "Band of the 80s," suggesting that "for a growing number of rock-and-roll fans, U2 has become the band that matters most, maybe even the only band that matters."


With four years of nearly constant recording and touring behind them, and with album and single sales increasing with each release, U2 was poised for international stardom in the mid-1980s. They earned it with a pair of charitable live shows. The Live Aid concert for Ethiopian famine relief in July, 1985, was seen by more than a billion people worldwide. Not expected to be one of the main draws, U2 stole the show with a relentless 13-minute version of "Bad" in which Bono jumped down into the Wembley Stadium crowd to dance with a fan. That performance helped earn U2 the headlining spot on 1986's "Conspiracy of Hope" tour for Amnesty International. This 6-show caravan across the U.S. played to sold out arenas and stadiums, and helped Amnesty International triple its membership in the process. It also solidified U2's spot as international stars on the verge of greatness.


Greatness arrived in 1987, with the release of U2's 5th studio album, The Joshua Tree. U2 had delivered a record that caught them at their musical and lyrical peak, finally comfortable with the "rock band with a conscience" label they first encountered with the War album four years earlier. In the spiritual and moral desert that had become the U.S. of the mid-1980s, U2 stood out by bringing meaning and passion to its music. Bono tackled his contradictory feelings about America in "Bullet the Blue Sky" and "In God's Country." Biblical images showed up throughout the record as Bono questioned faith, social injustices, governmental oppression, terrorism, and drug addiction. The album debuted at #1 in the U.K., and quickly reached #1 in the U.S. The songs "With or Without You" and "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" gave U2 its first #1 singles in the U.S. Even TIME magazine put U2 on its cover, declaring the band "Rock's Hottest Ticket." The Joshua Tree tour sold out stadiums around the world. U2 had become the biggest band in the world.


Just as U2 chronicled their first taste of international success some five years earlier with Under a Blood Red Sky, the band set out to document their latest run at stardom with Rattle and Hum. The project -- a combination big-screen rockumentary and double album -- paid tribute in words, music, and pictures to some of the American music pioneers that had influenced U2 in its rise to the top.



On Rattle and Hum, U2 played with B.B. King and at the legendary Sun Studios in Memphis, where Elvis Presley first found his feet as a rock and roll star. They wrote with Bob Dylan, sang about blues great Billie Holiday, and covered The Beatles. And for many critics, U2 had gone too far. Rattle and Hum was widely praised as a rock movie, but the project as a whole was roundly discarded by critics for being pretentious and excessive. It was seen by many as an overblown homage to U2's self-importance. The U2 backlash had begun, and U2 decided to stay away from the public eye for a while. The brief "Lovetown" tour of late 1989 lasted less than four months, and steered clear of North America.

After taking time off from the band and each other, U2 joined forces again in Berlin in late 1990 to begin work on their next studio album. They were working again with the familiar duo of Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, but these recording sessions were anything but comfortable. Recognizing they had to "go away and dream it all up again," -- as Bono promised during a Dublin concert before the turn of the decade in late 1989 -- U2 struggled to forge a new sound and a new identity together. But in November, 1991, the new U2 delivered Achtung Baby, an album that Bono would describe as "the sound of four men chopping down The Joshua Tree."

Achtung Baby was U2 at its most adventurous, bringing industrial guitars, feedback, altered vocals, and electronic dance beats into the mix. This was U2's most eclectic record to date, yet fans and critics welcomed it with almost universal praise. Rather than paying homage to the past, U2 were experimenting again -- introducing new sounds and textures, pushing new limits and moving ahead on their own terms. Instead of addressing the world's problems, Bono's lyrics were as introspective and intimate as he'd ever written before. On "Acrobat," Bono dismantled his holier-than-thou image of the 1980s:

And I must be an acrobat
To talk like this and act like that
And you can dream, so dream out loud
And don't let the bastards grind you down


