While picking up some things at Rite-Aid, I spotted U2 on the cover of Rolling Stone, and of course had to snag.

Bono has apparently been spending WAY too much time with Billie Joe (from Green Day). Smokey-eyes and eyeliner work for Billie Joe. Not so much for Bono.
(On reading the interview, I discover that it's partly him poking at a new character, currently named Jesse, Elvis' dead twin brother. He admits, "which maybe is in poor taste". My guess is that he's unconsciously dredging up Salman Rushdie's "Ground Beneath Her Feet" references. Which is fiiiine by me. <3)

I am bouncing off the walls with anticipation for the "sequel" album, which supposedly already has the set title of "Songs of Ascent". I've heard late this year, and I've heard early next year... but it's going to be the album of "future hymns" that "No Line" was originally conceptualized as, and I absolutely cannot wait to hear it. U2 is capable of creating the most beautiful, ethereal, vast textural landscapes of soundtrack - but they've always run away from it. "Passengers" let some in, and a B-side or two escapes, and things like "Being Born" and Unfire's-- well alright basically all of "Unfire". The Spiderman musical really is still forthcoming, with its music by Bono and Edge, supposedly debuting next January, and I'm curious as all hell.


But.

I don't know whether I'm getting twitchy to write fanfic again because of all the provoking tidbits in the interview, or if I actually feel like I don't *need* to, because the band are far too entertaining in themselves without being fictionalized:

"Interviewing Bono is like taking an Alaskan husky for a walk - you can only suggest a general direction, and then hold on for dear life."

Re: "Moment of Surrender", which apparently materialized all at once in an improvised session: "Eno fought hard to keep the band from messing too much with the original track. "These fucking guys," he says with a smile, "they're supposed to be so spiritual - they don't spot a miracle when it hits them in the face." "

Re: Larry Mullen Jr. "He's dressed all in black, still as lean-cheeked and handsome as in his 'Rattle and Hum' days, somehow managing to project an alpha-male swagger even while leaning back on a fluffy couch pillow at the band's waterfront headquarters." ---I think I hugged myself in a fangirling gigglefit for about five minutes. DID THAT NOT HAPPEN IN A FANFIC?!? Actually the fanfic had him curled up in a fuzzy purple sweater, an image which stuck in my head so hard that I wound up actually drawing it. bwahahahaaa.

"[Larry says:] "We spend a lot of time trying to hold Bono back from doing the maddest things possible. I just don't understand where he gets the energy." After this discussion, I develop a new theory about Bono's activism: He does it because convincing George W. Bush to give $15 billion to Africa is easier than getting Larry Mullen Jr. to do anything. Presented with this idea, Bono explodes with laughter. "I love him so, but that's an understatement," he says."

...honestly, expose me to about two more interviews, and work might very well resume on the (long-abandoned) U2 comics I have lurking around here somewhere.


edit: I just discovered (and really, should have realized on my own) that Anton shot the cover photo. That explains pretty much everything. I can't get that blue photo of B wearing a sombrero and a curly mustache smoking a cigar out of my head now.