*
In 2002, U2 got eight Grammy nominations for their album All That You Can’t Leave Behind. They won four awards, but lost the Best Album Grammy to the T Bone Burnett–produced soundtrack album for the movie O Brother, Where Art Thou? That album was released on Lost Highway Records, a small label run by my friend Luke Lewis—who also put out records by Lucinda Williams, Ryan Adams, and Willie Nelson. Once again, I was at Doug Morris’ Grammy viewing party at Cicada. Jimmy Iovine—whose artist Eminem lost the year before to Steely Dan—was apoplectic. Jimmy had been U2’s producer and now was the head of their record label, Interscope. Bono once described Jimmy to me as a “nutcase, and I love him.” At the party, Jimmy was screaming at Doug: “This is the second year we’ve had this party in this restaurant! This place is a jinx! We’re never having a party in this place again!” Almost a year later, at the Golden Globe Awards, U2 won Best Song for “The Hands That Built America” from the Martin Scorsese movie Gangs of New York. In his acceptance speech, Bono used the word “fucking” as an adjective and afterwards, it caused a furor with the FCC. At the Academy Awards that same year, U2 lost the Best Song Oscar to Eminem, who was home asleep in Detroit. After the awards, the entire U2 entourage—wives, friends, management—arrived at the Vanity Fair Oscar party at Morton’s. Gracious in defeat, Bono told me, “[Eminem’s] ‘Lose Yourself’ is a great song.” Everyone drank, and smoked, and the U2 entourage was the last to leave. The next day, Paul McGuinness called to say, “I think that was the best party we ever went to in our lives.”
*
In July 2004, Bono was “nominated” a third time for the Nobel Peace Prize, which he did not win. U2 was about to release a new album, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb. I knew the band was in Boston on July 27th for some Kennedy event and I phoned Paul McGuinness to ask if I could pop up there and talk to Bono. Paul seemed surprised that I would just get on a plane or into a car and come up that night. He thought it was very “rock and roll.” There had been a time, I told him, when he wouldn’t have blinked at this concept. But to this day, Paul occasionally tells people, with something akin to wonderment, how I went up to Boston on a moment’s notice and how rock and roll it was. The Democratic Presidential Convention was in Boston that week; Senator John Kerry got the nomination. When I arrived at Boston’s Symphony Hall, it was all decked out in red, white and blue balloons for a party honoring Senator Edward Kennedy’s forty-two years of public service. (Senator Kennedy showed up after his speech across town at the Convention. He changed into a white dinner jacket, and led the Boston Pops in the “Stars and Stripes.”) The room was filled with 2,600 political contributors, Kennedy friends and family members and Ben Affleck and Glenn Close. But as is often the case at such events, Bono, an actual rock star, was (after the Senator) the main attraction. Dressed in black and wearing his now ever-present sunglasses, Bono walked onstage to join conductor John Williams and the Boston Pops Orchestra. He appeared slightly insecure onstage without his band. He sang U2’s “Pride (In the Name of Love)” with the Boston Pops and then, accompanied by Yo-Yo Ma and the orchestra, “The Hands That Built America.” He got a standing ovation. And, as he walked offstage, he muttered to me, “It’s a long way from CBGB’s.”
After the event, Bono, his wife Ali, Paul McGuinness, Bobby and Maria Shriver, and assorted friends and associates all hung out in a suite of rooms on the fourth floor of the Fairmont Copley Plaza. I had been wanting to talk to Bono for a while about his political work. I was disturbed by his swanning around the White House and at prayer breakfasts with George W. Bush. “It’s classic rockstar syndrome,” Bono said. “I want to have fun and I want to save the world. The band has been incredibly tolerant. Let’s face it, this is pretty unhip work, some of these people are just so uncool. [The band] is occasionally frustrated and annoyed, but they’re also very proud, and therefore, they financially support my work. Because if it takes two years to make a record that should take one, that’s two years of their lives that they too, are investing in this other stuff.” I asked why, at this stage of their career, did an album take two years? “Great hangs back until very good gets tired,” he said. “Who wants a good, or even very good U2 record right now? What’s the point? We need eleven great reasons [new songs] to leave home.”