U2 hit the road in early 1992 for its first American concerts in more than four years. The "Zoo TV" tour was a mind-boggling exercise in sensory overload, complete with dozens of on-stage TV monitors spitting out images from stage cameras, a hand-held Bono-cam, and even direct from satellite TV. U2 ditched the "poor-men-in-the-desert" look in favor of a fun, loose, and raunchy run at glam-rock. Bono dressed in head-to-toe leather for "The Fly" and in a metallic, silver suit for "Mirrorball Man," two characters he adopted on-stage. Zoo TV was U2's attempt at mocking the excesses of rock and roll, and they succeeded so convincingly that some fans missed the point entirely. While U2 pretended to embrace trash and decadence, they still made a point to join a Greenpeace demonstration protesting the Sellafield nuclear power plant in England.

During a break in the nearly two-year Zoo TV tour, U2 went back into the studio to work on ideas they first developed during the tour. These sessions resulted in Zooropa, the band's 7th studio album, released in July, 1993. Zooropa took the experimentalism of Achtung Baby and multiplied it exponentially. "Numb," the album's first single, featured Edge on lead vocals reciting a monotone list of admonitions over a repetitive guitar riff. But like its predecessor, the album still managed to dominate the charts (admittedly for a shorter time than Achtung Baby did) and provided even more material for the remainder of their world tour.

U2 took an extended break after the Zoo TV tour, working relatively quietly on projects for the Batman Forever and Mission: Impossible soundtracks. In 1995, the band re-emerged with Brian Eno as a collective called "Passengers," and released an experimental album called Original Soundtracks 1. The album produced a memorable collaboration with Luciano Pavarotti, "Miss Sarajevo," but was largely ignored both critically and commercially.


U2 began work on its next studio album in early 1996, with an eye toward releasing the record later that year. The band admitted its desire to incorporate the electronic sounds of bands such as Prodigy and The Chemical Brothers into U2's vision of late '90s rock and roll. Even though the album was pushed back to early 1997, pieces of a couple tracks were leaked and distributed by fans around the globe via the Internet. The brief sample that circulated of "Discotheque", which was already known to be the first single, only reinforced the rumor that U2 were trying to make a dance record.



But when the Pop album finally hit stores in March, 1997, the electronic and dance influences weren't as pervasive as previous rumors suggested. Instead, tracks such as "Staring At the Sun," "Do You Feel Loved", and "Gone" represented some of U2's strongest and straightest songwriting yet. The lyrics seemed to expand at times on ideas first brought up on previous records: "Please" was a modern update of "Sunday, Bloody Sunday" and an even stronger plea for peace in Ireland; "MOFO" found Bono talking to his departed mother, just as he did in 1981's "I Will Follow." The album debuted at number one in 28 countries, and earned U2 some of the highest critical praise of the band's career. But Pop didn't have the long term staying power that previous U2 albums had, and it was soon surpassed on the charts by the record industry's newest flavors-of-the-month.

Meanwhile, U2 hit the road in April, 1997, with its PopMart Tour, which attempted to outdo the sheer size of Zoo TV five years earlier, but with a different goal: "I want this tour to be not quite so smart-arse as Zoo TV," Bono told Propaganda, the band's official fan club. "I want it to be as bright, fun, funky, and emotional for the people who come as I think it will be for us." Talk about bright, fun, and funky: The PopMart props included a 100-foot tall, bright yellow arch; the world's largest video screen at 150 feet x 50 feet; a 12-foot-wide illuminated olive which was stuck on top of a 100-foot tall toothpick; and a motorized, 35-foot tall mirrorball lemon. While some critics were quick to mention that PopMart didn't sellout every stop, U2 fans still ate it up. PopMart was the second-highest grossing tour of 1997, with revenues of just under million (US). By the time the tour ended in March, 1998, U2 had taken its act to every inhabited continent on the planet and played to well over two million people.

