Bono has shared what might be one of the most candid insights into U2’s dynamics to date.
He confessed that the world-famous group splits up ‘all the time’ and revealed he’s ‘amazed’ they’re still going.
Bono, 62, explained: ‘When you grow up together, you’re used to taking bits out of each other.’
The Irish rocker – real name Paul David Hewson – and his bandmates, The Edge (David Howell Evans), Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr, formed U2 way back in 1976, so it’s no surprise the men have had their ups and downs.
‘Being in a band is tricky. The older you get, it gets even trickier. You’re as good as the arguments you get, but at a certain point, when people are doing well, the male loves to be the lord of his own domain, you know? It’s rough,’ the Dublin-born crooner shared.
Speaking on Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes and Will Arnett’s SmartLess podcast, Bono added: ‘And you can just imagine why people say, “Ah, f**k this, I’m outta here”.
‘I mean, I really genuinely expect that and the band breaks up all the time. It’s the truth.’
The dad-of-four then noted: ‘Then we get back together and I’m grateful we do.’
It comes after U2 announced the release of Songs of Surrender – a 40-track album of re-imagined and re-recorded songs on March 17.
Announcing the news on Twitter, U2 said: ‘Songs Of Surrender. 40 Songs. Reimagined and rerecorded. March 17, 2023.’
Meanwhile, U2’s guitarist The Edge recently teased the new project in letters to fans, admitting the band are heading in a ‘new direction’.
He wrote in part: ‘The fact is that most of our work was written and recorded when we were a bunch of very young men.
‘Those songs mean something quite different to us now. Some have grown with us. Some we have outgrown.
‘But we have not lost sight of what propelled us to write those songs in the first place.’
The musician went on: ‘The essence of those songs is still in us, but how to reconnect with that essence when we have moved on, and grown so much?
‘Music allows you to time travel and so we started to imagine what it would be like to bring these songs back with us to the present day and give them the benefit or otherwise, of a 21st century re-imagining.
‘What started as an experiment quickly became a personal obsession as so many early U2 songs yielded to a new interpretation.’
The Edge added: ‘Intimacy replaced post-punk urgency. New keys. New chords. New tempos and new lyrics arrived. It turns out that great song is kind of indestructible.
‘Once we surrendered our reverence for the original version each song started to open up to a new authentic voice of this time, of the people we are, and particularly the singer Bono has become. I hope you like our new direction.’
The tracklist is yet to be confirmed, but some fans have speculated that it could be the same as the songs in Bono’s memoir, which told the stories of 40 songs from U2’s back catalogue.
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