I asked Bono how he could possibly balance such great riches with his insistence that he was, at heart, a punk rocker. “The bubbles might go to my head occasionally. And the altitude sickness . . . it’s called vertigo,” he said, deftly tossing in the title of the first single from the band’s new album. “For us, coming out of punk rock, we despised bands who thought it was just enough to turn up,” he said. “That fat rock and roll thing . . . they got the house and the car but lost everything else. Imprinted in us was that the only justification for success is not being crap. There’s a deal with your audience: we have this life and we don’t have to worry about the things they worry about—medical bills, where the kids go to school—and in return, don’t be dull, don’t give us your second best.”
And then he said, “I’ve noticed with men, as they get older, they rid the room of argument. They want to be lord of their own domain, and they eventually push out of their lives people who challenge their points of view. I noticed this with my father, cousins, uncles, brothers. They end up in a room where everybody agrees with them, which is like going solo. I think that’s a mistake.” Did this not apply to him too? I asked. No, he insisted, he was constantly surrounded by others’ opinions, by friction. “Friction keeps you sharp,” he said. “I would say I need the band more than they need me, especially as a musician—because I haven’t got the sophistication to play the melodies I make up in my head. But I also need them emotionally. A lot.”
As we ate pizza and drank wine, I told him I thought that he was now in the celebrity category that for years he said he wanted to avoid. “It comes in handy here and there,” he said, “and it’s an annoyance here and there. But I’m not sure I’m very good at it. We don’t get the paparazzi, we don’t get all that kerfuffle. When the guys go back to the New York Post and say, ‘Here’s a picture of Bono,’ they don’t go, ‘Wow.’” I laughed and said that’s because he’s out all the time, hence, he’s no big deal. “No,” he said. “It’s because it’s not our world. There was a time when we were playing with celebrity, we tried it on like a party dress and I enjoyed it actually. But it is not the way people relate to us.”
Then I segued into an area I had avoided for years. I told him that women were always asking me how Ali could put up with Bono’s rumored (and unsubstantiated) philandering. I said that I personally thought Ali, who always appeared to me to be somewhat cynical, was probably happy to get him out of the house. “I’m glad you spotted the cynicism,” he said, “because she is serene, but she also is a great skeptic. Ali doesn’t need the favor of anyone. She’s very complex.” Also beautiful, I added. He said, “I know this sounds like a line, but she doesn’t see herself that way. I met her when we were thirteen, and she was an academic. Her mother made her clothes; she wore Wellington boots, and I found that absence of vanity very attractive. She understands mysterious distance. A lot of the relationships I see are like ‘Where were you? Who was there?’ type of thing.” I venture that most marriages in rock and roll don’t last and it’s often because of that choking thing. “She’s the least choking person,” Bono said. “It’s sometimes unnerving, because I’ll be about to go away on a tour and she’s standing there in the doorway with the kids with a big smile on her face, waving. Whatever it is, it’s immensely attractive. And sometimes hurtful. You know, performers are not the most secure people in the world. Why would you go on a stage if you were of sound mind? In a very, very, very deep place, I’m secure. And on the surface, secure. But somewhere in there, I need 20,000 screaming people a night to feel normal.” I asked him what he was like when he returned home from a tour. “You find yourself on the dinner table,” he says, “maniacally swinging a lightbulb, te
lling jokes that aren’t funny.”
