This came out in 2004 – or at least that’s when I got it. Here’s what I said about it back then (with some minor editing):
There are, it seems, two kinds of U2 fans.
On the one hand, there are those who prefer the band’s earthy, earnest and emotional arena-rock. On the other hand, there are those who favour their esoteric, ethereal experiments. Which is to say: No matter what kind of an album Bono and co. make, somebody always seems to end up bummed.
To their credit, though, U2 are good enough to give each side a decade to call their own. The rockers got to lay claim to the ’80s, when Bono lit The Unfogettable Fire and waved the white flag for Sunday Bloody Sunday. The avant guardians had their way for the ’90s, when the boys played dressup and went from iconic to ironic with Achtung Baby and Pop. With the coming of 2000, the tide expectedly returned to the heartfelt simplicity and no-frills rock of All That You Can’t Leave Behind. And if you think U2 are going to leave all that behind one album later, you haven’t been paying attention.
If their last album was the sound of a band rediscovering their roots and reconnecting with their past, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, their 11th studio release, is the sound of a band staying the course. For the 11 songs on this 39-minute disc, they stuck to the game plan that worked so well four years ago: Never mind all the bells and whistles, just crank it up, belt out the chorus and get on with it. The Edge’s chiming arpeggios and scritchy licks; the rhythm section’s solidly unfussy grooves; Bono’s soaring vocals and philosophical odes to love and hope and birth and death and war and peace — it’s all straight out of the U2 101 textbook. Just dust off the white flag, assemble the heart-shaped stage and Bono’s ready for the stadium tour.
But of course, that’s also the biggest problem with How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb. To some debreet, it’s U2 by the numbers — safe, familiar, predictable and, ultimately, somewhat uninspired and uninspiring. Naturally, there are standout tracks — the clanging opening rocker Vertigo, the murky neo-blues of Love and Peace or Else, the fuzzy blast of All Because of You, the midtempo swirl of Sometimes You Can’t Make it on Your Own (which Bono sang at his father’s funeral) and the low-wattage One Step Closer (also inspired by his dad’s death). But even these cuts don’t have quite the same spark, the same punch, the same sense of wide-eyed exhilaration and rejuvenation as, say, Elevation, Stuck in a Moment You Can’t Get Out Of, Beautiful Day and Walk On. The fact that a few of the titles are so similar-sounding doesn’t help dispel that feeling of musical deja vu.
Don’t misunderstand. I am not trying to suggest that How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb isn’t a good album. It is. At times, it’s very good. But it doesn’t feel like it’s necessarily going to go down in history as a truly great U2 album. No matter what kind of a fan you are.
