When manager Paul McGuinness took on U2 in 1978 he said, quoting F Scott Fitzgerald, that their 18-year-old frontman saw “the whole equation”. Incapable of meeting punk’s standards of cool, the young Dubliners found improbable success by going too far and being too much. That impulse produced fabulous coups, from their performance at Live Aid in 1985 to their reinvention of stadium rock with Zoo TV – as well as memorable disasters, notably the decision to deposit 2014’s Songs of Innocence into every iTunes account in the world. As Bono writes in this, his first memoir: “Our best work is never too far from our worst.”
The same goes for his extracurricular activities. Nobody has done more to expand the parameters of rock stardom, often in contentious ways. If any song title sums him up, then it’s Tryin’ to Throw Your Arms Around the World, from 1991’s Achtung Baby. Bono wants to go everywhere, meet everyone, learn everything and somehow pull it all together. His failures are therefore more interesting than most people’s successes.
