U2’s “A Sort of Homecoming”

I received the package today, a few days earlier than expected, and once I opened the box and looked at my purchase, a flood of memories came pouring in that must be mentioned here. The purchase in question is U2’s fourth album “The Unforgettable Fire”, which I just bought for my son to help stock his growing vinyl collection of music.

Before diving into my intentions here, first allow me to point out a significant parallel that needs to be pointed out and truly appreciated, which begins with the Beatles, surprisingly enough. I am a huge fan of theirs and even consider myself as something of an aficionado. I’ve easily read a dozen books about them and know their story intimately. And like most everyone familiar with their catalog, I have the firm conviction that Lennon and McCartney were the greatest songwriting partnership the 20^th century had ever seen, if not beyond.

The reason I have for mentioning the Beatles is because I didn’t grow up with their music, so I didn’t get to experience their mind-bending evolution in real time as it played out from album to album. I had the freedom to begin with Abbey Road and work backwards. But try to imagine being a teenager in early 1964 when the Beatles released the exuberant, yet simple expression of teenage love with “I Want to Hold Your Hand”, or “She Loves You”, which introduced the world to Beatlemania, then watch as their genius matured, album after album, to the point of writing the otherworldly artistry of “Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band”, recorded just three years later in early 1967. It will sound trite, but their growth and prolificacy as songwriters will never be matched. It is just too incredible to duplicate. Just consider that within six years, 1964 to 1970 they had 14 No.1 albums, and 20 No.1 songs, not to mention another 35 that landing in the top 10.

Well, I shouldn’t have to say it, but I’ll remind everyone that U2 saw a similar maturity in artistic growth that stretched across six studio albums, covering a fourteen-year span, beginning with the primary colors of “War” in 1983, through their creative explosion in the 90’s, ending with “Pop” in 1997, and I had a front seat to it all and was able to experience what I missed out on with the Beatles. Certainly hearing “Achtung Baby” after “Rattle and Hum” felt as shocking as hearing “St. Pepper’s” after “Revolver” for that earlier generation.

But circling back to 1984 and the beginning of their creative run, I specifically remember hearing the album’s first single, “Pride In the Name of Love” and what first struck me was the extreme departure from their previous album “War.” U2 were a relatively new band at the time, so fans like myself were completely unaware of their artistic sensibilities, and certainly not their long term musical vision, so we had no way of processing why there was such an abrupt change. “War” was a smashing success after all, but instead of cashing-in on its success by duplicating the formula, this follow up was a complete departure, both sonically, and lyrically.  

The cut to the quick, “War” was recorded to sound raw, with a garage band aesthetic that fit well with the punk-rock ethos they arose from, but the new record was refined, atmospheric and even poetic. Even the album art signaled a directional pivot by stepping away from the implication of conflict displayed on ‘War’s’ cover, to the splendor of Moydrum Castle in Ireland, shot by their friend and longtime photographer, Anton Corbijn. The lyrical direction between the two records is also in opposition, as “War” looked outward at a world in disarray, while “The Unforgettable Fire” turned the focus inward.

It’s not my intention to expound on the entire album here, but there were two songs from the record that continue to reside on my short list of all-time favorites, one being their existential masterpiece “Bad”, which I discussed in an essay last year titled “Bad Has Never Felt So Good”. But there is one other song I want to discuss here, and the reason for it remaining so close to my heart is no trivial thing to discuss, for the song would likely not strike anyone as a candidate for inclusion to an ‘all-time favorite’ list. There have been many other songs, probably even better songs, that have jumped on the list over the years, only to peacefully fall away once an unspoken threshold of too many repetitions had been crossed, yet this song continues to resonate and will always remain an expression that I’ll keep close at heart until my dying day.

