U2 Achtung Baby: An Exploration of Meaning (ENG 344)

Achtung Baby album art © U2/Island Records

U2’s Achtung Baby: An Exploration of Meaning

U2’s album Achtung Baby, the band’s seventh album, emerged from post-Cold War Europe, recorded both in Berlin and Dublin. The effort to create the album nearly caused the band to break up and was marked by “crisis, chaos, and equivocality,” yet remains recognized as possibly their most creative work. (Calhoun 1-2) The sounds and themes of the songs that make up the album are diverse, and their arrangement pulls the listener’s emotions in a sine wave from high energy peak, through a solemn, melancholy trough, before pushing back up and leveling off in denouement. The album weaves around themes of excitement, love, loss, defiance, and surrender. Stephen Cantanzarite’s 33 1/3 Achtung Baby uses the album’s arc as a metaphor for the Fall of man and overlays the struggles of Adam and Eve cast into the sinful world of man as they attempt to fill the hole of their loss after they are cast out of paradise. This essay riffs off of Catanzarite’s metaphor and instead explores the feelings and emotions triggered by the album during the course of a man’s daily dog walk. It is an exploration on the meaning of an album and where it can take us; the emotional rollercoaster, triggered and propelled by the music, through a journey of love, loss, discovery, hope and reconnection.

Stephen Catanzarite’s exploration of Achtung Baby is an epic interpretation of Adam and Eve’s journey through life after the Fall. Catanzarite casts Adam as the willful, arrogant, and discontent man that relishes his dive into sin and extremity, while Eve is dutiful and loyal and waits for Adam to come around so they can return to their faith and strength in one another—and uses the music to carry the reader through the emotions and struggles of the fallen pair. Catanzarite offers this interpretation of the album:

[the songs] offer an insightful meditation on the Fall and the consequences of our “fallen-ness.” It is all there: Our infinite potential for dreaming, discovering, and building, and the trouble we cause by confusing our liberty with license…the sad acceptance of our brokenness; the excellence of fidelity; the appeal of seduction; the glamour of evil; and the disaster of sin; … the God shaped hole at the center of our being, and our vain attempts to fill it with something, everything, anything other than God. (Catanzarite 3-4)

While Catanzarite’s argument is powerful and deeply rooted in his Catholic beliefs, it remains meaningful and accessible to readers without his faith. This approach reflects U2’s own approach. Bono, the group’s lead singer, replied to a question about religious content of U2s music like this: 

We’ve found different ways of expressing it [our belief], and recognized the power of the media to manipulate such signs. Maybe we just have to sort of draw our fish in the sand. It’s there for people who are interested. It shouldn’t be there for people who aren’t. (qtd. in Galbraith 191)

In this story, our man is just religious enough to acknowledge everyone has the right to their own beliefs. This is an interpretation of how the music works on him, and as a result, perhaps on many of us.

Our man has a routine. He walks his dog every day—sometimes twice a day—for about an hour on a one way loop through the winding streets of his neighborhood. Achtung Baby is just long enough at fifty-five minutes to serve as the soundtrack for one lap. Armed with wireless headphones, dog clipped into an eight-foot leash, our man steps out of his home into the world. The dog is excited and knows the routine as they take a right and cross their first intersection. 

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“Zoo Station,” with its ticking intro and heavy guitar signals the beginning of the stroll. The energy of the song is powerful and upbeat. The man feels the excitement of something new. He loses himself easily in the song, its lyrics proclaim readiness for “what’s next … for the push.” (“Zoo Station”) For him, it feels almost like a fight song. Catanzarite’s Adam and Eve are also at the beginning of something. They, cast out of Paradise, arrive at the “City of Man” by train and while Adam “wants off this God-damned train…[to] get this party started,” Eve is frightened. (8) The song’s energy carries us into the next track, “Even Better Thank the Real Thing.”

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The pulse of “Even Better” carries forward the rush of the first track. The energy built up in “Zoo” is unleashed as Adam finds a thrill in the “carnival of carnivores” in Sin City. (Catanzarite 11). His excitement exemplifies Catanzarite’s proposition that “mankind is unique among animals for our willingness to trade real experiences for artificial ones.” (9) The man and his dog have crossed another street. The lyrics of this song carry him into reflection that diverges from the excitement Adam feels. Instead, in his late forties, he’s been around long enough to realize we’re all carnivores. He reflects on chasing the improbable, missing the point because nothing is good enough, fawning over curated visions of reality, and missing the fulfilling, satisfying opportunities right in front of him because of it. He thinks of how often we delude ourselves into thinking there’s something better just around the corner and how destructive it can be. His reflection becomes melancholy as the first notes of the next song flow into his ears.

