Music: Act naturally

U2 has been trying to find its voice for some time now. They’ve been trying to rediscover that precarious balance between earnest tunefulness and arch irony that they had perfected in the ’90s. So, after a decade of playing it safe, the band has tried to reinvent itself again with its new album, No Line on the Horizon. Do they succeed? Yes, but not in the way they would like.

A band of U2’s ambition is especially bothered by its own myth. They know that they had that mythic aura for a while, when in 1990 they went all androgynous and ironic on Achtung Baby and carried it through Zooropa and 1997’s Pop. For those few years, they had an unbeatable image that was equal parts inspiration and artifice.

They’d found a sound and an attitude that worked. All of that posturing came crashing down with Pop, when U2 learned the hard way that to push boundaries, you need to sell a few million albums less. When all the techno/electronica experiments on Pop got a definite thumbs down from the band’s core fans, U2 returned to the pedestrian power pop of All You Can’t Leave Behind and How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb. It served them commercially, but they could no longer be called relevant. This new album is U2 trying to rediscover their street cred by turning to all their old producers for inspiration and going to places like Fez to record.

No Line on the Horizon has some of their best music in over a decade, but only where the group isn’t forcing itself to be cool. It opens and closes with two gems. The title track is a spacey throwback to Achtung Baby, with clattering percussion and some great ensemble playing. Bono’s vocals and lyrics are the biggest drawback here. While at his best he can deliver emotionally devastating lyrics, here he goes for platitudes and throwaway lines à la Chris Martin of Coldplay.

The more playlist Martha and The Vandellas Love is a Heatwave The Motown superstars shine on this R’ n’ B classic. The Beatles Good Day Sunshine Paul McCartney’s sunny disposition never sounded this compelling. Lauryn Hill Do Wop (That Thing) A song for all those times when all you want to do is dance. Eddie Cochran Summertime Blues For those long summer afternoons that just don’t seem to end. Miles Davis All Blues Slow-burning noir for the hot summer evenings.

However, the music is compelling enough to draw you in. The closer, Cedars of Lebanon, harks back to their earnest political stance of the mid-80s. Bono sings in the character of an embittered war correspondent about conflicts in West Asia over delicate acoustic guitars. The lyrics are again vague, but the heart-on-sleeve emotion and the music save the day.

In between these bookends, the band re-visits all their previous avatars, and finds that nothing really fits anymore. On the single Get on Your Boots they try to marry Bob Dylan to Kings of Leon and fail spectacularly.

Moment of Surrender is a seven-minute-long gospel slow burner that doesn’t combust and Stand-Up Comedy fumbles unconvincingly towards irony. The more straightforward songs that play to the gallery actually work better, like Magnificent and I’ll Go Crazy if I Don’t Go Crazy Tonight—where Bono doesn’t pretend to be anything but the ridiculous rockstar that he is, and the rest of the band effectively grounds his populism with some solid playing. It’s time U2 realised that they have long relinquished their experimental mantle, and are now the straight men of rock. It is what they do best.