The song, “A Sort of Homecoming”, is the album’s opening track and immediately informs us not to expect the harsh, bombastic aesthetic of ‘War’, but is instead built from an atmospheric soundscape with layers of chiming guitars. Musically speaking, the instrumentation appears purposely vague, meaning it appears meant only to provide a background wash, a sort of sonic bed for Bono’s melody to float above. The title comes courtesy of a German poet, Paul Celan, who wrote that ‘poetry is a sort of homecoming’, a sentence so poignant in its suggestion that it could stand as a complete poem purely on its own.  And for Bono, it proved to be an inspiration that drove him to aim higher with his own wordplay.

But aside from its poetic posturing, what captured my fascination back then, and still holds it to this today is the experience of hearing Bono’s impassioned voice surging through its emotional finale. It’s important to note that during most of his career, Bono wrote using a self-styled stream of consciousness that he used to find the melody a song wanted, not one forced upon it. He would babble unintelligible words, or what producer Brian Eno termed “Bonoglease”, which were just sounds voiced on top of what the band was playing, attempting to feel and capture the natural flow buried in its rhythm, and only then would it give way to lyrics. The approach was purely intuitive and often captured emotional textures far deeper and authentic than proper song structure.

I mention that simply because this melody sounds as if it fought its way up from the depths of his psyche, and I don’t say that in a misused sense of profundity. I would argue, in fact, that this song is the preeminent example of his unique style of songwriting, because a mood is here created that only Bono could have expressed. For anyone as intimately aware of the U2 catalog as I am, specifically Bono’s propensity for wading into spiritual themes, this song represents a high-water mark for his artistic expression, and in the purest sense, for there is a profound yearning coursing through his voice during the final two minutes. There you’ll hear a uniquely talented and profoundly sincere singer, at least at this stage, pouring his heart out, at volume.

I could continue down this line, as unschooled as I am, describing various transitions and production values that I feel enhance this section or that, but it would be pointless, because this song has nothing to do with any of that. This song is all about Bono, his passion as an individual, and a voice straining to match it. 

I’ve also included the lyrics below, but keep in mind they represent Bono’s initial steps along his way to becoming one of the truly great wordsmiths of his generation. Then listen to the song and allow yourself to slip beneath the surface and feel the passion surging through his voice, and there you’ll enter an arena where mere mortals can only imagine. THe final two minutes of this song is pure adrenaline for my soul.

The magic begins with the line, “the wind will crack in wintertime“ around the 2:30 mark in the clip. At that point, Bono throttles up the intensity before unleashing an incredible outpouring of raw emotion. The clip is poorly edited, as you will no doubt catch, but we can still hear Bono pouring everything he has through that powerful voice of his, cracking at the edges, yet there is something beautifully sublime at the sound of it.

U2 – A Sort Of Homecoming (Wide Awake In America Version) – YouTube

And you know it’s time to go
Through the sleet and driving snow
Across the fields of mourning to a light that’s in the distance.
And you hunger for the time
Time to heal, ‘desire’ time
And your earth moves beneath your own dream landscape.

On borderland we run.
I’ll be there, I’ll be there tonight
A high-road, a high-road out from here.

The city walls are all come down
The dust a smoke screen all around
See faces ploughed like fields that once
Gave no resistance.

And we live by the side of the road
On the side of a hill as the valleys explode
Dislocated, suffocated
The land grows weary of it’s own.

O com-away, o com-away, o-com, o com-away, I say I
O com-away, o com-away, o-com, o com-away, I say I

Oh, oh on borderland we run
And still we run, we run and don’t look back
I’ll be there, I’ll be there
Tonight, tonight

I’ll be there tonight, I believe
I’ll be there so high
I’ll be there tonight, tonight.

Oh com-away, I say, o com-away, I say.

The wind will crack in winter time
This bomb-blast lightning waltz.
No spoken words, just a scream
Tonight we’ll build a bridge across the sea and land
See the sky, the burning rain
She will die and live again tonight.

And your heart beats so slow
Through the rain and fallen snow
Across the fields of mourning to a light that’s in the distance.
Oh, don’t sorrow, no don’t weep
For tonight at last I am coming home.
I am coming home.