U2’s Ordinary Love was major contributor to band’s album delay

The Guardian by Sean Michaels (2014-02-13)

‘We were on a roll – it was clear where we were going. And a decision was made to abandon ship, more or less, to focus on this,’ says the band’s Larry Mullen Jr

U2’s song for the Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom soundtrack reportedly set back the band’s whole album process, forcing the group to “abandon ship” on their follow-up to No Line on the Horizon. Though it is now nominated for an Oscar, Ordinary Love may have been a contributor to U2’s album delay from December 2013 to summer 2014.

“[The Mandela song] was the one project you just couldn’t say no to,” U2’s Adam Clayton said in a new interview with the Hollywood Reporter. Still, admitted Larry Mullen Jr, “it was hard to stop what [U2 were] doing”. “We were on a roll – it was clear where we were going. And [yet] a decision was made to abandon ship, more or less, to focus on this.”

U2 had powerful personal connections to South Africa’s anti-apartheid campaign, as well as to Nelson Mandela himself. While there are no regrets to contributing to Justin Chadwick’s movie, the project took time: “They will perfect the song, and deadlines be damned,” recalled film producer Harvey Weinstein.

An end now seems in sight however. “Right now, people are … running as if to a finish line,” Bono said. “[But] the album won’t be ready till it’s ready.” With a wry working title of Insecurity, the record is allegedly a bid to revive the energy of U2’s early punk rock days; drawing inspiration from Joy Division, Kraftwerk and the Ramones. “We don’t want to ever be a heritage act,” Edge explained. “It might happen, but we’ll go kicking and screaming into that mode.”

The Mark Romanek-directed video for U2’s new charity single, Invisible, was released yesterday.

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