"Tell me, what do you like about U2?"
The question comes from Paul Hewson, better known as Bono, U2's singer. It's aimed at the Trouser Press writer. Who's interviewing whom here?
Hewson, 23, isn't being presumptuous, just disarming. It's the day before Ireland's U2 sets off on a two-month, 42-date tour of the U.S. that should certify the band's status as conquering heroes of 1983. War, U2's third album, has crashed into the upper reaches of American record charts. With FM radio plugging the "New Year's Day" single, very few people seem not to like U2.
Hewson doesn't want ego-stroking praise. He's genuinely curious about how his suddenly popular band is being perceived stateside. Why? Because U2 cares.
The Manhatten hotel room shared by Hewson and drummer Larry Mullen has a comfortably disordered appearance. A big acoustic guitar case (Mullen's; he's started writing songs) lies on the floor. The coffee table in front of the couch bears magazines, a basket of fruit and an open box of chocolates with one piece in it. The band arrived in New York the previous day; before flying to North Carolina that evening, where the tour will begin, they want to see Tootsie. Hewson also wants to check out the city's hipper dance clubs -- surprising. in light U2's own rather "traditional" rock music.
"It's not how you play it, it's why you're playing it," the singer comments on the band's disregard of musical fashion. "Instruments are just bits of wood and metal nailed together, plastic skins stretched over boxes. It's what you do with them that's important."
U2 has taken its wood, metal and plastic, and used the conventions of rock as a basis for evocative combinations of words and music. In June, Hewson will be declaiming his introspective (if exuberant) lyrics from the Los Angeles Sports Arena; the band is also considering playing New York's 20,000-seat Madison Square Garden. Not bad for a one-time punk outfit from Dublin. But what happened to the anti-big biz ethic that nourished U2 in the first place?
"If we stay in small clubs," Hewson counters, "we'll develop small minds, and then we'll start making small music.
U2 likes to think big.
Hewson is dressed all in black, but casual: black shoes, black pants, black peasant shirt. His spiky hair is long in the back; some dyed-blonde tufts in the front are the only touch of affectation in his appearance. Broad of face and stocky of build, he talks slowly and intently, hesitating between phrases. Overall he gives an impression of unforced sincerity.
U2's albums identify him only as Bono (pronounced "bonno"), a childhood nickname short for Bono Vox, shorter still for Bono Vox of O'Connell Street. His name, as well as guitarist the Edge's, is a legacy of growing up with friends who invented their own town, Lypton Village, and peopled it with arbitrarily renamed acquaintances.
"People think, 'They're into pseudonyms, they must be really pseudy-type people,' " Hewson says. " 'They want to hide their real names.' I can think of a lot better pseudonyms than Bono! Why couldn't I have thought of something like 'Sting'?"
(As a mini-revelation, War marks the first time Mullen's full name has seen print on a U2 album cover. "He's become a man," Hewson teases the youthful drummer; Mullen turned 21 early this year. "He now knows how to drink a pint of Guinness.")
Hewson didn't think of Bono; he was given it by an especially creative Lytonian. As a "return serve," Hewson dubbed him Guggi, and that name stuck as well. Guggi now sings in another Dublin export, the Virgin Prunes.
More likely U2's members abjured surnames out of folksiness. Nonetheless, Hewson is getting tired of misrepresentation. "Publications keep calling me Bono Vox," he sighs. "I'm not Mr. Vox."
U2's early history is intertwined with that of the Virgin Prunes. Before both groups stabilized, their personnels were interchangeable. The Prunes' Dik is older brother to U2's Edge -- David Evans, to his parents.
The magnet for all these musicians -- and would-be musicians -- was a notice posted in school by Mullen, who was looking to start a band. ("If I see that in print again, I could do a nasty," Hewson warns.) It was 1976, and Mullen was 14. The drummer now resembles Billy Idol's kid brother in a blue denim vest over a T-shirt with rolled-up sleeves, blue jeans and sneakers. His hair is '50s-rebel length and newly dyed blonde. He wears a solitary earring.
