Ranking the Reassemble

Mason Merritt goes deep on what works - and what doesn’t - on the new shadow album.

Hey everyone, it’s good to be talking about U2’s music again, isn’t it? For my first guest post on this fabulous substack, I’m taking a look at “How to Re-Assemble an Atomic Bomb”, the band's latest collection of B-sides, outtakes, and reimaginings, stacking them against each other lowest to highest and seeing what comes out on top.

10. Are You Gonna Wait Forever?

When ranking the songs on most U2 albums, I have a least-favorite song because I “have” to have one, not because whatever it might be is not a good song.

This is not one of those times.

“Are You Gonna Wait Forever?” is a tune that dates back to the “Vertigo” single, where it appeared as a B-side, and both then and now, it’s one that has never really stuck with me. I don’t think the melody is particularly strong, its tempo is a bit sluggish, and it lacks that spark that says “this is a song that only U2 could write.” To that point, in interviews over the years the band has discussed getting a song or even an entire album finished only to take a step back and realize that there’s no magic to it, and starting again. I suspect this was one such tune that just was not ‘started again.’

9. All Because of You 2

I can’t help but wonder if there was some other never-before-heard song in the running for this shadow album that was left off the track list because the pun of ‘You 2’ was just too irresistible. Either way, this is an excellent, rocking tune that stands out because of how much looser and more playful it is compared to its album counterpart. It scores points with me because of that, but less than others for the simple reason that it doesn’t set itself apart enough from its twin.

8. Happiness

In what is the band’s first acknowledgment of the “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark” musical in at least a decade, we now have “Happiness” out in the world, the musical ancestor to “Pull the Trigger” from that beautiful disaster. This has a nice groove overall, but what makes it stand out is the absolutely insane solo by Edge at the end. It has to rank as one of the most Guitar Hero-y moments of his career, really putting that wah-wah to work.

I’ll also take a moment to talk about a pet peeve that runs through much of this album. To avoid repeating myself I’ll just address it once here. Bono does this weird thing where he stretches out a phrase waaaaay too far over the music - as in “happiness is for those who don’t really need it” (an incredibly silly line by the way). It’s as if he’s stretching a king-sized fitted sheet over a queen-sized bed. There’s just too much loose fabric to get caught up in. That’s a nitpick though, and that choice in particular is made up for by this song’s brilliant callback to “Drowning Man.”

7. Luckiest Man in The World

To talk about “Luckiest Man” is to talk about “Mercy,” so let’s just start with the latter. If that original song were released as-is, “Mercy” would probably rank as a top 10 or 15 song in the U2 catalog for me. The backing track is absolutely ethereal, and while the lyrics aren’t as coherent as they could be, lines like “love will come again” and “love’s got to be with the weak/only then love gets a chance to speak.”

Melodically, “Mercy” is some of the best work the band has ever come up with, and on the instrumentation side of things, Edge’s synth/guitar layering is perfection, Adam’s bass has never thumped harder, and Larry guides it all to one of the most satisfying crescendos of U2’s entire discography. For whatever reason, the band left it off of Bomb in 2004, only to briefly revive it for the No Line follow-up that never was, then again as one of many approaches they took to crack “The Little Things That Give You Away.”

Now it’s back and called “Luckiest Man in The World.” I’m sure I’ll make my peace with this song someday, but for now it really, really bugs me, despite many moments of musical transcendence. I don’t love the lyrical changes, especially the clumsy weaving in of new vocals with the old. The melody of the fitted-sheet chorus in particular is a bit all over the place, and the listening experience of the song as a whole is disjointed. The moments where this feels like “Mercy” very much outweigh the “Luckiest Man” parts.

With all that said, I’ve come up with two explanations for why this transformation occurs. One reason could be the band’s general M.O. of not knowing when to leave well enough alone. For evidence of this, re-familiarize yourselves with the story of recording “Moment of Surrender,” specifically a reaction they had after God did a dead-sprint through the room, left, brought back his motorcycle and did wheelies around Larry’s drum kit, and they still wanted to trim a verse.

