That’s where his expertise is, so those top-line ideas can be for his melodies. With the music, I know Bono’s really a top-line specialist. I’ll throw lines in and help steer him through a logjam of lyric writing. What’s the best in the room?ĪS: Working within that structure, what are some of the compromises you face when it comes to lyrics?Įdge: We tend to give Bono free rein with the lyrics because he’s got to sing it. It becomes about what’s the best idea in the room, and that can come from the others, or by changing the way that they’re playing the songs or Bono will throw ideas at me all the time, which I incorporate. I’m always open to a better idea, and I think that’s the key to our process, that we sort of take personal ego out of it. I’m really trying to develop close-to-finished song ideas, if not lyrically, certainly, musically, so that we’ve got something very clear to start with. Sometimes we get some really cool beginnings that way, but these days, it tends to be beginnings that I generate and bring to the others, either close to complete, or in some some cases very rough, like just a starting point. And sometimes it might be just a guitar part or a chord progression that is particularly intriguing. Sometimes I’ll start with a drum beat, and I’ll just build it up where I’ve got a very clear intention for a certain kind of outcome. The Edge: There are so many ways that we write songs. How has the band’s collective songwriting “system” shifted over time? An ode to “Britain’s greatest motorway”, M5 is typical of the bands output, and whilst it is geographically confused (the M5 goes nowhere near Aldershot) it’s hymning of mundanity and naff-ness is both slightly condescending and endearing.The Edge recently chatted with American Songwriter about producing Songs of Surrender, the band’s history of song originating in melody and emotion before lyrics, how “Bongolese” often helps the band finish a track, and some of the “gifts” they’ve received over time.Īmerican Songwriter: At the beginning of U2, everything was more jam-based and improvisational. M5 was an early single that never made is way onto their debut album (it’s the lead track on 2019 EP Keep Walking!) and seeks to upend that tradition were American places and roads sound great in songs, but British locations don’t somehow have the same romance and resonance (see also Billy Braggs A13, Trunk Road To The Sea). Live, their shows are a seething cauldron of energy and mayhem, good-natured but always somehow teetering on the brink. They have cultivated an obsessive following with their fans, sharing a WhatsApp group with their more dedicated fans, and have been putting on annual bus trips to Margate for a celebratory day of like-minded music. ![]() ![]() But their sound is an abrasive, energetic version of indie – a rough punk / post-punk sound, all 3-minute bursts of energy that don’t overstay their welcome. The six-piece formed whilst at university in Cambridge, and in their songs have a tendency towards the minutiae of life in middle England (fishing, flip phones, Weatherspoons, M5). If you haven’t come across them yet, Sports Team are at once a throw back, a contemporary sensation, and a contradiction. Well certainly a more raucous, rambunctious and abrasive sound than the last couple of posts. And now for something completely different.
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