U2, the album Carnaval De Luz: Punk inspiration to make the midnight sun shine

It's a transition album. Without transubstantiation but still transitional, with its own sacredness, with roots in that Ireland where, as Bono says, "Carnival has never involved a true celebration of meat, on the contrary it has taken on the characteristics of renunciation: in the northern area of ​​Dublin the big Carnival evening was reduced to a couple of pancakes while in southern Europe or South America Carnival is something completely different". Carnaval de Luz is U2's new album and it is an immersive and seductive project, with songs such as Glorify that insert a powerful message into a ballad: "People protest against the lies, we are brother and sister, we are made for each other... and if the heavens fall, darling don't we all fall? But let your heart be full and wait for the miracle". In the end this Carneval de Luz is a luminescent album, an album that conveys a sense of community: "We are very interested in ritual gatherings and their importance - says The Edge - for us music festivals represent that type of gatherings. People come together sharing the same ideas, they are looking for a community, for something that can act as a tool of transformation: it becomes a way to reflect on one's own direction and on what is happening in the world. So, although at first glance it may seem that the participants only want letting go and having fun, in reality there is much more: it is something important, truly fundamental. It is an aspect that we also recognize for ourselves." Compared to the previous works in Carnaval de Luz the Punk influences are clearer, all the members of the band have gone through that movement (Bono recalled having seen both the Clash and the Ramones live when he was a teenager), which turns fifty in 2026, explaining that that experience gave him the idea that if there had been a good idea they would have made it. And what did U2 do? Having understood that the original idea consisted of avoiding the most obvious chord sequences, notes and themes, focusing instead on an impactful aesthetic, they created one of the greatest bands ever "but the surprising thing - says Bono with a smile - is that we, in all of this, really believed in it".

CARNAVAL DE LUZ IS THE SON OF SPONTANEITY

Carnaval de Luz is undoubtedly a complex album that does not betray a healthy spontaneity: songs such as Mirror Maker (Rosalía) and Silencio convey the sensation of having been recorded live and in fact the band shared the same room letting themselves be guided by inspiration, wherever it led. The spontaneity, the genuineness of the songs can be felt from the fact that the studio, and The Edge has underlined this several times, that U2 had fun in the studio: "The band was always present in the crucial moments, but we never rigidly imposed ourselves to follow a single recording method. We let the songs suggest the path to take", adds The Edge. A powerful song, among others, is Superficiality which revolves around the concept of freedom, which is a very human sensation but which it is also possible that it has never been known in this infamous and warmongering world. There is a beautiful phrase, in Midnight Sunshine, which in my opinion contains the essence of this album and it is "it's time to take shelter, in a bunker or in bed, because in the night we discover the midnight sun": isn't this a message of hope? Isn't it the white dove of peace that flies from Dublin over our consciences to pacify them? Nothing and Nobody Can't Stop Us Now...nothing and no one can stop us now.

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