From the Sky Down Page #6

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there was a sort of sense of regrouping,

like, "Right, so that's what

we've left behind.

"OK, well, we have got one or two things

"that are leading the way. "

Berlin was a baptism of fire.

It was something

that we had to go through,

to realise that

really what we were looking for

and what we were trying

to get to,

was not something you could

find physically outside of ourselves

in some other city.

There was no magic to it -

we had to actually just put the work in,

and figure out the ideas,

and hone those ideas down.

I mean,

it's never gonna be a democracy,

but if it's a benevolent dictatorship,

that allows everybody to feel that they at

least get a chance to say yay or nay.

Then you get something like One -

everybody's going,

"Wow, that's amazing!

Classic song, genius. "

Brian, "I really don't like that.

"We're gonna have to sort that,

that's just boring me to tears. "

The idea is to try to set a scene,

so that the band

doesn't walk into a blank canvas.

There were suddenly

all these little glimpses -

"Oh, I can do that"

and "I can try that. "

The thing behind the foreground -

push that more and the voice more.

So, bells back?

Bells and Dan's like

real attacky guitar.

Everybody started to see

jumping off points.

What about the low one?

I really like that.

There's a kind of quicksilver sound

about it, it's like shimmering.

I like it, a real sliver of silver...

at the top,

but it needs maybe some...

grit.

And maybe that would come from...

from you, Edge.

You dirty dog!

As wiry a sound

as you can make it, Edge.

Grit, wire...

The drum sound,

the original drum sound,

it came in so low and then it went...

it came in and then went up,

so I missed that.

- It's not a point of drama anymore.

- I felt I really missed it.

The thing about Larry is

he's as much of a visual part

of the band as Bono and Edge.

His style of drumming

is unlike anybody else's.

He's completely self-taught

and he's basically wrong,

but, thereby incredibly individual.

Yeah, basically,

what I was just gonna do was,

because Edge seemed

so keen on the previous part,

I was basically just gonna try

and emulate that

and then change

for the choruses.

Sure, I'll do that.

No problem. Sure.

Man, he comes up with

the drum signatures.

Now hardly any drummers do this.

You hear the drum beat

and you know that's that song.

Sorry, Larry, I'm stopping you

cos I don't think that's going anywhere.

It's softening the song up.

What I liked about the previous part

was that it was brutal,

and made it sound

vigorous and strange.

It might be because

there's another snare involved in it.

Everybody knows

the value of the band.

The idea that there'll be

somebody to challenge you,

and you can challenge other people,

the idea they can do that as adults

and not necessarily

have to agree with people.

- It's a nice sound, isn't it?

- Yes, I know.

They're very, very loyal

to each other.

And they're really, really kind

to each other.

It's no good to have somebody

not well in the unit or not happy.

The others don't say,

"Hard luck, mate, we're carrying on. "

The others say, "OK, we've gotta get

that person happy again. "

"We've got to draw them

back into the circle. "

If we're being accused

of megalomania...

...let's do some judo.

Let's use the force of what's attacking us

to defend ourselves.

So, then we got a voice,

this character, The Fly...

...to go with the glasses,

and we distorted the voice,

so I could go...

...it's no secret that the stars

are falling from the sky...

So, getting down there,

into that sort of guttural place,

into the gutter

then I had a whole new

vocabulary open up.

You're going to go there,

and I just decided

I was gonna go there,

but I couldn't do it

without some armour on.

If I was gonna expose my heart,

I needed the right kind of armour

to protect the rest of me.

Well, I'm learning to lie.

- Tell us about Bono.

- I'm learning to be insincere.

The shades, rock and roll, man.

To quote Iggy Pop, "When things get

too straight, I can't bear it,

"and I feel like I'm stuck on a pin. "

Let's give them a rock star,

let's have some fun with this.

I took Lou Reed's glasses,

and Jim Morrison's pants,

Elvis's jacket,

and a little bit of his hair -

it was like an Identi-kit rock star,

you know, an assemble one yourself?

And actually,

it was incredibly freeing.

We started to embrace our world

and the silliness of it -

the contradictory nature of it.

We stopped trying to be

those earnest po-faced men.

The mask reveals the man alright.

It was a move into brighter light.

I think we got a bit fed up with

those serious black and white

gloomy photographs.

It's Anton really not working in an area

that he was comfortable in.

I think we did brighten up a bit.

That song informs so much

about what ended up becoming

our exploration live of media

and the truth which was Zoo TV.

Or maybe the encore's

exactly the place for it.

Just, you know, like fish tanks,

something that might start over there

and end up over there,

but it's not what you think it is.

So, you really like that?

And Ned reckons

he can get fins on it and all sorts.

It's something funny, basically,

isn't it?

Yeah.

During Zoo TV,

I remember Edge saying...

"This fantastic thing, this is

our reward for ten years of restraint. "

It's just such a wide expanse to do

something that...

makes people laugh,

as opposed to just be impressed.

Loud, boom, boom!

Boom!

All different versions of us.

I saw... them.

I saw into them.

I saw what Edge is now,

I saw it then.

I saw who they could be.

It was always there.

And I saw Larry, and I thought,

"This guy's a superstar. "

It's a very unromantic love,

it's a very hard-bitten,

tough, f*** off love.

You have to reject

one expression of the band... first,

before you get to the next expression,

and in between, you have nothing.

You have to risk it... all.

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