"Beautiful Day" -- already a radio hit -- opens the album with heady optimism. It's as if the dawning of the new millennium has inspired the band to take a fresh morning outlook after the storminess of the 20th century and all its ills: "See the bird with a leaf in her mouth / After the flood all the colours come out," sings Bono. Indeed, anyone familiar with Bono's current Jubilee 2000 cause célèbre -- to relieve Third World nations of their debts so they can start fresh and presumably feed their people -- will hear the hopefulness of this song in that light.

It's also comforting to hear The Edge again: He has returned to his patented staccato guitar squalls, accentuating the songs here, driving them there, always tastefully. Likewise, a handful of other songs prove irresistible after about the third listen: "Wild Honey" is a lissome, breezy love song that recalls the naïve sweetness of early Van Morrison à la "Brown-Eyed Girl"; "In a Little While" uses a slinky R&B groove to build its soulful choruses; and "Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of" is a transformed southern-gospel spiritual, including implied choir, in which Bono wears his let-me-lift-you-up hat for anyone feeling down and out or powerless. It's advice, both for proactive action -- "You gotta stand up straight, carry your own weight / These tears are going nowhere" -- and for patience: "This time will pass."

On the other hand, Bono oversteps into preachiness on "Peace on Earth," a heavy-handed hymn. In fact, too often here he paints with overly broad strokes, as he did in his earlier idealistic days. He wants to change the world, which is admirable, but by overwriting, he removes the opportunity for the listener to go there with him. One of the great joys of Achtung Baby was the lyrics' combination of intimate detail and open-endedness. They evoked elusive moments of sadness and tragedy, and thus allowed the listener to enter into the experience, to adopt it in his or her own ways. But Bono rights himself just enough through most of these songs. Instead of using irony to cloak his bleakness, Bono now uses those fleeting images of loss and confusion to cast happier endings. In perhaps his most personal song, "New York," he sings of losing himself: "I'm staying on to figure out my mid-life crisis / I hit an iceberg in my life … You lose your balance, lose your wife / In the queue for the lifeboat"; then returns to home and sweet comfort: "I heard your voice a-whispering / Come away child."

That, in a sense, is the moral of the story with this band. It could be argued that they've spent the last few years losing themselves in superficial endeavors -- hopping on the electronica bandwagon here, camping it up there -- in an ultimately futile and unsatisfying effort to swim with the ever-changing tides of the cultural zeitgeist. But at heart, they always meant to make a more permanent mark. Those divergent efforts were useful: Now they know more, they've seen more, and they've come back to themselves. Irony, shmirony: It's more important to be sincere. Again.
John Bitzer
CDNOW Editorial Director

PLEASE VISIT U2 STUDIO FOR FURTHER NOTES AND QUOTES, ALONG WITH SONG AND VIDEO CLIPS, THAT ABSOLUTELY FREE FOR US TO ENJOY.

The heart's a bloom, shoots up through the stony ground
But there's no room, no space to rent on this town
You're out of luck and the reason that you had to care
The traffic is stuck and you're not moving anywhere
You thought you'd found a friend to take you out of this place
Someone you could lend a hand in return for grace

It's a beautiful day, the sky falls
And you feel like it's a beautiful day
It's a beautiful day
Don't let it get away

You're on the road but you've got no destination
You're in the mud, in the maze of her imagination
You love this town even if it doesn't ring true
You've been all over and it's been all over you

It's a beautiful day
Don't let it get away
It's a beautiful day
Don't let it get away

Touch me, take me to that other place
Teach me, I know I'm not a hopeless case

See the world in green and blue
See China right in front of you
See the canyons broken by cloud
See the tuna fleets clearing the sea out
See the Bedouin fires at night
See the oil fields at first light
See the bird with a leaf in her mouth
After the flood all the colors came out
What you don't have, you don't need it now
What you don't know, you can feel it somehow
What you don't have, you don't need it now
What you don't need it now, you don't need it now

It's a beautiful day

I'm not afraid of anything in this world
There's nothing you can throw at me that I haven't already heard
I'm just trying to find a decent melody
A song that I can sing in my own company

I never thought you were a fool
But darling,look at you
You gotta stand up straight,carry your own weight
These tears are going nowhere, baby