"I had two days of glory when I was tellin' people what to do," Mullen says. "Then Bono came in and that was the end. He took it from there."
It's not hard to to imagine the outgoing Hewson taking charge. Back then, though, there wasn't much to take charge of, as no one was very proficient on their instrument. But the four -- Hewson, Evans, Mullen and bassist Adam Clayton -- became friends, which seems as important to them as anything else.
They took the deliberately ambiguous name U2 to avoid categorization in those heady punk days. About a year after coagulating, in 1977, Clayton convinced manager Paul McGuinness to attend a gig.
"He came down to talk us out of it," Hewson remembers," how we shouldn't do this, it's really a dead end." McGuinness came, saw and was conquered. The band rechristened him Magoo. "His first assignment was to get us served in the pub next door, 'cause we were too young," Hewson chuckles.
McGuinness formally took on U2 in 1978. The band was constantly improving and building a local following. After winning a lucrative talent contest, U2 was offered a record contract by the Irish arm of CBS. They issued a three-song single on that label, but refused to commit themselves.
In the spring of 1980, U2 signed to Island Records worldwide. "People there really believe in this group," Hewson says. "They never wanted us to be a pop group. We wanted '11 O'Clock Tick Tock' to be our first single. It was 4-1/2 minutes long, and was never going to get played on radio. They stood by us."
U2's first U.S. release was Boy in early 1981. The twin themes of adolescence and growth run through this debut LP, matched by swirling, misty music. Producer Steve Lillywhite's echoic approach gave U2 the phosphorescent quality of swampfire; Hewson's passionate stream-of-consciousness vocals combined with the basic guitar/bass/drums line-up to create an album that's both accessible and enthralling. For a new band receiving little airplay, U2 sold respectably well.
The group came over to tour, and fulfilled expectations with a dynamic stage show. Unfortunately the climax of the trip occurred in Portland, Oregon, when two women walked into U2's dressing room and walked out with Hewson's briefcase, containing his notes for the following album.
"I'd like to meet them," he says wistfully of his robbers -- "those big blue eyes." He pauses. "It's the $300 I want back! Keep the lyrics!"
Hewson may joke about it now, but at the time the loss of his lyrics was no laughing matter. In between extensive tours of the U.S. and U.K. -- U2 played over 200 shows in 1981 -- the band had booked studio time to record its second album. In the past, the group-credited compositions evolved out of soundcheck jams, with lyrics often improvised onstage. Now Hewson was forced to push his creativity to the limit.
That summer, with the backing tracks already laid down, the singer went into U2's recording haunt, Windmill Lane Studios in Dublin, and literally expelled lyrics through massive amounts of free association. Afterward a harried Lillywhite helped piece together snippets of Hewson's extemporizing. The technique would have pleased James Joyce.
"It's best to do it under stress," Hewson avers with hindsight. "Maybe I have a few lines in my mind, or words or images. I play around with them, fill up a [vocal] track, move on, fill up another track. Then I go back with Lillywhite, and maybe Larry or Adam, and see a train of thought.
"I try to pull out of myself things I wouldn't be able to do with pen and paper. At the front of your brain is a lot of rubbish: You write about things you think you're concerned about, but that may not be what you're concerned about at all."
The album was entitled October for its month of release and the autumnal nature of its songs. To American ears it lacked the impact of Boy and didn't even dent the Top 100. But it entered the British charts at #11, serving notice that U2 was no one-shot wonder.
Hewson admits October "was quite an introspective record" and not "as immediate" as Boy. More importantly, its subject matter shoved U2 out of the Christian closet.
Hewson had started to talk about his deeply held but slightly unorthodox religious beliefs at interviews. While professing contempt for organized faith -- understandably, having seen it divide his native land -- he could take on an evangelical fervor.
"Christ is like a sword that divides the world," he told one reporter. "It's about time we get into line and let people know where we stand." It wasn't exactly sex and drugs and rock 'n' roll, but then U2 has never worried much about appearances.
To bolster October in the U.S., U2 toured here a second time. Swallowing its Irish pride, the group even accepted opening-act status for several shows with the J. Geils Band. Hewson, who says U2 doesn't "believe in playing a venue unless we sell it out," flatly denies the exposure helped U2's subsequent commercial breakthrough.
