What is the story being told on Atomic Bomb?

[U2Soar]

I read this post yesterday on Wire by jeconnors3. I would be interested to read some Interferencers thoughts on what story is being told on Atomic Bomb (Michael Griffiths, Skeek, Spanisheyes, the more the merrier!)

We've been down this road before, a few years back, but for the
record, here's my argument against the notion that ATYCLB is not
cohesive. To me the album takes the listener on a very archetypical
journey, and one not unfamiliar in U2's work - the journey from the
joy that faith can bring to the despair that losing faith can cause.
At it's core the basic theme of the album is the eternal conflict
between faith and doubt, between the joy and bliss that faith
promises and the realities of the world that seem to counter that
promise. A quick walk through the album and how I see these themes
being played out:

BD – The pure joy of discovering a faith and the rapture of that
devotion to a higher power – but already hints of doubt are present,
like poppy seeds in a bagel.

Touch me
Take me to that other place
Teach me
I know I'm not a hopeless case


SIAM – Doubt starts to color faith more; protestations abound that a
feeling of despair is just temporary, a lull to get out of, but the
seed has been planted

And if our way should falter
Along the stony pass
It's just a moment, this time will pass


Elevation – Doubt is temporarily brushed off, and we revel in the
heights faith can bring you to.

You make me feel like I can fly so high
Elevation


Walk On – More ecstasy, but colored ecstasy, there's a feeling of
resignation and indignation here; the notion is that faith can heal,
but why does it have to, why is injustice allowed to flower in the
first place

And I know it aches and your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on


Kite – An uneasy truce is begun, between the ecstasy and the reality
of the real world, and questions are being asked

I don't know which way the wind will blow
Who's to know when the time has come around
Don't wanna see you cry
I know this is not goodbye


In a Little While – The yearning to leave this world behind for the
better one is expressed, but in a very bittersweet way, that
essential conflict is cemented now

In a little while surely you'll be mine
In a little while I'll be there
In a little while this hurt will hurt no more
I'll be home, love


Wild Honey – More on the separation between those who've moved on
and those still on earth

I'm still standing, I'm still standing where you left me
Are you still growing wild with everthing tame around you


Peace on Earth – The beginning of anger, a little flailing out at
the lost promises of faith

Sick of sorrow, sick of the pain
I'm sick of hearing again and again
That there's gonna be peace on Earth


When I Look at the World – The doubt has colored to despair, despair
that we earthly bound people will never be able to understand the
true mysteries of faith

So I try to be like you
Try to feel it like you do
But without you it's no use
I can't see what you see
When I look at the world


New York – An attempt to brush off the conflict, to find answers
where they can't be found

Living happily not like me and you
That's where I lost you
New York


Grace – Some peace has been found in the notion that we will never
know how to reconcile that eternal conflict, but that in Grace we
will find rest.

Because Grace makes beauty out of ugly things
Grace finds beauty in everything
Grace finds goodness in everything

 

[AEON]

I posted this a few days back. This what my guess is:

have not quite figured out the theme completely yet. There is a mystery to be solved here - and I love it. It took me about a year to figure out Achtung (well, maybe more, because I really didn't "get it" until I read Flanagan's book 1995 - so it took me 4 years!).

What I'm getting so far is all of this is going on in a fictional town called "Vertigo" - and I get the impression it is a poor, 3rd world type of place (war, hunger, disease, death). Bono is a character in this city - begging, praying, and singing for help.

In the middle of the album, the Bono character is battling his way out of Vertigo. But he is being beaten down by war (Love and Peace), death (Sometimes), hunger (Crumbs), a tough relationship (Man and a Woman). But he also catches glimpses of a better world (City of Blinding Lights, One Step Closer)

Ultimately, U2 is telling us that this place called Vertigo has hope. Right now things are dark (pain before the child is born, the dark before the dawn). Even though I think the Bono character eventually transcends/escapes the place called Vertigo (Original of the Species - the Character is rescued by God and is a new creation), he doesn't turn his back on the place he came from - and he begs God to make the City Shine on a Hill (...take this city...) He wants to keep up the battle, so he asks God to make his heart brave.

I may be way off track. I won't know this album for another 5 years, but that's what makes it so good! Man - I've never experienced music that perfectly evokes the emotion the songwriters intended.