I asked him—again—how he could possibly justify his association with George W. Bush. Artists should not go into that White House, I said. To which he replied, “I’d do anything if it meant he’d give more money to help people in Africa.” I continued to challenge him about Bush until I said I could no longer argue with him. “It’s not an argument,” he said. “It’s a debate. Irish people debate.” But, I said, Orrin Hatch??? “I have huge respect for Senator Hatch,” he said. “Huge respect. I know it’s strange from someone coming from a Labor family, from the Left such as myself, but I’ve discovered you can disagree with someone’s position and still respect them for holding it if it comes from real conviction. I’ve met a lot of people who are conservative who are really true to their code—and others who are just greedy. Look, does an AIDS sufferer in Africa care that the ARVs that are keeping him or her alive were paid for by a dollar from the pocket of a person who might be preening sometime in the future? I don’t think that person taking a twenty-cent pill gives a damn about that, and I don’t think they should. So I don’t either.”
*
Soon after that conversation, I talked to Paul McGuinness, Larry and the Edge about how Bono’s political work affected the band. Paul said that Bono was very careful to lobby every political leader around the world. That his efforts were always bipartisan. And that yes, it could put him in some pretty strange photographs and some very uncomfortable juxtapositions, but that he was certain Bono would say the embarrassment was compensated by the things he achieved. Edge told me, “It doesn’t necessarily help our band that Bono is so well known now as a political activist. It’s great on one level, but being photographed with George W. Bush and the Pope—I don’t like it particularly and he knows it. I asked him, whatever you do, please don’t be photographed with George Bush Jr. [sic], and he said, ‘You know Edge, I hear what you’re saying, but this is really important.’ And at the end of the day I had to agree that if you can help hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of people’s lives . . . I just worry that with political work, it’s a murky business. You never really know if the deal you’re getting is the deal you think you’re getting. He’s had to make certain compromises I’m not sure I would be comfortable making.” And Larry said, “We’ve all asked him if this is something he can defend, and he’s said, ‘I’ve been to Africa, I’ve seen people dying from starvation, I’ve been to AIDS hospitals and seen people dying from AIDS. If I have to have lunch with the devil himself to get people to help and to do something, I’ll do it.’ You can’t really counter that.”
*
In 2005, in their first year of eligibility, U2 were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The running joke was who was going to induct them, since Bono couldn’t really introduce his own band. In 2008, they jumped on the Obama bandwagon and performed at an inauguration special aired on HBO. They released an album (No Line on the Horizon) that was, Bono emailed me, a “knockout punch.” He reminded me that I had asked him, after How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, when the band was going to musically “take things up to the next level.” He said this was the “next level,” and would send me an advance copy. In 2009, after the album hadn’t done well, he told me at great length one night how it was one of their most misunderstood albums ever. And that it had been their most critically acclaimed, which was not entirely accurate. Since then, the party line from the band’s camp has been that the album was meant to be “experimental” and “underground,” but was promoted out of proportion. The band themselves went on a huge “360” tour in 2009 to promote that album. In March 2009, I saw them in New York when they performed for an entire week on the David Letterman show. During a rehearsal, Bono saw me sitting in the orchestra and once again, started singing “Lisa is a punk rocker.” On September 24th of that year, I went with Rick Rubin to see the “360” concert at Giants Stadium. Bono gave onstage shout outs to such New Jersey notables as Bruce Springsteen, Jon Bon Jovi and The Sopranos. Rick and I moved to the soundboard just in time to see Mick Jagger, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban leave. U2 then threw two Stones songs into their set—including the 1978 disco hit “Miss You”—a song no one other than Mick Jagger should ever attempt to sing. Rick and I stood with Kanye West. It was a few weeks after his debacle on MTV with country pop darling Taylor Swift. We commiserated with Kanye for awhile. When the face of Aung San Suu Kyi, the jailed pro-democracy leader of Burma appeared on the giant video screens, and extras wearing masks of her face marched around onstage while the band sang “Walk On,” Kanye said to me, “Who’s that girl? I don’t keep up.”