The band re-crossed the Atlantic and played some European dates. U2 finally retreated to Ireland by the end of the summer of 1982 to recuperate and plan a third album -- the first they could plan since their debut.
As early as 1981 Hewson was hinting that Ireland's civil strife "was starting to affect me." Now he admits the concerns behind War, U2's current LP, were originally going to surface on October. His purloined lyrics were different from those on War, "but they had that same [feeling of] conflict."
War, released in early 1983, topped British record charts its first week out. Over here the record's gradual acceleration into the Top 10 has been less dramatic but more impressive, given chronic American indifference to new and/or imported popular music.
Lillywhite, who normally tries to vary his clientele, once again produced a U2 album. The band had been thinking of changing producers; having decided to strip down their sound on the new record, however, they realized Lillywhite was the most empathic choice to carry out their intentions.
"I rang up Steve," Hewson says, "and in a flash he said, 'I'll be over.' He said we're his favorite group. It's a very close thing."
War opens with the claustrophobic attack of "Sunday Bloody Sunday," whose violent imagery tackles the Northern Ireland situation head on. But the mention of Jesus at the song's end implies it isn't just about politics.
"In the Republic of Ireland," Hewson says gravely, "if you make a statement against a man of violence you are in danger of coming into a certain amount of violence -- a brick through a window. Some of the lines in that song were very strong in castigating the IRA. At the time I felt very angry. But that had to be tempered, 'cause I realized I was dealing with a blinkered situation, where people really believe in what they're doing; they're not just bad men. I'm prepared to say it's wrong, but I wanted to make it more than a song about the IRA. That's why I contrast it with Easter Sunday, the ultimate Bloody Sunday."
He acknowledges the lyrics were "tempered by other members of the band. They redeemed a very volatile situation." Still, "we have the right to speak out."
War speaks out on other topics as well: Poland ("New Year's Day"), atomic Armageddon ("Seconds" -- "black humor on the bomb"), the senselessness of all armed combat ("The Refugee"). As on "Sunday Bloody Sunday," the specific is a jumping-off point for more generalized observations.
"I'm trying to get across the theme of surrender," Hewson says, "the white flag that applies to every area of your life -- whether it's the factory, the campus or just being out on the street. I think the revolution begins at home, in the heart."
Whew. Does Hewson think everyone slapping down their money for War is getting the message?
"I'd like to say they are, but I couldn't. I'm sure there are many levels on which people come into our music. You may find 16-year-olds into the phenomenon of the Edge. I don't look down on that; I hope the music draws people in further."
On that point, the packaging sure is right. U2 has consistently shunned synthesizers and other trendy electronic hardware in favor of the good old power trio -- the "primary colors" Hewson invariably mentions to the press. He has nothing against synth bands as such, but just likes some meat with his potatoes.
"It is a breakthrough hearing Human League on radio -- they play synthesizers, they're non-musicians and they come from Sheffield -- but the content of the songs is the same as Abba."
U2, on the other hand, is concentrating on message more than form?
"Well, 'message' always gives an image of a prophet [pointing]: 'This way!' It's not like that. We only use it in a very personal way."
The singer, who describes himself as an "aggressive pacifist," can be similarly convoluted explaining his music's conflicting components.
"There are few instruments that get across aggression as well as a distorted guitar; it's physically brutalizing. The power of a rock 'n' roll concert is that it stimulates you emotionally, as you follow the singer, and physically, as you dance and are hit by the music. It also has a cleansing effect; it's a great release.
"The brutalizing effect of the guitar has been used in a very negative direction at times. But our aggression is not, uh -- masturbation. It's much warmer, much more communicative than that."
The master of U2's warmly brutalizing guitar, 21-year-old Edge Evans, is sharing a hotel room with bassist Clayton, 23. With his receding hairline and couple of days' stubble, and wearing blue jeans, black T-shirt and checked wool jacket, the thin, soft-spoken Evans could pass for almost anything except a high-powered rock guitarist. A steely gaze and lupine face help explain his nickname.