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Catanzarite characterizes “One” as an elegy with “melancholia … in the song’s DNA … [the song has] a certain darkness that is built right into its chord structure.” (20) Adam and eve argue at the kitchen table, each pretending to drink coffee, and Adam refusing to accept responsibility for his actions. (Catanzarite 22-23). The song carries them through both reflection and conflict, if not toward resolution or acknowledgement. Our man, now along a straight stretch of road with an open field to his left, falls into a different reverie. He is also struck by melancholy, but his thoughts drift to a divorce after twenty years of marriage, the loss of friendships, the distance between him and his closest friends—in some cases they are separated by continents. He thinks of the failed marriage as a death of sorts and wonders what one does with those memories, spanning decades. Where do you put them? With the lyrics “We get to carry each other: sisters, brothers / One life, but were not the same / We get to carry each other,” he reflects on the power of love and commitment and is both sad and hopeful at once. (“One”) Sad, remorseful for the past, hopeful that the future might offer another shot at happiness. The feeling, like the song, is ambiguous and sad with just a touch of hope that drives into the next song. 

Photo by Gábor Molnár (left) Photo by Cristian Newman (right) on Unsplash

“Until the End of the World” continues the pity party with a slight upbeat twist. The dog walker contemplates the lyrics and their somber disquietude about the end of a relationship and scoffs. He thinks that if the end of a relationship is the end of your world you haven’t lived enough. He recognizes the jaded bitterness in his thoughts but casts the notion aside. To him, such catastrophic imagery brings up different visions. It reminds him of standing each night in a warzone paying tribute to another fallen warrior’s portrait projected on a large screen in an operations center, and how each night the ritual brought home the importance of the work and the terrible youth of the fallen. His mind flashes to a different place and time. He is standing next to a grieving father singing “Amazing Grace” through sobs and tears as he honors his son at his memorial. Our man’s mind flashes again and this time he is standing in a hospital next to the body of that son as the doctor pronounces him dead. His thoughts carry him to the friends he’s lost to war and other tragedies and how he regrets not being there when his squadron burned a piano in a fallen comrade’s honor. He chastises himself for his selfishness as he thinks of ten names; a good friend has to live with a list fifty-six names long. “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses” is a welcome change of tune.

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The theme of “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses” is selfishness. The questions about who is going to do the things for our lost loves that we used to do is not about them, it’s about us. Catanzarite’s Eve confronts Adam, still at the kitchen table: 

“You know what makes you so dangerous?” she asks, breaking the silence. He tenses but does not look up from his plate “What makes you so dangerous,” she continues, “is that you don’t even bother pretending anymore. You know exactly what you are doing to me, exactly what you are doing to yourself, and it just doesn’t matter.” He nods silently and takes another bite. (Catanzarite 40-1)

For our man, still walking, now turning past the post office, “Wild Horses” reminds him of self-pity and delusion. The lyrics describe someone unable to move on, stuck in what used to be and disguising their own loss as questions of concern for their former lover. It’s a lesson everyone has to learn. Love is hard, sometimes cruel. 

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“So Cruel” is a song of suffering and also of understanding—it is a contemplation of love itself. Our man is thinking in the abstract. He listens to the words and “she” becomes love. The feeling, the sensation, the lack of control the lack of “rules” and the helplessness you feel when real love works upon you and you know you are at its mercy. Catanzarite’s Adam feels it as well. He, however, remains in denial. Still struggling, he says “There’s nothing exciting about the way we live, sweetheart. We’re all just using each other, using our bodies to try and forget about just how awful our lives really are. That’s the fact, and everybody knows it.” (Catanzarite 45) Adam is stuck in his anger and disappointment at his circumstance. He hasn’t yet learned his lesson. Our man has learned this one lesson very well and reflects on the experiences by which he earned that knowledge. Thankfully, the energetic guitar sounds of “The Fly” carry him out of those memories.

Photo © the author

The abrupt beginning of “The Fly” is a welcome change. The energy of the song is a dramatic change to the solemn, sad energy of the previous songs. This song is a beating of the chest and a readiness for new things. Catanzarite characterizes it like this: “the song’s sonic landscape is littered with the debris of mankind’s hubris … here is the theme song of our fallen humanity, this ruined beauty.” (53-4) The Fly is “the man who has heard it all, seen it all, done it all, and been through it all, and he has taken it upon himself to tell the world.” (Catanzarite 54).  For our man, the song is an opportunity to regroup. He loves the energy of the song. Its nihilistic lyrics are oddly inspirational. He flashes images of Icarus, falling from the sky and rather than pursuing the sun, he is pursuing love even though it will make him fall. There is euphoria in the pursuit, and he relishes the feeling, the excitement of love. 

Photo © the author

The guitar that begins “Mysterious Ways” robs our dog walker of his momentum. The instruments and lyrics hit him hard and make him think of the woman in his life—the guitar stops him cold much as she did when he saw her. The sound, like her, is something you can’t help but notice. She accepts him despite his failures. She knows him and loves him anyway. She is magnificent, patient, loving, beautiful, and lights up his soul. He is afraid of her power over him and afraid of losing her at the same time. Sometimes he thinks she is too powerful, but he revels in her might over him—he can’t pull away. Catanzarite writes that this song and the next “celebrate the feminine genius—while also expressing mankind’s fear of it.” (58). “Mysterious Ways” and “Tryin’ to Throw Your Arms Around the World” capture the spirit of what it means to be in love with someone and powerless against the feeling. Happy and horrified by the power love has over us. When he thinks about her, our man wants to wrap his arms around her and hold her, to protect her, and to be her strength, but deep inside he knows she has plenty of her own strength and she loves him and humors him. He needs her so much more than she needs him.

