U2 bassist Adam Clayton shed light on the group's new album, Songs Of Surrender, which is set for release on St. Patrick's Day, March 17th. He touched on the impetus for the 40-track collection, which is a companion piece to frontman Bono's memoir Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story, telling Mojo: "It was very much a Bono and Edge project. It started out being, 'How could we do something that mirrored the chapters in Bono’s book?' The songs had to show some sort of perspective and development. So, something that may have been maybe better conceived as 15 or 20 songs started to mushroom into these 40 tunes."
Clayton said that U2's scrapped album — Songs Of Ascent — has been totally pushed aside for a raucous new vibrant collection: "We are turning the amps on. I certainly think the rock that we all grew up with as 16 and 17-year-olds, that rawness of those Patti Smith, Iggy Pop records. . . that kind of power is something we would love to connect back into."
Despite the enormity of U2's concerts, The Edge told us a while back that part of the key to the band's success as a live band is that it never allows itself to become too polished: ["It's ultimately, to steal a phrase or to re-coin a phrase, you can take the guys out of the garage, but you can't ever take the garage out of the guys. And I think we still have a little bit of that in us."] SOUNDCUE (:15 OC: . . . that in us)