Return to Form

Review Score: (10/10)
It's time to take an axe to received wisdom concerning ALTYCLB - it's no more a return to the sound of the Joshua Tree than it is some kind of inventory of everything U2 have done throughout their career. Just as Rembrandt had a late style, so do U2 here: a style that sounds at once like a summation and an advance on everything they've done before.

After what has, perhaps unkindly, been dubbed 'Flop' by even U2 diehards, they proceed to strip away all excess, artifice, and anything else that misleads. They rely on the yearning melodies, driven pop songs made their name in the first place. Despite the token detractors' opinions it's difficult to see how posteirty could do other than choose Walk On and Kite as the finest, most enduring songs on the album . The lack of filler on the album is refreshing, also. When I Look at the World and The Ground Beneath Her Feet (written by Salman Rushdie) both could have gone all the way. I wasn't keen on Wild Honey (used in the film Vanilla Sky) or the unmixed version of Elevation, however.

What we have is one of the most accomplished bands in music at the peak of their powers and firing on every cylinder. I can only hope the next album sees U2 pursue the late style that makes ATYCLB what it is.


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