Another reason could be found in the lyrics. I’ll spare too deep of a dive, but when putting the lyrics to both versions side-by-side, it appears that in “Mercy,” Bono was singing to his wife and perhaps his children; in “Luckiest Man,” I think he’s singing more about his father. Perhaps Bono realized in the process of putting this shadow album together in 2024 that the lyrics should better reflect the theme of the original album as it was being made in 2004: the feeling of being a father when you’re no longer a son. That would certainly explain the repeated references to death (“relics of your love,” “you were the luckiest man in the world”), and occasional shifting of perspectives. “Mercy” has had one of the most fascinating journeys a song of theirs has ever taken, and despite my issues with this newest version I’m still (somewhat) glad we’ve got it.

6. I Don’t Wanna See You Smile

In an early draft of this list, this song actually ranked at #9, but the more I’ve listened to it, the more I appreciate the subtleties at play. There’s a “Beautiful Day”-esque feeling of bittersweet melancholy mixed with reckless optimism to this tune that I really appreciate, especially given how tough those feelings can be to get across in a song. They’re feelings that are beautifully conveyed in Edge’s spongey guitar, which refreshingly takes a softer tone compared to the ruggedness of much of the rest of the album.

5. Picture of You (X+W)

This is another one that’s been around for a long time. Whether it’s called “Fast Cars,” “Xanax and Wine,” or “Picture of You,” this is just a killer song, and the changes in this from “Xanax and Wine” are subtle but still effective. I also appreciate having this harder-edged option stand in nice contrast to the looser and more jumpy “Fast Cars,” which has finally found a home in the Atomic Bomb project with this release.

4. Theme from The Batman

In one of the many moments of U2 playing a role in my life before I knew of their existence, The Batman was a cartoon I watched obsessively growing up. Even then I remember thinking to myself that this was an extremely cool theme song, especially in the context of its predecessor. One day I might put together a list of my favorite guitar tones Edge has ever constructed, and if I do, I expect this one will rate extremely high due to his obsession with matching the guitar tone to the mood or tone that a given song is trying to convey. His tone in “The Batman” is particularly clever because it evokes the echolocation that a bat uses to see, a choice that could have easily been corny, which Edge steered to cool. Walking that tightrope is why he is one of the best to ever do it.

3. Evidence of Life

Recency bias/shiny new toy syndrome is certainly at play in this list, but I really can’t help it. These new songs just rip. “Evidence of Life” in particular is an Edge masterclass. It seems that when left to his own devices, his musical instincts go in a slightly darker and more aggressive direction than one would expect from the mastermind of the U2 sound. In fact, I had every expectation after reading the lyrics to this song a few weeks ago that it would be a soft, electric piano-lead piece, so imagine my surprise when I queued it up to find he’d taken a page from the Jack White playbook. Had he ever gone solo, I have no doubt our favorite electrical alchemist would have pulled a McCartney/Prince and come up with 10 awesome songs and performed them all on his own as he did here.

2. Country Mile

Sweetness and sincerity are hard feelings to convey in a song, which makes me all the more impressed by “Country Mile.” As soon as I queued this song up, it immediately lifted my spirit and put a smile on my face. A major chord and an airy “I believe you” vocal from Edge will do that to you. While there are moments of melancholy in this song - “Open up your darkest forest/And leave me where I can't be honest” - I love that it all comes back to faith. It doesn’t matter if the faith this song deals in is romantic or spiritual; it’s about a declaration of believing in something beyond your grasp.

“I'm gonna get there/But not unless you help me.”

You will, and I will, U2.

1. Treason

If you put on this album for the first time and don’t immediately run back “Treason” for another go, I would love to know why. Please comment if this was the case, or if you think this isn’t a very good song or even a bad one, because on first listen “Treason” absolutely floored me. It’s one of those rare U2 songs, like “The Crystal Ballroom” and “Moment of Surrender,” that don't really sound like U2 songs, but at the same time are only songs that U2 could write.

On first listen I was vibing hard with the rolling reggae beat of “Treason” and its yearningly melodic chorus, but then three minutes in, Larry and Adam joined the party and brought a rapping Edge with them, which shot this tune into the stratosphere as one of the band’s most creatively inspired pieces in decades. I suspect the reason for this not being on the original album in ‘04 is they thought it was too close to “Love and Peace or Else.”

If that isn’t the case, then I believe we are all owed a signed letter of apology from everyone involved in the decision.

Do you agree? Let us know in the comments!

©Merritt/U2 and Us, 2024