Their latest album ‘How to Dismantle an Atom Bomb’ U2 express Christian faith with excerpts from Psalm, and hallelujahs to the Almighty.
The Irish band has been on a promotional tour, and lead singer Bono said, “It feels like there’s a blessing on the band right now. People say their feeling shivers – well, the band is as well. And I don’t know what it is, but it feels like God walking through the room, and it feels like a blessing, and in the end, music is a kind of sacrament; it’s not just about airplay or chart position.”
“It was a temperate yet unapologetic witness, not showy or preachy but unashamed,” reviewed Kenneth Tanner of Touchstone Magazine, who is ordained in the Charismatic Episcopal Church in America “and that spirit continues on Atomic Bomb.”
He continued, “The abandonment of romance for the truer love (of the ‘tougher,’ more resilient yea eternal, variety) is a common theme on Atomic Bomb, and though it might strike contemporary ears as paradoxical and uncool…it seems Bono’s experiences in Africa have taught him to distrust reigning American and European definitions of the beloved.”
Amid all the publicity of the new album, Bono has stated that he did not want to perform his famous ‘God’ line again for the newly released Band Aid record, which is one of the favourites to be the UK Christmas chart topper. He revealed that he wanted to do something different to the line he originally recorded in the 1984 classic. Bono revealed that he hated recording the lyric “Tonight, thank God it’s them instead of you” for the single ‘Do they Know it’s Christmas?’
Campaigners have in the past criticised the lyrics as inaccurate, politically unhelpful and religiously fatalist.
At a Labour Party conference recently, Bono gave a speech in front of Prime Minister Tony Blair and Chancellor Gordon Brown. He called for a movement for debt relief, HIV medicines and to increase overseas aid spending to Africa.
Bono is renowned for his radical stands for what he believes in. Since the original Band Aid single 20 years ago, and his Live Aid concert performance, Bono has continuously campaigned despite receiving death threats.
In 2003 the U2 lead man met Blair at Downing Street to discuss African affairs, and in the past Bono also was an influential part of the Jubilee 2000 campaign to cancel Third World Debt.
Tanner praises the new album for it theological stance. Many of the songs on the track even rely on Gospel messages to reveal the true meaning behind the lyrics. He described the track ‘Yahweh’ as a post-modern Christmas hymn and said, “It looks in hope to the birth of Christ…as it presses home a question the Father’s long-awaited gift evokes in honest souls.”
“Their fans can be grateful for a veteran band that refuses to settle for second best, and at a career point when acts think they’ve earned the right to be mediocre. That might appear to be the band’s self-interest speaking (who wants to buy a “crap album”?), but it still takes humility to serve anyone (even rock fans), and the hard work that produced the double-barrelled art of U2’s last two albums needs not only a touch of grace but the cooperation of courage. It’s faith active in love.”