Clayton, by contrast, sports a tie-dyed tank top, bracelets, a necklace and studded belt through his black Levi's. His blond hair trimmed down from its former curly thatch, he looks like a serious hedonist.
According to Hewson, Clayton was bounced out of several schools before ending up at Mt. Temple Comprehensive with the other budding musicians: "People usually have no problems at our school, but he did! He was thrown out and became a full-time hustler for the group."
"I'd never been particularly interested in school," Clayton admits in cultured tones. "Then playing an instrument occurred to me."
Superficially, at least, Clayton as U2's odd man out. "Adam was more and more into the rock 'n' roll circus," Hewson says, while the rest of U2 was "getting more and more estranged from all that." Besides his distinctive (for U2) dressing up, he is the sole non-believer among his spiritually devout bandmates. Yet all concerned agree the group has no personality problems.
During the War sessions, Hewson says, Clayton "was becoming a caricature of himself, with a bottle of brandy. But there was never tension. There's always great love and respect for him, and vice versa."
"I don't think there are any particularly sensitive or vulnerable relationships within the band at all," Evans says. "We're pretty open; we're not afraid to talk to one another."
Something else all U2's members agree on is the band's continuing growth over the years. "We now know a lot more about what we do and how we do it," Clayton says. "In the past, we'd have a rough idea how a song was going to turn out, but we'd never really know how good it could be. Nowadays we're in control a lot more."
"I don't think U2 will ever get to the stage where there's a formula," Evans adds. "Our way of writing is always so much a part of experimenting, and a feeling at the time. It's not a conscious thing." Indeed, Hewson may change lyrics, or add them to a song (like "Twilight," on Boy) the band has been playing as an instrumental for a year or more.
"Essentially, there are no rules to what we do," the guitarist says. "That's what people can't understand."
Where do they go from here? The next U2 music will be a score for the Royal Dublin Ballet, to be presented this summer. That work may involve outside musicians on traditional instruments. Evans, who started out on acoustic guitar, hints at picking it up again. (He's also just recorded with Jah Wobble, Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebeziet.)
Hewson also implies U2's next album will mark a break with its past. "Everyone feels a weight off their shoulders," he says. "We feel like we're in a new group now. I can't sleep at night with thoughts about the next record."
What a come-on. How about some details? "We're not allowed to say," he laughs.
U2 admittedly hasn't revolutionized music through stylistic innovation. What they have done, though, is perhaps more daring: injected commitment into an escapist pop scene.
"We open ourselves up to people to such an extent it gets embarrassing," Evans says. "We sacrifice a certain amount of cool. There's so much theater involved in this business, and to a certain extent we've opted out of that. A performance must be larger than life, but to be worthwhile you must have an element of humanity. It has to be more than an intellectual pursuit."
Asked what effect he wants to have on audiences, Hewson replies, "Uplifting. That's the effect the music has on me. I hope that's the effect a U2 concert has: 'Let's all go get uplifted at a U2 show!' "
At least he's kept his sense of humor along with his ideals. At the same time, Hewson presents himself as a worldly character -- a depiction that, to his credit, he doesn't bring off very well.
"Because we used a child's face on the cover and Boy was about innocence, people thought, oh, they must be four good Catholic boys from Ireland, wide-eyed to the world. I've probably been through more than a lot of people," he laughs.
"We were never innocent. We still have a lot to learn, and we've always felt if we didn't know something we should find somebody who did. But it would be complimenting us to portray us in that way. We're actually really nasty people." He laughs again.
Somehow that doesn't jibe with Hewson's belief in the power of music to change, just as he feels '60s music united a culture to stop the Vietnam war.
"It would be wrong for me to say, yes, we can change the world with a song. But every time I try writing that's where I'm at!" Another self-deprecating laugh.
"I'm not stupid. I'm aware of the futility of rock 'n' roll music, but I'm also aware of its power. We're only coming to terms with our trade. We've yet to become craftsmen. Well, maybe we should never become craftsmen. It's great fun being in this band."
© Trouser Press, 1983.
