Achtung Baby
U2
19 November 1991
This is the first in a series of rambling blogs concerning the albums which have taken up permanent residence in my musical universe.
When I first heard Achtung Baby, I didn’t know what to think. I certainly was not a typical U2 fan. Except for a handful of radio singles, I was unfamiliar with their early work. I did not yet fully appreciate The Joshua Tree (1987), which had publicly overshadowed the superior Prince masterpiece, Sign ‘O’ The Times. 1988’s Rattle & Hum, a double album, contained only three or four really good songs. So, for the most part, I was quite underwhelmed by U2’s output to that point.
My first reaction to Achtung Baby was, “What the hell was that?” The epic, save-the-world excesses of the previous singles were gone. In its place were intensely personal, moody songs, complemented in their lyrical content by a darker, decidedly European brand of pop/rock music. I was perplexed…and intrigued. So I listened again. And again. And again. I began hearing new things with each listen, unraveling new layers of meaning as time passed. Within a month, I concluded Achtung was easily the best thing U2 had ever recorded. Seventeen years later, my opinion stands.
The first two songs of the album usher in a new sound. As mentioned earlier, Achtung Baby employs an industrial, dark, throbbing brew of a musical landscape. There is distortion of instrumentation and vocals. There are production tricks galore as sounds zoom from one channel to another out of nowhere. The sounds of hammer hitting metal that open “Zoo Station” are appropriate; U2 is fashioning a new sound with which to explore. The song sounds straight out of Berlin (in fact, much of the album was recorded there in the wake of the Wall’s fall). “I’m ready…ready for what’s next,” proclaims Bono in a distorted, exhuberent tone. The music thumps along moodily, preparing the listener for “Even Better Than The Real Thing”. It is in this second track that The Edge delivers the first of several blistering guitar solos. Who knew he’d go Guitar Hero on us? Bono’s lyrics, in yet another surprise, center on sex, sex, sex. At this point, it seems the band is ready for a full-scale party. Bono wails, “Take me higher!” and it seems as if these surprisingly danceable songs are merely precursors of what is to come.
“One” stops the party in its tracks. And maybe, based upon a closer listening of the first two songs, it should have been evident it really wasn’t a party to begin with. The opening tracks, danceable as they may be, convey a sense of desperation, a respite of euphoria in the wake of an unknowable future. With “One”, U2 delivers a lamentation on loss. In every way, from the sad guitar that opens it to the full band fervor that concludes it, the song is breathtakingly beautiful. Of course, the meaning of any piece of music, lies in the heart of the listener; Bono has attributed its meaning to a monologue delivered by an AIDS- stricken son to his father. For me, then and now, “One” remains a rumination of a relationship’s dissolution. Near the song’s climax, Bono delivers one of the most affecting moments of frustration I’ve ever heard:
You say, “Love is a temple…love the higher law”
“Love is a temple…love the higher law”
You ask me to enter…well then, you make me crawl
And I can’t keep holding on to what you’ve got
When all you’ve got is hurt
I could go on and on about “One”. It’s truly transcendent. I’ll simply add that whereas before I saw it is a song which offered no chance for redemption, I now see it differently. There is a light, however dim: “We’ve got to carry each other, carry each other…one love.” For whatever reason, this soothes me.
What follows in the wake of Achtung’s masterpiece is a series of dark, at times very cynical, explorations of love and lust. “Until The End of the World” depicts Judas’ confession to Christ. Bono’s lyrics are sharp and The Edge goes berserk with a funky, driving guitar solo that is topped only by the impossibly ascending climax which ends the song. Adam Clayton’s rumbling bass and Larry Mullin, Jr.’s assertive drumming are in fine form here, as throughout the album. The rhythm is undeniable. Bono’s Judas openly questions Christ’s affirmation of complete, never ending love: “Waves of regret… waves of joy…I reached out for the one I tried to destroy…You, you said you’d wait until the end of the world.” Apocalypse ensues.
The pure pop of “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses” follows, full of layered guitar fills, Bono’s desperate (and lustful) lyrics, and a wonderful opening string section that is only audible in one channel (another production trick!). Side one (remember tapes and vinyl, kids?) closes with “So Cruel”, a cynical look at a relationship gone bad:
She wears my love like a see-through dress
Her lips say one thing
Her movements something else
Oh love, like a screaming flower
Love…dying every hour
The darkness that ends side one continues with side two’s opening, “The Fly”. The boys rock hard in this track as Bono spews venom on the nature of hypocrisy. One section, in particular, strikes close to the heart:
Every artist is a cannibal
Every poet is a thief
They all kill their inspiration
And sing about the grief
Ouch! “The Fly” is augmented by another Edge guitar freak-out, this time in the vein of Hendrix.
After the pervading darkness of the previous tracks, the band loosens up with some more good old fashioned horniness. “Mysterious Ways” was a monster hit and deservedly so: it is funky as hell, nasty (“If you wanna kiss the sky…Better learn how to kneel…On your knees, boy), and dance club-friendly. By this point on the album, U2 is on a serious roll.
“Trying to Throw Your Arms Around the World” follows. I’m not sure how to describe this track. It’s a psychedelic, surrealist collage held together by a hip-hop beat. I’ve read that the song relates the thoughts of a drunk man walking home. Hey, that sounds as good as any other interpretation. What I know is that Bono’s vocals are astounding and that this musical concoction is brewed to perfection. Whatever its meaning, “Trying to Throw…” is irresistibly good pop music.
For the next two tracks, the band engages in more conventional arena-friendly rock. “Ultraviolet (Light My Way)” again finds Bono questioning, with exultation and frustration, the contradictory feelings experienced in a love relationship:
You bury your treasure
Where it can’t be found
But your love is like a secret
That’s been passed around
Initially, due in part to the magnificence of what has preceded it, “Ultraviolet” seems rather minor. However, over time, it grows on you. “Acrobat”, on the other hand, hits your head-on. This is a roaring rock song, all momentum and snarls. Bono again sees love, especially its hypocritical-inspiring elements, in a very cynical light. The imagery he employs is harsh and lewd: “And you can swallow or you can spit…You can throw it up or choke on it.” Not that he is proclaiming himself above reproach, mind you. He finds himself as guilty as anyone else: “And I must be an acrobat…to talk like this and act like that.” However, by song’s end, he is still holding on to love by a thread.
The thread snaps in Achtung Baby’s dark finale, “Love is Blindness”. The title is certainly truth in advertising. Bono laments, in a tired and defeated voice, of a love that is irrevocably lost. The music itself is dirge-like, highlighted by a bitter, angry Edge solo.
Love is clockworks
And cold steel
Fingers too numb to feel
Squeeze the handle
Blow out the candle
Love is blindness
Taken as a whole, Achtung Baby is about loss. Even the upbeat tracks hint at a certain desperation. The characters who inhabit this album’s musical landscape are holding on to ideals, even as those ideals seem to slip from their grasp. I was a twenty-one years-old when Achtung was released and, at the time, was involved in a relationship that I felt was mirrored by these songs. The album became a kind of soundtrack to my life at that time- an incredible testament to the power of music and a common element of all the Great Albums I’ll be writing about in the future. I’ve since become a devoted U2 fan and have found their music, while not always of the highest order, nonetheless intriguing and well worthy of exploration. To my mind, Achtung Baby, in its fearless shattering of boundaries and in its unblinking, unsparingly personal examination of love, remains the finest album U2 has ever released.