"You see Larry, you let an outsider taste your food.
I'm not jealous, but if you need someone to eat off your plate you should always go to your bass player. - Adam
"A man so handsome, he will never be let sing in this group!"
-Bono, introducing Larry at Irving Plaza, NYC 2000
BP: Do you ever wish you were Edge / Larry / Adam?
ADAM: Sometimes I wish I was Larry, yeah. Why? I'd like his dog JJ, who's a labrador
"We were four guys from Dublin who didn't have a clue. We were uncool and unhip."
"Larry is the core of U2. He never does any interviews.
He just gets on with his life the way he always has. He still enjoys
being back home with his mates. "
-Bono, 1987
"A lot of people think the power comes from the guitar, but it's really from Larry's drums."
-Bono, 1982
"It's an amazing place, with its own character.
You can get immaculate drum sound in the hallway,
which is solid stone walls with a really high ceiling.
I set my kit out there, and they put mics all the way down
from the very, very top of the stairwell. I've recorded many songs out there."
Larry describes the acoustics of Windmill Lane Studios
What do you do when female fans get too agressive?
Adam: We let Larry deal with those things.
"Well, it could have been an artichoke, but we wanted a more practical fruit."
"I'm using all this shit to my advantage. Otherwise I'm going to be looking for a job."
-Larry discussing drum machines
BP Fallon: What is the worst thing about rock n roll Larry Mullen Junior?
Larry: Excess.
BP Fallon: What is the best thing about rock n roll Larry Mullen Junior?
Larry: Excess.
BP Fallon: What is ZOOTV Larry Mullen junior?
Larry: Expensive.
BP Fallon: What is ZOO Radio Larry Mullen junior?
Larry: Cheap.
"The day U2 stops fighting is the day that U2 will not be the band it is today."
BP: What's the best thing about you?
LARRY: My dog.
BP: Do you ever wish you were Edge / Bono / Adam?
LARRY: Sometimes I wish I was as gifted as Edge on his guitar
or Bono on his lyrics or Adam is on other things.
"If a student with an accordion had come along,
I would've played with them ya know...that was where I was at,
I was that desperate to play with somebody."
"I'm a cynic about all that lovey-dovey stuff. A marriage is a partnership
and you better look at it that way or you're in trouble!
All that lovey-dovey business gets in the way.
How's she gonna feel about him in a couple of years when he's pickin' his nose?
Or when he's pickin' her nose?"
"What do you mean 'lose money in some markets'?
We generally lose money in all markets."
"The most important thing about the beginning of U2 is that
we were four people before we were four musicians.
When we started out we couldn't play any instruments.
We built the band around the drum kit but when we were on stage we were a shambles.
It was like every night we'd want to break up,
but then every morning we'd wake up and want to start again."
BP: IF YOU WERE AN ANIMAL WHAT ANIMAL WOULD YOU BE?
Larry: Aaah! A fly. Because Bono wrote about a fly and
what's good enough for Bono is good enough for me.
"It's a tough life being a pop star. You know, at the end of the day
when you've paid all the bills and put the kids through college and that,
you know, there's only enough left for a small island off the South Pacific."
- Larry 1997
"Anyway the evening ended quite abrubtly when Larry Mullen's Dad
arrived to take an indignant Larry home. Larry was only 15 at
the time and his Dad felt that school next morning was far more
important than this recording session."
Jackie Hayden, a judge at the Limerick talent contest which U2
won in 1978, recalls the band's first studio experience.
Max Magazine: Let's move to some lighter subjects.
Larry, you finally got a tattoo. Why did you choose this motive.
It's some kind of sun, isn't it?
Larry: Yeah.
MAX: Tell me about it.
Larry: It's a personal thing. I want to have it for a long time but I
don't like needles so eventually I had to drink heavily and went up to
Woodstock and I got it done there. I am planning it for about ten
years, so a bottle of Whisky and off I went.
"One of my favorite memories of Larry is him coming up
against a biker gang in a pub. They were being pretty obnoxious, but
Larry walks up to the biggest guy and says, "Listen," and the guy's like,
"Yeah, what?" and Larry goes, "If you're looking for trouble, I'll find you some."
Because Larry is all about back-up. You wouldn't mess with Larry
because you never know who's around the corner."
-Bono, GQ Magazine, 2001
"I'm so looking forward to playing indoors, to be able to look at people
and see the whites of their eyes."
-Larry, Revolver magazine, 2000
"I remember after the Pop record being so gutted that Staring At The Sun...
it should have been a fucking huge single but we didn't have time
to finish it properly. And I remember having to do interviews,
and being asked what the album was about and
[does mean dog eyes] I had no... fucking... idea.
All I knew was that if we'd had one more month we could have
pulled that song through."
-Larry, Q magazine 2000
"Do you know, one of Hitler's first military acts was to
carpet bomb his village of his birth? He was obsessed by obliterating his past."
-Larry, Q magazine
"We should do that to the Q photo library. Destroy all evidence of mullets!"
-Edge, in response.
"Some people would say I'm lucky.
I'd say...[pondering, then brightening] I'm lucky!"
-Larry, 2001, on his good looks
"Between songs people look at you, so I think when I'm holding
the sticks, Do I look bored? What sort of expression should I have
on my face? Should I have an expression on my face?
I find myself cringing sometimes."
-Larry, 2001, says as he cringes on cue.
"I live in a nice house and don't feel bad about it.
But I don't drive a flashy car, first of all because I don't want to, and second of all
because I think that would be rude in a country like Ireland,
where there is high unemployment."
"I have nightmares of my kids saying, Did you really look like that?
Did you really make that shit? I want to make good enough records for them to be able to say I'm OK."
-Larry, 2001
"I am a Christian and not ashamed of that. But trying to explain my beliefs, our beliefs, takes away from it. I have more in common with somebody who doesn't believe at all than I do with most Christians. I don't mind saying that."
"During the course of that very first afternoon, I saw that some people could play.
The Edge could play, Adam just looked great. Big bushy hair, long caftan coat,
bass guitar and amp. He talked like he could play, used all the right words,
like 'gig'. I thought, this guy must know how to play.
Then Bono arrived, and he meant to play the guitar,
but he couldn't play very well, so he started to sing.
He couldn't do that either. But he was such a charismatic character
that he was in the band anyway, as soon as he arrived.
I was in charge for the first five minutes, but as soon as Bono got there I was out of a job."
"I was the guy who borrowed the guitar for the first rehearsal.
I borrowed the guitar for the first gig as well.
I was in charge, I was the leader of this band for two days. Two days was all I lasted."
"In Ireland you have to fight- very hard - if you want to do anything different.
To be in a band is really, really difficult. There's nowhere to play.
But it's an interesting and beautiful place too. I live there now;
I wouldn't live anywhere else."
"It's a mad thing we do.
There's nothing natural about it.
I mean, I hit things for a living. I hit things and people clap!"
2001
"You begin to feel like a fish bowl.
You get some girls who just stare, never come near, never speak.
Weird."
- Larry, 1987
"Before his (Larry) bandmates even met him, he lost a younger sister,
and after the four became friends, his mother was fatally struck by a truck.
In his early teens he realized he was 'a very aggressive person, in a positive sense.
I liked to hit things. Playing drums was the only thing I could do.'"