Welcome to ATL Collective’s first-ever presentation of U2. Tonight we bring you the band’s fifth album, The Joshua Tree. Released in 1987 and produced by Daniel Lanois and Brian Eno, the team who produced U2s previous release, Unforgettable Fire. The Joshua Tree won the Grammy for Album of the Year in 1988. It’s one of the best-selling albums of all time, and in 2014 the Library of Congress preserved it on the National Recording Registry for its cultural and historical relevance. This is an album many of us grew up with. It’s anthemic and inspiring. It’s also steeped in more Irish and American roots and blues sounds than the band’s previous work. Bono was influenced by his developing friendships with Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Keith Richards as the band was beginning work on the album. Bono claims that these relationships made him take lyric writing more seriously. Where he used to improvise in front of the microphone while recording, on The Joshua Tree, Bono was moved to write lyrics that meant something. According to Rolling Stone, this was the album that turned the band “from heroes to superstars.”

Lineup

• Monahan
• Leah Calvert
• Lera Lynn
• 100 Watt Horse