Tryin' to throw your arms around the world (4)

Tryin’ To Throw Your Arms Around The World

So there are two poles in U2’s spirituality but in their hands they are not opposed. Instead, both are embraced. The Edge, looking back on the October/War period, has said that:

"it was reconciling two things that seemed for us at that moment to be mutually exclusive. We never did resolve the contradictions. That's the truth. And probably never will. There's even more contradictions now ... but it's a contradiction I'm able to live with".

Contradictions that you are able to live with, this is where U2 take us - to an affirmation of both the goodness and fallen-ness of human beings. Into the still centre at the heart of the storm of contradiction to give a different take on reconciliation. Bono has echoed the same theme in talking about Achtung Baby and Zooropa:

"I decided that the only way was, instead of running away from the contradictions, I should run into them and wrap my arms around them and give 'em a big kiss".

Contradictions flavour U2 songs and often flick the on-switch to illumination in us, the listener. The embrace of contradiction that U2 celebrate is most effectively captured in the image of the acrobat:

“And I must be
An acrobat
To talk like this
And act like that”

Contradiction is also captured in their name. U2 can be inclusive, as in ‘you too’ a recognition of a wider community containing the band, but is also the name of a US spy plane and therefore is symbolic of violence and political conflict.

This embrace of contradiction is intended to reflect their age and challenge it, at one and the same time. Their idea is to "use the energy of what's going against you - and by that I mean popular culture, commerce, science - to defend yourself. Rather than resistance in the hippie or punk sense of the word. You try to walk through it, rather than walk away from it". To describe the age can be to challenge it. The job of artists being to describe the problem, the contradictions, "to describe what's going on, describe the attraction, and be generous enough not to wave your finger at it as its going by". To look for 'diamonds in the dirt', shining, transcendent moments - sex and music as places where you glimpse God. To trawl through the state of confusion that is the contemporary moment - reflecting, mocking, embracing, describing, describing your attraction to it - in order to glimpse God, resist or mock the devil and be a harbinger of grace.

If these contradictions are acknowledged and shown in the performance - private thoughts through a public address system, rehearsed spontaneity, injecting pain into celebration - then the performance is revealing connections/linkages not normally shown on stage - revealing what is normally hidden, what is normally 'off-stage'. These hidden connections are what Mosley has identified as being key ingredients in ongoing intelligent life.

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U2 - Acrobat.