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“Ultraviolet (Light my Way)” is “both a prayer and a love letter.” (Catanzarite 76) Adam, realizing his failures and the error of his ways, is struggling back to Eve and falling down along the way. His apology is scrawled on a cocktail napkin jammed into his pocket “like the long-lost relic of some ancient saint.” (Catanzarite 77) Our man thinks about the quiet moments the woman he loves shares with him; how she patiently listens to him with understanding. She gives her perspective, beautiful in its simplicity as it cuts through the anger, biases, and the warlike parts of his nature. She lays it out in vivid simplicity and truth; he is disarmed and understands. He sees his own failings and is grateful for the lesson. She is the embodiment of grace.

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“Acrobat,” shifts tempo and the guitars “play out over a human landscape that is at once comic and tragic, desolate and abundant, Godforsaken and blessed.” (Catanzarite 82) The lyrics and the sounds point to the challenges life throws at us. The song’s lyrics proclaim: 

And I must be an acrobat

To talk like this and act like that

And you can dream, so dream out loud

And don’t let the bastards grind you down (“Acrobat”)

The song is a representation of struggle to do what is right and a reflection on our hypocrisy.  Catanzarite offers that “to dream is to hope, that our only hope is to love, and that to love is to become responsible.” (Catanzarite 83) Adam recognizes his need for redemption. He argues “Show me a church that is not full of bastards and hypocrites like me … and I will gladly join it.” (Catanzarite 82) Yet, he returns to Eve and “collapses in a heap before her, he tells her to be careful—loving him may be hazardous to her health” (Catanzarite 83). Where Adam is prone at Eve’s feet, our man is on the last stretch of his walk. He understands that his control on his life is limited, he recognizes Adam’s struggles, but he knows that he’s made all those mistakes and paid for them. He knows that he has learned hard lessons. He is confident and he is thankful for his failures—they taught him valuable lessons.

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The final track on the album, “Love Is Blindness,” is about surrender and sacrifice. In Catanzarite’s tale, Adam and Eve surrender and return to God to and “experience together all of the anguish and torment they have inflicted upon each other, magnified by the presence of Divine Love that surrounds them.” (Catanzarite 87). They surrender their pride and return to God together, leaving behind the separate struggles that dominate the story that spans the previous elevon songs of Achtung Baby. Our dog walker feels similar emotions, but for other reasons. He surrenders to life. He allows himself to accept that he cannot control everything that happens to him and for him to love completely he must surrender to love and be vulnerable and available. It is a powerful sensation and realization. In the same way that the song ends, a fading, quiet lingering series of sounds, he lets the thought linger as he unlocks the door, unclips the dog’s leash, and resolves to let life and love carry him into the future without a plan or a destination. 

Music has a profound effect on people. “Popular culture is a location of the profoundest significance for where explorations of love, truth, justice, power, and peace are happening.” (Marsh 204) U2’s album is a perfect example of Marsh’s assertion. Achtung Baby is a rollercoaster of emotion and feeling. This album lacks the happy-go-lucky vibe of some popular music. Instead it is a “dark and disturbing album about ruination that is strikingly beautiful and inspired.” (Catanzarite 6). The order in which the songs are presented, combined with the moods of each, create an opportunity for the listener to reflect and consider significant events in their lives. Achtung Baby carries the listener through valleys, over peaks, and on a journey of emotional discovery if they are listening and open to hear the message. The religious undertones common in so much of U2’s work, are also at work on this album. The ever-present love themes that dominate so much modern music and popular culture are handled with sublime effect, at once both subtle and bludgeoning. The album’s meaning will vary for each listener. However, U2’s Achtung Baby is a powerful vehicle for introspection and reflection for those that choose to listen to and to feel what it has to offer. 

Works Cited

Calhoun, Scott D. U2 Above, across, and beyond: Interdisciplinary Assessments. Lexington Books, 2015. ProQuest,ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ewu/detail.action?docID=4694452

Catanzarite, Stephen. 33 1/3 Achtung Baby: Meditations on Love in the Shadow of the Fall. Bloomsbury Academic, 2007.

Galbraith, Deane. “Drawing Our Fish in the Sand: Secret Biblical Allusions in the Music of U2.” Biblical Interpretation, vol. 19, no. 2, 2011, pp. 181–222. EBSCOhost, alliance-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/f/nfvohq/TN_brill_s10_1163_156851511X557352

Marsh, Clive. “One Step Closer: Why U2 Matters to Those Seeking God – By Christian Scharen.” Conversations in Religion & Theology, vol. 5, no. 2, 2007, pp. 202–211. EBSCOhost, alliance-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/permalink/f/nfvohq/TN_wj10.1111/j.1479-2214.2007.00119.x

U2. Achtung Baby, Island Records, 1991.