U2 guitarist The Edge wants to be “the vanguard of this resurgence of guitars”.
The 61-year-old rock legend has revealed he has a lot of “great material waiting” and that he hopes frontman Bono’s LP that he wants to release before ‘Songs of Ascent’, which is a “noisy, uncompromising, unreasonable guitar album”, will be their next project.
Speaking to the latest issue of MOJO magazine, The Edge said of U2’s planned rock album: “Well, I would love that to be the next U2 record! The lockdown was a very creative period for me, just in composing music. I don’t want to jinx ourselves… but there’s a lot of great material waiting. I think the guitar is coming back. I really feel it. And I would like to be part of that.
He continued: “I’d like to be the vanguard of this resurgence of guitars! Don’t get me wrong – talking to people I know who work at Fender [guitar shop], they’re selling more guitars now than they’ve ever sold. But in terms of popular culture, there’s been a drift away from the instrument, it would be fair to say.
“And I think that pendulum is going to start swinging the other direction. Because it’s such an incredibly expressive instrument. The few bands that are using it well, it’s still fresh.
“Doesn’t necessarily have to feel like you’ve heard it all before.”
The ‘With or Without You’ hitmaker was then asked if U2 have to be aware of what’s current in music or if they can set the trends, to which he replied: “We do that as well (laughs). I dunno … To not have any ear for what’s relevant within the culture is just being out of touch. You can do stuff that’s completely against the grain, but you still want to know where the grain is. I think about it in terms of the flow of a river – if you’re not in the flow, you’re part of an oxbow lake.
“And I want to be part of the flow.”