‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’: The failed experiment Bono believes stood the test of time
No artist is safe from having a few of their songs feel a touch dated in retrospect. There are bound to be a few lyrics that either don’t hold up over the decades, or on the rare occasion, there could be a particular track that feels like it should never be spoken of again because of how awkward it is to revisit with fresh ears. Although Bono tried to make most of his songs universal, he admitted that screwing up ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ actually made it sound better over time.
Then again, no member of U2 has been safe from looking more than a little bit ridiculous over the years. The move to put an album free of charge on everyone’s phone made them look like they were in cahoots with the Big Brother of technology, and any reputation they had of being a strictly serious band went out the window when looking at any frame of the video for ‘Discotheque’.
Back when they were still a post-punk-adjacent outfit, though, Bono seemed to have the voice of his generation when talking about the greater problems with the world. It’s usually rule number one not to discuss religion or politics in lyrics, but U2 were never afraid to put it at the forefront. So, since October covered their struggles with faith, War kicked off with the angriest songs in their canon.
‘New Year’s Day’ had already been a bleak look at how nothing changes from one generation to the next, but ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ is absolutely seething with rage. After looking at the footage of protestors left dead in the streets like dogs during the infamous day, Bono is both crying and asking questions throughout every verse, wondering how long it will be until people realise that this type of violence will never be the answer.
That wasn’t how it was supposed to go, though. According to Bono, this was supposed to be the song that bridged their latest album with October, serving as a way to connect Bloody Sunday with Easter Sunday and how that marks a sense of triumph over death. It doesn’t sound impossible to make that connection, but no one was listening to that song in Under a Blood Red Sky and thinking about their own faith.
While the frontman admittedly that he wholeheartedly failed to get the lyrics that he wanted, he did admit that he was proud of what he created in its wake, saying, “I spent minutes on these songs rather than hours. So ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ didn’t quite come off. And yet, melodically and the suggestion of the lyrics stood up to the test of time. I’ve changed the lyrics when I sing it now just to make it more believable for myself.”
Despite his hangups with it, keeping the track more universal is exactly why it works so well. Not everyone is going to have the same crisis of faith that Bono has, but anyone can relate to the idea of violence for no reason and the need to call for some sort of peace in the world if we want to keep our sanity.
Bono may have seen a disappointment when looking at the lyrics at first, but there’s a lesson to be learned in the less-is-more approach. It’s one thing to make a lyric sheet with Bob Dylan levels of detail, but sometimes the best way to get your point across is to just get out of your own way.
