The show that turned U2 into superstars: “Play like our lives depended on it”
Bono didn’t start U2 thinking that he was going to be a part of one of the biggest bands in the world.
He may have liked the idea of putting on massive shows and having a congregation of the rock faithful singing along with him, but those are pretty lofty dreams when you’re putting together a band in the middle of Ireland with nothing but a few amplifiers and a dream. But every step that they took up the musical ladder came from those few times where they defied the odds that would have killed any other group.
It was hard enough trying to get out of their town when they were first starting out, but once they had their first splash with songs like ‘I Will Follow’, they were already gaining momentum. It might have been immediately snuffed out the minute that they started working on October, and people got uncomfortable with him talking about religion, but Bono wasn’t going to mince his words. He sang from the heart, and if religion wasn’t going to get everyone invested, surely politics would, right?
That said, War is still one of the best albums that U2 ever made. The anger that they felt in songs like ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ is beautifully done, and when looking through a lot of their other records to follow, a lot of their best moments came from harnessing their emotions as they did on this record. But if they wanted to capture that experience, they would have needed to perform the tunes live.
The band became a different animal whenever they performed, and while a lot of what they were doing was more than a little bit over-the-top in the beginning, they needed that energy when they played Red Rocks for the first time. That landscape is perfect for their sound to reverberate over the stone walls beside them, but if the band hadn’t made their money back on Under a Blood Red Sky, chances are they would have been floundering.
They had invested a lot of money into making these recordings, and come hell or high water, they were going to put on every show like it was the last thing they would ever do, saying, “The Red Rocks area was in a cloud, a rainstorm. We’d paid all the camera people’s wages, we’d paid their flights over. We had to go on with the concert. We had to explain to [the promoter] there was no way we could afford for it not to take place. If only eight people turned up, we were still going to play like our lives depended on it.” Because in a way, their lives almost did.
The band were still doing what they could to make everything explode in the US, but even under harsh weather conditions, the band put forth the best performance they could have possibly done. For all of the clouds that swept in during their show, you can hear Bono singing with every single ounce of passion that he has in his body, to the point where ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ almost sounds better than the album version of the tune.
And while the band weren’t playing anything new up until that point, the timing couldn’t have been better for them to capitalise on everything. Even deep cuts like ‘40’ showed them sounding like one of the most anthemic rock bands anyone had ever heard, so when they eventually began work on The Unforgettable Fire, it felt like the world finally got a good look at them when ‘Pride’ was released.
They had spent years trying to crack the US, and while the country did eventually fall head over heels for them when The Joshua Tree came out, Under a Blood Red Sky was what really turned the tide. All those rehearsals were hard work to get around, but when looking through the biggest shows they ever played, this deserves as much attention as their massive performance at Live Aid.