After PopMart, U2 remained in the public eye by throwing the band's weight behind the Northern Ireland Peace Accord. They played a brief concert in Belfast in May, 1998, three days before the public voted in favor of the agreement. Later that year, U2 would perform on Irish TV during a tribute show and fundraiser for victims of the Omagh, Northern Ireland, bombing which killed 28 and injured hundreds more earlier in the year. In late 1998, U2 issued its first compilation, The Best of 1980-1990, which included an updated version of "Sweetest Thing", an old b-side from The Joshua Tree sessions.


U2 returned to the studio in early 1999 to work on its next studio album, reuniting with both Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois for the first time since 1991's Achtung Baby. The band also collaborated with author Salman Rushdie, who penned the lyrics to a song called "The Ground Beneath Her Feet," based on his book of the same name. That song, and others, eventually appeared on the soundtrack to The Million Dollar Hotel, a movie based on a story written by Bono.


In between studio sessions, Bono seemed to devote every free moment he had to causes including debt cancellation in Third World nations and HIV/AIDS relief for Africa. In 1999 alone, Bono made appearances at the G8 Summit in Germany, at the home of Pope John Paul II, at the NetAid concert, at America's Millennium Gala, and at various other functions on behalf of the Jubilee 2000/Drop the Debt campaign. While his social crusading slowed down the band's efforts in the studio, Bono dropped hints that the next record would be a more "classic"-sounding U2 album.


That album, All That You Can't Leave Behind, was exactly that. After spending the better part of the 1990s trying not to sound like U2, the band decided it was finally okay to stop avoiding the U2 sound. The album, released in late October, 2000, debuted at No. 1 in 22 countries and spawned a worldwide hit single, "Beautiful Day", which earned three Grammy Awards. U2 made more than a dozen promotional appearances, including many live performances, in an effort to promote the album and win back mainstream fans that had deserted the band in recent years.


U2 set out on a full-blown world tour in the spring of 2001 to promote All That You Can't Leave Behind. The Elevation Tour saw the band return to arenas for the first time since Zoo TV in 1992. After the extravaganzas of that tour and PopMart in 1997, the relatively stripped-down Elevation Tour saw U2 perform on a heart-shaped stage which brought the fans closer to the band than ever. The highlight of the tour was an unprecedented two concerts at Slane Castle outside Dublin, the first of which took place just days after the death of Bono's father. The terrorist attacks of September 11th led U2 to rethink continuing the tour, but they chose to tour throughout October and November with a setlist that had changed to reflect the times. The Elevation tour was nearly a complete sellout, and U2 was the top concert draw in North America. The band's 80 shows (of 113 total) in North America grossed 0 million, the second-highest total behind The Rolling Stones' Voodoo Lounge Tour in 1994.


After wrapping up the tour in late 2001, U2 returned to the stage in front of a worldwide audience in early 2002 when they performed three songs in New Orleans at halftime of Super Bowl XXXVI, the NFL's annual championship football game. The band returned to the States just weeks later for the Grammy Awards, where All That You Can't Leave Behind picked up four more awards.


When plans for a European tour in the summer of 2002 fell through, Bono continued his campaigns for debt and HIV/AIDS relief, which included a meeting with U.S. President George W. Bush and an 11-day tour of Africa with U.S. Treasure Secretary Paul O'Neill. He made his case for African relief on the Oprah Winfrey and Larry King TV shows. His clout, both musically and politically, earned Bono the title "Most Powerful Man in Music" according to Q magazine in October, 2002.


A month later, U2 issued its second compilation, The Best of 1990-2000. The set included tracks from Achtung Baby through All That You Can't Leave Behind, plus two new songs: "Electrical Storm" and "The Hands That Built America". The latter, also featured as the theme to Martin Scorsese's film Gangs of New York, won a Golden Globe Award in January, 2003, for Best Original Song.




More than twenty years on, it appears that U2 still has plenty of gas in its tank. The four original band members remain close friends and stellar musicians, and their collective ambition appears to be as strong as ever. U2 remains one of only a few bands qualified to wear the label of World's Biggest Band. They continue to write music and explore new ideas on their own terms, and their future releases and tours will be no less anticipated than those of the past.