• • •
By now, U2 were firmly in what I consider Stage Four of a band’s evolution. They were a huge, huge, global superstar group. They made a ridiculous amount of money. They had, in fact, been criticized for moving some of their official businesses out of Ireland to the Netherlands to save on taxes. With age and financial success beyond anything anyone could imagine, people change. With adulation, people change. Priorities change. Three out of the four band members had children in private schools. They had multiple houses. They carried a large staff who also had mortgages and children with school tuitions. Edge was involved in some sort of lawsuit in Malibu for trying to build houses in a spot that some Malibu property owners protested would ruin the environmental lay of the land. Bono had joined forces with the venture capitalist group Elevation Partners. Along with Mario Batali, Jay Z and others, he invested in New York restaurants. The band owned a hotel in Dublin. With this sort of operation, it becomes difficult to know who to trust. The band trusts fewer people. And for the most part, those they do trust are financially dependent on them. Musically, the band became more insecure. The signs were there. Bono always thought he could talk his way out of everything; he even had meals with critics who had unfavorably reviewed the band, trying to change their minds. They (meaning Bono) started to take the pop music temperature. Jimmy Iovine urged them to make dance records. The band meetings undoubtedly lasted longer. Their recording sessions dragged on for years. They weren’t sure if they were still relevant. I had seen this before with others: Led Zeppelin in 1979 at Knebworth, the Rolling Stones (well, Jagger) even as far back as 1975.
On June 14, 2011, Spider-Man, the Broadway show with a score written by Bono and the Edge finally opened. When Paul McGuinness had called me several years earlier to tell me the good news—Julie Taymor was going to collaborate and direct—I told him it would end in tears. He told me I was crazy. For several years the show had been described as “troubled.” It was savaged by the theater press in previews. Cast members flew around the theater, fell from cables, were injured, and sent to the hospital. On opening night, in a downstairs VIP green room were, among others, former President Bill Clinton, Mayor Bloomberg, Jay Z, Lou Reed, John McEnroe and Jimmy Fallon. I stood chatting with Jay, John and Lou. Bono wore a black suit and a glittery shirt that reminded me of the shirt Edge wore at the Kmart “Popmart” press conference. Bono saw us, came over, and seemed nervous. “My rock and roll friends,” he said, and proceeded to do a short monologue on why this should not be considered a rock and roll show. I felt kind of sorry for the guy. He was putting on a brave face. Perhaps he actually thought the show was great. Or perhaps he was aware that tourists from Kansas would bring their children to see it in droves. This was not the Clash telling me they wanted to do a Broadway show someday in the future. Joe Strummer didn’t live long enough to do it. And if he had, who knows what he would have come up with either.
*
U2 is a great rock and roll band. They have a real body of work. They’ve influenced hundreds of bands—although Radiohead would never admit it, and Coldplay is U2 “lite.” The chorus in Cee Lo’s song “Bright Lights Bigger City” is note for note U2’s “[She Moves in] Mysterious Ways.” There is a Kia car commercial on TV that sounds decidedly like Edge’s guitar runs in “Surrender.” U2’s “Elevation” is played at nationally televised NBA games
. They’re much more fun to spend time with than anyone might think—especially when drinking is involved. And especially Larry—who I’m always happy to see, much to the surprise of the band’s own staff. Bono can be great company—when he isn’t going on about Africa or that great guy Senator Bill Frist (who destroyed health care in his home state of Tennessee). And it’s hard to consistently argue with someone who might have helped save some lives. His bandmates always told him the music should speak for itself. It’s been four years since the last U2 album. I always said if I won the lottery I’d be off in a flash to the South of France. U2 won the lottery. They were in the South of France where, I’m certain, they continued to debate their future musical direction. And where, I’m certain, they listened—and listened, and mixed and re-mixed—the songs they recorded with the trendy producer Brian (Danger Mouse) Burton. And I wonder if Bono tried to convince the rest of the band—Larry especially—that it’s time to also make some music that gets people up to dance. After all, wouldn’t that be the punk rock thing to do?
There Goes Gravity: A Life in Rock and Roll Page 26
