Dec. 02, 2009 - Issue #737: Climate Crossroads

U2

U2
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, U2

Now that U2 has graduated to the "retirement home" of rock—big-budget arena tours that serve mainly to crank out the greatest hits—it's too easy to take pot shots at the lacklustre quality of the band's recent material or its tired persona. I mean let's face it, we are talking about grown men who still refer to each other by stage names they gave each other when they were teenagers. What's far more challenging and rewarding is to begin looking back over U2's career and appreciate the scope, ambition and importance of its contributions to rock music.

When U2 comes up in conversations at parties or during booze-fueled bar arguments, the impassioned defenses are as valid as the naysayers who maintain Bono's "a douche" (verdict: pending). Yet there are three rules to keep in mind when arguing the merits and flaws of one of rock's truly great bands: which U2 are you talking about (note: there are at least four distinct eras); an understanding that, like the Rolling Stones, the group is responsible for its own tumble from relevance, because it was once just that good; and, lastly, you have to allow great artists to take great risks (see: Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Radiohead, the Beatles, Beck, etc.).

Which brings us to 1993's Zooropa. Like Young's Trans or Radiohead's Kid A, Zooropa is a divisive album for fans, who claim to have either completely "got it" or were left to mumble, "Uh, that's where they kinda lost me." It's a black sheep in the band's catalogue, for sure: intended as an EP in the heady days following Achtung Baby's opulent, satirical world tour (complete with a post-Cold War carnival stage set and Bono's creepy alter-egos like the Fly and MacPhisto), Zooropa acts like a call-response to Achtung Baby's Euro-club discotheque sensibilities. Whereas Achtung Baby had tried to capture the spirit of life on the ground duriing the fall of the Berlin Wall, Zooropa attempted to articulate the exuberance and disoriented fear that came in the wake of Eastern Europe's frenzied freedom that blew the doors off in one long exhale, like half the world had been holding its breath for 40 years.

Like the title track extols, "I have no religion / And I don't know what's what / And I don't know the limit / The limit of what we've got." "Stay (Far Away, So Close)" was used in the soundtrack for Wim Wenders' film of the same name, exploring those same themes of unencumbered realities following a lifetime of barriers and feeling cut off from the freedoms and potential enjoyed by the rest of the western world, embodied in the golden angel statue atop the Berlin Victory Column. There's a dizzying excitement about the record, but the subtext admits to the stark reality of the morning after—that a change for the better is still change, and along with it come new realities that are as discomforting as they are promising.
Musically, U2 had fully embraced the growing role of technology in music, thanks to its innovative approach and integration of electronica and theatrical pop sensibilities. While Joshua Tree is arguably a perfect record and Unforgettable Fire their most courageous and engaging, like it or not, Zooropa represents U2 at its most ambitious, prolific and relevant. V

U2
Zooropa
(Island) Originally released: 1993

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