While the merit of things done in the name of social justice are debated elsewhere on rednoW, allow us to point towards another example of it. Dark Was The Night is a two disc compilation that boasts a jaw dropping list of contributors [see below]. Compiled by RedHot, an international organization dedicated to fighting AIDS through pop culture, DWTN is brimming with great sounds. What is so captivating about DWTN is the overall tone and quality of the album(s). The  vibe of introspection, pain and hope is consistent through out the entire compilatioin. What makes this more than just an AIDS fundraiser is the sense that this music was truly affected by the cause for which is was created. The reality of the AIDS pandemic around our globe is infused in the sounds of DWTN. Those infected affected the art profoundly.

Every time U2 releases a new album, the rumors begin of it being another "throw-back" Joshua Tree. Fortunately, No Line of the Horizon continues the tradition of squashing such rumors.  Sure, don't get me wrong, The Joshua Tree was one of the more redeeming aspects of 80's music scene, but who wants to follow a band that continually remakes the same album?  Here is where U2 earns their bigger-than-their-own-ego status.  Whether it is the distorted sounds of Achtung Baby!, the experimental project of Passengers, or the identity crisis of Pop, U2 has continually pushed their own creative bounds.    No Line for the Horizon is no different.   With their unique play on post-Irish punk, songs such as Magnificent, Unknown Caller, and Breathe only suggest that U2's progressive nature has yet to reach its conclusion.

What happened to the pissed-off punksters from Dublin who were writing songs with titles like "I Threw a Brick Through a Window," "Sunday Bloody Sunday" and "Bullet in a Blue Sky"? U2's latest album seems to carry with it a sense of (rocking) freedom. The rage of the past seems to have been spit out and burned up and with it has come lines like:

"Every day I have to find the courage to walk out into the street with arms out. Got a love you can't defeat. Neither down or out, there's nothing you have that I need, I can breathe. Breathe now." 

Bono admits the fear and defeat of the world exists, but screams that it doesn't have anything that he needs, now he can breathe.

Bono used to be the subject. "I still haven't found what I'm looking for." But for the track "Moment of surrender" from U2's newly released album, No Line on the Horizon, Bono flips that around, singing "It's not if I believe in love, if love believes in me." Before the "I" was the subject, but now "love" is the subject (here's a link if you need to brush on your grammar). The rest of the song seems to be getting at some watershed moment in the life of the speaker (I'm not sure how autobiographical this is, though most of Bono's song lean heavily that way), though what that exact moment is or how it comes about isn't exactly clear. But this much seems to be clear, Bono (who maybe speaking for the rest of the band as well) seems to have given up control, apparently to something represented by, or like, "love."