You've got to get yourself together
You've got stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it
Don't say the latter will be better
Now you're stuck in a moment and you can't get out of it

I will not forsake, the colors that you bring
But the nights you filled with the fireworks
They left you with nothing
I am still enchanted by the light you brought to me
I still lesten to your ears, and through your eyes I can see

And you're such a fool
To worry like you do
I know it's tough, and you can never get enough
Of what you don't really need it now...my oh my

You've got yourself together
You've got stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it
Oh love look at you now
You've got yourself stuck in a moment and now you can't get out of it

I was unconsious, half asleep
The water is warm till you discover how deep
I wasn't jumping, for me it was a fall
It's a way long down to nothing at all

And if the night runs over
And the day won't last
And if your way should falter
Along the stony pass
And if the night runs over
And if the day won't last
And if your should falter
Along the stony pass
It's just a moment
This time will pass

High, higher than the sun
You shoot me from a gun
I need you to elevate me here
At the corner of your lips
As the orbit of your hips
Eclipse, you elevate my soul

I've lost all self-control
Been living like a mole
Now going down, excavation
I and I in the sky
You make me feel like I can fly
So high, elevation

A star lit up like a cigar
Strung out like a guitar
Maybe you could educate my mind
Explain all these controls
I can't sing but I've got soul
The goal is elevation

A mole, living in a hole
Digging up my soul
Going down, excavation
I and I in the sky
You make me feel like I can fly
So high, elevation

Love, lift me out of these blues
Won't you tell me something true
I believe in you

And love is not the easy thing
The only baggage you can bring
Is all that you can't leave behind

And if the darkness to keep us apart
And if the daylight feels like it's a long way off
And if your glass heart should crack
And for a second you turn back
Oh, no be strong

Walk on, walk on
What you got they can't steal it
No they can't even feel it
Walk on, walk on
Stay safe tonight

You're packing a suitcase for a place none uf us has been
A place that has to be believed to be seen
You could have flown away
A singing bird in an open cage
Who will only fly, only fly for freedom

Walk on, walk on
What you've got they can't deny it
Can't sell it, can't buy it
Walk on, walk on
Stay safe tonight

And I know it aches
And your heart it breaks
And you can only take so much
Walk on,walk on

Home...hard to know what it is if you never had one
Home...I can't say where it is but I know I'm going home
That's where the hurt is

Leave it behind
You've got to leave it behind
All that you fashion
All that you make
All that you build
All that you break
All that you measure
All that you steal
All this you can leave behind
All that you reason
All that you sense
All that you speak
All that you dress up
All that you scheme

Something is about to give
I can feel it coming
I think I know what it means
I'm not afraid to die
I'm not afraid to live
And when I'm falt to my back
I hope to feel like I did

Cause hardness, it's set in
You need some protection
The thinner the skin

I want you to know
That you don't need me anymopre
I want you to know
You don't need anyone, anything at all

Who's to say that the wind will take you
Who's to know that it will break you
I don't know which way the wind will blow
Who's to know that the time has come around
Don't wanna see you cry
I know that this is not goodbye

In summer I can taste the salt in the sea
There's a kite blowing out of control on a breeze
I wonder what's gonna happen to you
You wonder what has happened to me

I'm a man, I'm not a child
A man who sees the shadow behind your eyes

Who's to say where the wind will take you
Who's to know what it will break you
I don't know where the wind will blow

Who's to know that the time has come around
Don't wanna see you cry
I know that this is not goodbye

Did I waste it
Not so much I couldn't taste it
Life should be fragrant
Rooftop to the basement
The last of the rock star
When the hip hop drove a big car
I the time when a new media
was a big idea
That was a big idea

In a little while
Surely you'll be mine
In a little while I'll be there
In a little while
This hurt will hurt no more
I'll be home, love

When the night takes a deep breath
And the daylight has no air
If I crawl, if I come crawling home
Will you be there

In a little while
I won't be blown by every breeze
Friday night running to Sunday on my knees
That girl, that girl, she's mine
Well, I've know her since
Since she was

A little girl with Spanish eyes
When I saw her first in the pram they pushed her by
Oh my, my how you've grown
Well it's been, it's been...a little while

