In the 1988 documentary Rattle and Hum, B.B. King chats with Bono, then 27. The bluesman reflects on his station in life: “[People] say, ‘There he is, a 62-year-old — and what is he trying to do?’”
It’s a question that U2‘s members may have asked themselves as they worked on Carnaval de Luz, their 16th full-length and first album of original music in nearly a decade. They were teens when the group formed in Dublin half a century ago, in their thirties when their art-damaged rock started to “fuck up the mainstream,” middle-aged when they reinvented themselves with “Beautiful Day,” and old enough to know better when they brute-forced Songs of Innocence onto your iPhone. Their resume boasts multiplatinum Number One hits, instant sellout tours, and household-name status. But now, here they are, sixtysomething years old — and what are they trying to do?
U2 show they’re nowhere close to a finish line on Carnaval de Luz, whose central theme seems to be “it’s not too late”: It’s not too late to party (“Go [Carnaval de Luz]”), not too late to find God (“Midnight Sunshine”), not too late for empathy (“Torn”), not too late to save a relationship (“If the World Is at War We Better Not Be”), not too late to save the world (“Street of Dreams”), and just plain not too late (“Can’t Stop Us Now”).
Each song is tight and punchy, memorable and melodic. The music is the opposite of the blues, as well as U2’s legend-making hits; it’s big, bright pop music with more silver linings than clouds and only a few minor keys. As always, U2 work best when they’re not trying too hard. The songs on Carnaval never recall “Pride (in the Name of Love),” or “One,” or “Stuck in a Moment,” but they do sound like U2 every time Bono opens his mouth and croons something profound (“Nobody is alone but nobody knows that,” on “La Reina”) as much as when he belts something a little corny (“Sing-a-ling the reggaeton,” also on “La Reina”). They sound like U2 whenever the Edge‘s guitar echoes and chimes (“Street of Dreams,” the intro to “The Mirror Maker [Rosalía]”), when Adam Clayton‘s bass stabs and undulates (“La Reina”), and when Larry Mullen Jr. plays a propulsive, march-like rhythm (“Can’t Stop Us Now”) — affectations that come to them naturally.
Carnaval’s best song, “The Greatest Show on Earth,” does resemble The Joshua Tree’s big singles, thanks to an ambient soundscape assisted by that album’s producer, Brian Eno. But it also fits in with the lean, hook-focused essence of the rest of the LP, produced by Jacknife Lee. The band’s last collection of originals, 2017’s Songs of Experience, suffered from a bit too much experience — nine credited producers — and the songs went in too many directions. This time, they kept the production relatively simple and achieved a cohesive feel.
They seem refreshed. Carnaval de Luz is an ambitious endeavor, connecting the previously released EPs Days of Ash and Easter Lily into a conceptual arc. Carnaval, at least the way they spell it, is Brazil’s colorful festival preceding Lent (which good Catholic boys like U2 know means Ash Wednesday, a day of ash) and, later, Easter.
Days of Ash featured the punk rocker “American Obituary,” mourning the death of Renée Good at the hands of an ICE agent, and the powerful, Roy Orbison-like “The Tears of Things,” which obliquely addresses the divide between Gaza and Israel. Easter Lily, the better of the two EPs, featured “Song for Hal,” a classic-sounding U2 song about never feeling alone (“You are not alone when you close your eyes,” sings the Edge) and “In a Life,” which features more traditional U2 drama and sparkling guitar. The final song, “Coexist,” ends with the opening analog-synth notes of Carnaval, starting the cycle over again.
When taken as a whole — and a deluxe edition of Carnaval de Luz does pair the LP with the EPs — the songs present an alternative argument to pop-culture doomsaying, since, as always, U2’s central message is preaching peace, hope, and love. And, well, the music is fun. Right from the word “Go,” the upbeat dance song that kicks off Carnaval, they fuse Nile Rodgers–style disco guitar, Suicide-inspired keys, and hooks galore into a dance-rock anthem with lyrics about how they “came to find other people who feel like this.” Best yet, the song runs under three minutes.
“La Reina” and “Street of Dreams” borrow the spirit of Latin pop without becoming Latin pop (though there is a little hip-hop on “Street of Dreams”), and Bono still aspires to transmit universal truths like “Everyone is on their own, everybody knows that” on the former and “Don’t you give up, and your dreams won’t give up on you” on the latter. On “The Mirror Maker (Rosalía),” Bono may be drawing inspiration from Rosalía, but the Edge is thinking of Pete Townshend as he strums big wind-milling chords on acoustic and electric guitars.
The album’s best songs come toward the end, and they’re anything but quiet. The intro the Edge plays on “The Greatest Show on Earth” begins like a Joshua Tree single but then the guitar echoes shift out of phase, similar to Refused’s “The Shape of Punk to Come,” perhaps to show they’re in a new era. Then they settle into a gentle rumination on love, aging, and God. “Is this a church of love or fear?” Bono sings. “Have we made God feel like a stranger here?” Meanwhile, he repeats words for extra hooky oomph on the Martin Garrix co-produced “Glorify,” singing, “They’re looking for you to glorify, glorify.” And “Midnight Sunshine” feels like it could be both a sex jam and an end-of-the-world party song, since Bono’s lyrics — “In the dark, we discover midnight sunshine” — are open to interpretation.
Carnaval ends with “Torn,” a country-ish duet with Dolly Parton in her final recorded vocal, which recalls Johnny Cash’s appearance on the band’s Zooropa. Just like “Sunday Bloody Sunday,” U2’s chronicle of the division wrought by Ireland’s troubles decades earlier, it’s not a “rebel song” but a humanitarian plea. Parton sounds emotional and cracked, and Bono deepens his voice for maximum gravitas as they describe “a family at war.” Neither Parton nor Bono calls out Republicans and Democrats, Catholics and Protestants, or any other ideologically divided people. It’s clear that Parton and U2 just want everyone in the world to try to understand one another on a fundamental level, before it’s too late. That is what U2 are trying to do.
