A Thousand Miles from Kansas

In my university days, my friend Bob suggested I give the U2 album The Unforgettable Fire a listen. So I did. U2 was not quite on my musical radar yet, but Bob had been listening to them for a couple of years. I was blown away! “Pride (In the Name of Love)” was the best selling single from the album, but “Bad” and the title track “The Unforgettable Fire” were my favorites. After that, I dove into their back catalog of albums: War, Boy, and October. All very good albums. 

And then, in 1987, U2 released their 5th studio album: The Joshua Tree. That did it…I became a fan for life! During this time in the late 1980s, compact discs were just becoming popular and one of the first CDs I purchased was The Joshua Tree (along with Springsteen  Born in the U.S.A., Pink Floyd The Wall, Steve Miller Greatest Hits, and Dire Straits Brothers in Arms). Joshua Tree lived in my car stereo and provided the soundtrack to the latter half of my university days. 

In concert, U2 is a great show. Melissa and I have witnessed their spectacle twice. The first concert was The Joshua Tree Tour in 1987. This concert blew me away! Raw and powerful. The BoDeans were the opening act. The second concert was The U2 Experience + Innocence Tour in 2018 in Las Vegas. No opening band, just U2. This show, for  me, was too political with a lot of preaching by Bono and political statements by the band. Just play the music please. Your message and statements will be evident. 

The album The Joshua Tree opens with the long, fade-in intro and Edge’s signature guitar sound aggressively runs down “Where the Streets Have No Name”. Another slow fade in awakens the gospel sounds of “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”. What we do find next is a hauntingly powerful ballad “With or Without You”. Now that Bono has us all warm, comfy, and in love he hits over the head with the politically charged and raucous “Bullet the Blue Sky”. Next track is “Running to Stand Still”, which was written to reflect the effects of heroin addiction and its impact on Ireland. Coal miners take center stage in “Red Hill Mining Town”, a song about the 1984 miner’s strike in the United Kingdom. U2 explores more American culture on the track “In God’s Country” and the failure of the American Dream and dirty politics. “Trip Through Your Wires” is the next track  delving  into the traps of love and being “tripped by her wires”. The next song is “One Tree Hill”, my personal favorite on The Joshua Tree and my absolute favorite U2 song. This track evokes a lot of emotion and reflection every time I listen to Edge pick and scratch me in as Adam’s bass line sets the pulse, Larry’s  syncopated drums pave the way to Bono’s ethereal vocals that lull me  into a place of “natsukashi” and sadness. “Exit” is the only song on the album that I often skip. No particular reason, just never really liked the song. Seems violent to me. The last track on The Joshua Tree is “Mothers of the Disappeared”. The song was inspired after a trip to El Salvador in which Bono became aware of a group of women called Comadres. In Bono’s words of explanation,  “Comadres were a group of women also known as the “mothers of the disappeared.” These women had lost their children, who were taken in the night by death squads, leaving the mothers unsure if their children were alive or dead.” As the last track on the album, it is a fitting end to, in my opinion, a hauntingly brilliant piece of musical genius. 

And that’s The Joshua Tree…in its entirety.

1. Where the Streets Have No Name
2. I Still Haven’t Found What I Am Looking For
3. With or Without You
4. Bullet the Blue Sky
5. Running to Stand Still
6. Red Hill Mining Town
7. In God’s Country
8. Trip Through Your Wires
9. One Tree Hill
10. Exit
11. Mothers of the Disappeared

© 2024 Gregory Vessar. A Thousand Miles from Kansas. All Rights Reserved.