“How to Dismantle” at 20 Announced

Original Story by Aaron J. Sams (2024-09-28)

We’ve had a busy week with the news of How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb finally being launched. We first told you about the release in July, and have been building our discography entries since that time. But there has been a lot to catch up on since the official announcement. Below we’ll include a few notes on the release, some useful links here at U2Songs to find more information on what we’ve been updating, and a bit of a discussion about what is on that demos album.

The album itself is remastered, and will be released on November 22. The standalone album will include a bonus track on all copies. “Fast Cars” will be a part of the album going forward. The album by itself is available in a number of formats:

  • 12-Inch vinyl in black vinyl (double LP in gatefold sleeve)
  • 12-Inch vinyl in black and red ‘Ink Spot’ vinyl (double LP, gatefold sleeve)
  • 5-Inch CD
  • 5-Inch SHM-CD (Japan Exclusive)
  • Cassette in black and red

The ‘ink spot’ vinyl and the cassette are available exclusively online it appears via Universal records storefronts as well as at U2.com. They are both described as limited, but in this case limited usually means they will only press items once, and when they sell out they won’t be repressed in that format. It does not give any indication of total numbers produced. But if you are looking for either it appears you must order them direct.

The digital release on November 22 will include an album of ten ‘demo’ tracks which the band are calling How to Re-Assemble An Atomic Bomb. You can preorder the digital album now on some services and get the first two demo tracks right away. (They are also released as a 2-track digital single.) On November 29, for Record Store Day’s Black Friday event, How to Re-Assemble an Atomic Bomb will be released as a standalone vinyl. It will be in black and red vinyl for that pressing. (In the box set, it’s black vinyl.) Also that day, November 29, How to Re-Assemble an Atomic Bomb will be released separately on digital services and streaming.

There are three versions of the box set. These are being released on November 22.

  • 12-Inch vinyl (Contains 8 LPs in black vinyl)
  • 5-Inch CD (Contains 5 CDs)
  • 5-Inch SHM-CD (Contains 5 SHM-CDs, Japan Exclusive)

The box set contains the same contents in each case. The album including “Fast Cars”, the How to Re-Assemble An Atomic Bomb demos album, a set of remixes, and the audio from U2’s 2005 concert in Chicago, availble in audio format for the first time and newly remastered for this set. At this point no digital release of the live material or the remixes has been announced, so for now these box sets are the only locations to find information about these.

We do track release information such as catalog numbers, UPC information, track listings, etc. in our discography. We’ve got those entries up to date at this point, but will be continuing to update throughout the weekend.

If you click on the track titles in our discography entries you will see additional information about the songs including lyrics where available, and perhaps a few early peeks at those as well.

Down in our videos section we’ve also added in entries for the two new lyric videos:

These need a bit of work yet, and like other things, we are catching up on images over the next few hours.

The demos disc has been providing a lot of discussion. The songs here are sometimes under alternate names to what we have been used to calling them in the past, others include fragments of other songs that are familiar. “Country Mile” for instance appears to include some early DNA from “Yahweh” and also includes bits of “Boy Falls from the Sky” which was later used for Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. The piece of music at the end of the trailer was later used for “Spider-Man” as well and can be heard in “Pull the Trigger” on that soundtrack.

“Picture of You (X+W)” is a version of the song we know as “Xanax and Wine”, but this is not the same recording as before edited down. There are alternate lyrics present, and it is arranged differently. “Luckiest Man in the World” is a newly updated version of “Mercy”, a song that leaked in 2004, and has long been a fan favourite. New parts were recorded recently to ‘finish’ the song, which has resulted in a few lyric changes (not many) and a new title. The original was 6:31 in length, the new is about 20 seconds shorter as well. Steve Lillywhite has told a fan that “Mercy” is on the album under a new title and “it’s the same version just finished lyrics.” (Thanks Ross!) The lyrics from “Mercy” are also popping up in “Happiness” so we are interested to hear how that incorporates “Mercy”.

A few of the songs we’ve known about for some time. “I Don’t Wanna See You Smile” appears to be the song we’ve called “Smile” all these years. Whether it has been changed at all beyond remastering remains to be seen. Likewise “All Because of You 2” is likely the alternate version of the song that was released in “The Complete U2” back in 2004. “Are You Gonna Wait Forever?” was the original B-Side to “Vertigo” and runs within a couple of seconds of the original run time, but there may be additional changes, as it is subtited “Re-Assemble Edition” on some digital services. “Theme from ‘The Batman’” is Edge’s mostly instrumental theme to the 2004 cartoon The Batman which ran for a number of seasons. The Edge’s work was used for the first two seasons. This is a longer version that what has been released before via the show and that alone makes it unique.

Two other new songs appear on the demo compilation. “Evidence of Life” promises to be interesting with Bono on keyboards and The Edge on additional drums. Like “Luckiest Man in the World” there have been some more recent updates done to that song more recently. “Treason” is a song that Bono started working on with David Stewart of the Eurythmics, and at one point the two worked with Dr. Dre, and they recorded with the Gateway Ambassador singers, a group of musicians from Ghana. “American Prayer” was also born out of those sessions. Bono took the song, “Treason” back to U2 and continued to work on it. And it’s now part of this album of demos. The choir is still present in the song, as is Dave Stewart. He plays guitar on the track and co-produces. Dr. Dre does not make an appearance.

You can hear bits of “Country Mile”, “Happiness”, and “Luckiest Man in the World” in the trailer for the album.

Pre-ordering of the album is open now, although not all stores have the full listings up. (Amazon for instance appears to just have partial listings in many countries, none at all in some areas, and full listings in others.)

As more information arrives, we’ll be updating our discography entries, which are linked above. To date we have managed to track down most of the formats, with catalog information, track timing, lyrics and more. A few things need to be updated, we’ve been adding by the hour, and trying to clear up any questions along the way.

< Next News Entry | Previous News Entry >

u2songs.com was formerly known as u2wanderer.org. Follow us on Twitter | Facebook