U2: Bono (vocals, harmonica); The Edge (guitar, keyboards, background vocals); Adam Clayton (bass); Larry Mullen, Jr. (drums).
Additional personnel includes: Daniel Lanois (guitar, keyboards, tambourine, background vocals); Brian Eno (keyboards, programming, background vocals).
Recorded at Windmill Lane Studios, Dublin, Ireland.
THE JOSHUA TREE won the 1987 Grammy award for album of the year.
U2: Bono (vocals, harmonica); The Edge (guitar, keyboards, background vocals); Adam Clayton (bass); Larry Mullen Jr. (drums).
Additional personnel includes: Daniel Lanois (guitar, keyboards, tambourine, background vocals); Brian Eno (keyboards, programming, background vocals).
Engineers include: Flood.
Recorded at Windmill Lane Studios, Dublin, Ireland.
Few bands are as ready for superstardom as U2 circa 1986. After chart successes with WAR and THE UNFORGETTABLE FIRE and a high profile appearance at Live Aid, the Irish quartet holed up at a Dublin studio with engineers Daniel Lanois and Brian Eno, and crafted the definitive sound of late '80s mainstream rock. Deftly marrying WAR's edgy bombast, THE UNFORGETTABLE FIRE's impressionism, Eno's ambient flourishes, and the band's new found interest in American roots music, THE JOSHUA TREE is U2's crowning moment, a perfect nexus of the band's expansive muse and the popular zeitgeist. It consistently ranks in the higher reaches of critics' lists of the greatest albums of all time.
Due both to Eno's georgeous production and a stellar set of songs, the album has aged stunningly. The first three tracks--the rousing "Where the Streets Have No Name," the gospel-inflected "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," and the tortured, echo-drenched ballad "With or Without You"--have all become FM standards, but cuts such as "Red Hill Mining Town," "Running to Stand Still," and "In God's Country" with grittier Americana influences resonant just as emphatically. The rhythm section's (Larry Mullen, Jr. and Adam Clayton) propulsive minimalism provides the perfect bedrock for the Edge's veritable clinic on guitar effects and economy. Like the best U2, however, the album belongs to Bono, whose soulful voice hitches an epic passion to lyrics both deeply personal and overtly political.
After their arresting appearance at Live Aid, U2 album sales went berserk across the globe, and the world waited impatiently for their next release. The Joshua Tree arrived, and fans were not disappointed. There are few weaknesses, musical or lyrical, in this album. The pure power of the music and patent honesty of the lyrics steer the band clear of whimsy and self-indulgence. The anguish and questioning is shot through with faith as they chant and stomp and batter their way through instant classics such as 'Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For', 'Where The Streets Have No Name' and 'With Or Without You', leaving the listener bruised but elated.
What the critics say...
Rolling Stone (p.85) - 5 stars out of 5 -- "[T]he best moments connect on a physical level -- the glistening bass groove of 'With or Without You' and the Hendrix-worship guitar storm of 'Bullet the Blue Sky.'"
Rolling Stone (11/89) - Ranked #3 in Rolling Stone's "100 Best Albums Of The 80s" survey.
Rolling Stone (11/89) - Ranked #3 in Rolling Stone's "100 Best Albums Of The 80s" survey.
Q (10/01, p.91) - Ranked #12 in Q's "Best 50 Albums of Q's Lifetime" - "...This collection of downbeat rock made U2 superstars..."
Uncut (pp.108-109) - 5 stars out of 5 -- "It still bristles with the bravado of a band shaping up for a shot at the title, daring to believe that they could make their idols their peers."
CMJ (1/6/03, p.15) - Included in CMJ's list of "Top 25 College Radio Albums of All Time"
CMJ (1/5/04, p.20) - Ranked #1 in CMJ's "Top 20 Most-Played Albums of 1987"
CMJ (1/6/03, p.15) - Included in CMJ's list of "Top 25 College Radio Albums of All Time"
CMJ (1/5/04, p.20) - Ranked #1 in CMJ's "Top 20 Most-Played Albums of 1987"
Billboard - Ranked as the #14 hit album of the 80s.
Q (Magazine) (p.115) - 5 stars out of 5 -- "Their reinvention of stadium rock sounds as impassioned as ever....A finely balanced mix of intimacy and power..."