Adam, Bono, Edge, Larry...Thank You!!!...Again, and again...and again

 

[mwheelonh]

To be honest, I've been hearing HTDAAB as a continuation of the story begun with AB. Especially telling was Bono's comments in the Best Buy interview about Vertigo being about a night club where you hate the music and hate the people and are having a horrible time, but you're at what is supposed to be the top and are scared about falling off.

The character of AB went through a steady decent into the wildness/madness of Nighttown (see, again, Flanigan's book). By the end of it, he was so far from home that he couldn't see anything at all (Love is Blindness).

Vertigo picks up the story--our character is still out there, partying it up, and hating it. Miracle Drug is a plea to science and reason to save him; he can't call on God, since he's walked away from Him, so the only place to turn to for salvation is Man. We never get to see if that works or not though, because suddenly, someone close to him dies (SYCMIOYO).

I see SYCMIOYO very clearly: the character returning from the big city to the small town where he grew up. He's strung out and dressed in expensive clothes, standing in the early morning by the gravesite of his father (or mother/sibling/loved one, etc.). He's walking through the empty house, trying to reconcile the present with the loving, full memories of his past ("A house doesn't make a home/Don't leave me here alone"). He's been shocked completely out of the spiritually-dangerous/exciting path he's been following.

Then comes LPOE, which many people on this board have said doesn't really fit on the album, both in the style of music (the industrial grunge + blues of it) and thematically, but here's why I think it *does* fit. After someone close to you dies, most people go through a period of unreasonable, unfocused rage. They hate death, hate the person they love for dying, hate everyone around them because they don't understand what they're going through, hate everyone in the world for taking life so much for granted. LPOE is jarring, but that's the point: it's the sudden burst of anger in the aftermath of a personal tragedy.

With COBL, the rage has passed, and the character is reflecting on his life, trying to make sense of it now that so much has changed. It's a first, important realization that the path of exploration he's been on hasn't really helped him at all ("I knew much more then/Than I do now"). With ABOY, he's starting to remember what he knew then: at the beginning of everything was God (or his mom, or both, depending on your interpretation of the song), and that's the only thing that can heal him before it's too late ("I'm not broke, but you can see the cracks/You can make me perfect again").

Having passed through this "rebirth" (incidentally, it's interesting to place Mercy at this point in the tracklist, particularly because of the ending lines), he starts to take stock of the life he has now. He has a wife, whom he loves, and tries to rediscover that love (AMAAW). He lives in a world that's pretty messed up, but has the potential to be so much better--much like himself (CFYT). He has his own impending mortality to face, but this time, instead of the easy answers of his youth, or the drug/party-fueled escape of his recent past, he's able to face it, calmly, accepting that he doesn't know what's coming, but he's getting "One Step Closer" to it every day. Ultimately he has the one thing that will last after him, regardless of what's waiting for him after death: his children (OOTS). And then it ends with a hymn, a psalm, David dancing naked in the temple, singing to the Lord, to "Yaweh".

 

[AEON]

Dang mwheelonh, that was a good post. I think you should expand on that and make a book out of it! (I'm actually serious)

 

[*k_i_t_e_86*]

To be honest, I've been hearing HTDAAB as a continuation of the story begun with AB. Especially telling was Bono's comments in the Best Buy interview about Vertigo being about a night club where you hate the music and hate the people and are having a horrible time, but you're at what is supposed to be the top and are scared about falling off.

Could you possibly post this Best Buy interview here?... Id really appreciate it

 

[mwheelonh]

I think the Best Buy interview was posted here already--don't have premium status to search for it. Check the News archives here and a few other fan sites (u2log, @u2, etc.)

this was actually just a quick draft of something longer i'm in the midst of writing about HTDAAB. i'll post the full thing when (if) i ever get it done.

 

[coach]

Kinda like Billy Graham here, ahem ahem.

It's the same character from AB and Zooropa, he's at the top. But his lost, empty, Bomb is the trip to finding god. He starts at this place called vertigo, (the times, the shallowness, the speed of it all), goes through a lot. He pleads for just a glimpse of what the guy in miracle drug sees in the world; he returns to a broken home to try to fix it, he throws punches at the air, halfway through the album. Crumbs is the turning point to god I think. And after that redemption, with Original, One step closer to knowing, and Yahweh; the renewed heart and finding god at the end.

cheers