An Open Letter to U2

Dear U2,

OK, we get it: Your new album, No Line on the Horizon, is coming out in a month, and it’s "the best thing you’ve ever done," blah, blah, blah. Allow me to remind you that we’re not morons, and that we realize you would make the claim that your new album is your best ever whether you believed it or not. You know your last album, the one about the Atomic Bomb? You also claimed that was your best work, remember? Guess what? It wasn’t. Not even close.

Your new single, "Get On Your Boots," makes us nervous, mainly because it’s completely unremarkable. It sounds like "Vertigo" (as in, almost exactly like "Vertigo"), except the chorus is worse (if possible). So far, no good.

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But I will admit this much: Bono, your voice has been sounding really good lately. After hearing your last two albums I wanted to write the band and beg them to let you sing in a range with notes you could actually hit. But lately you’ve been sounding pretty comfortable in that upper register, which gives us hope.

So please, don’t embarrass us. No more songs about moles digging in holes or monkeys stealing honey. No more lines about New York being hot as a hair dryer or people in Ireland tearing down trees and using them on their enemies (what does that even mean?).

Take us back to the experimental vibe of the ‘90s. Give us fat grooves and filthy, give us sensuality, give us a bit more tenebras and a bit less lux. Give us more songs like "Acrobat."

We’re counting on you, lads. The reviews have all been positive, but you’ll have to forgive us for keeping our enthusiasm to a minimum. We don’t want an album that we have to convince ourselves to like because it’s by U2. The Joshua Tree wasn’t brilliant because you made it, it was brilliant regardless. We didn’t have to force ourselves to like Achtung Baby, it was a masterpiece in its own right. So all we’re asking with No Line on the Horizon is that you don’t put us in the awkward position of having to keep re-convincing ourselves that you’re the best band in the world.

You are. So please—prove it to us again, just once more....