Slow down my beating heart
A man dreams one day to fly
A man takes a rocket ship into the skies
He lives on a star that dying in the night
And follows in the trail, the scatter of light
Turn it on, turn it on, you turn me on

Slow down my beating heart
Slowly, slowly love

In the days
When we were swingging from the trees
I was a monkey
Stealing honey from a swarm of bees
I could taste
I could taste you even then
And I would chase you down the wind

You could go there if you please
Wild honey
And if you go there go with me
Wild honey

Did I know you
Did I know you even then
Before the clocks kept time
Before the world was made
From the cruel sun
You were shelter
You were my shelter and my shade
If you go there go with me
Wild honey
You can do just what you please
Wild honey
Yeah, just blowing in the breeze
Wild honey
Wild,wild, wild

I'm still standing
Where you left me
Are you still growing wild
With everything tame around you?

I send you flowers
Cut flowers for your hall
I knew your garden's full
But is there sweetness at all

And if you go there, go with me
Wild honey
Won't you take me, take me please
Wild honey
Yeah, swinging through the trees
Wild honey
Wild, wild, wild

Heaven on Earth
We need it now
I'm sick of all of this
Hanging around
Sick of sorrow
Sick of pain
Sick of hearing again and again
That there's gonna be
Peace on Earth

Where I grew up
There weren't many trees
Where there was we'd tear them down
And use them on our enemies
They say that what you mock
Will surely over take you
And you become a monster
So the monster will not break you

It's already gone too far
Who said that if you go in hard
You won't get hurt

Jesus could you take the time
To throw a drowning man a line
Peace on Earth
Tell the ones who hear no sound
Whose sons are living in the ground
Peace on Earth
No whos or whys
No one cries like a mother cries
For peace on Earth
She never got to say goodbye
To see the colors in his eyes
Now he's in the dirt
That's Peace on Earth

They're reading names out over the radio
All the folks the rest of us won't get to know
Sean and Julia, Gareth, Ann and Breda
Their lives are bigger, than any big idea

Jesus thing song you wrote
The words are sticking in my throat
Peace on Earth
Hear it every Christmas time
But hope and histore won't rhyme
So what's it worth?
This peace on Earth

Peace on Earth

When you look at the world
What is it that you see ?
People find all kind of things
That bring them to their knees
I see an expression
So clear and so true
That it changes the atmosphere
When you walk into the room

So I try to be like you
Try to feel it like you do
But without you it's no use
I can't see what you see
When I look at the world

When the night is someone elses
And you're trying to get some sleep
When your thoughts are too expensive
Too ever want to keep
When there's all kinds of chaos
And everyone is walking lame
You don't even blink now, do you
Or even look away

So I try to be like you
Try to feel it like you do
But without you it's no use
I can't see what you see
When I look at the world

I can't wait any longer
I can't wait till I'm stronger
Can't wait any longer
To see what you see
When I look at the world

I'm in the waiting room
Can't see for the smoke
I think of you and your holy book
When the rest of us choke

Tell me, tell me, what do you see?
Tell me, tell me, what's wrong with me?

In New York freedom looks like too many choices
In New York I found a friend to drown out the other voices
Voices on the cell phone
Voices from home
Voices of the hard sell
Voices down the stair well
In New York, just got a place in New York

In New York summers get hot, well into the hundreds
You can't walk around the block without a change of clothing
Hot as a hairdryer in your face
Hot as a handbag and a can of mace
In New York, I just got a place in New York
New York, New York

In New York you can forget, forget how to sit still
Tell yourself you will stay in
But it's down to Alphaville

New York, New York, New York
New York, New York, New York

The Irish have been coming here for years
Feel like they own the places
They got the airport, city hall, concrete, asphalt,
They even got the police
Irish, Italians, Jews, and Hispanics
Religious nuts, political fanatics in the stew
Living happily not like me and you
That's where I lost you...New York

New York, New York, New York,
New York, New York, New York

In New York I lost it all to you and your vices
Still I'm staying on to figure out my mid life crisis
I hit an iceberg in my life
But you know I'm still a float
You lose your balance, lose your wife
In the queue for the lifeboat

You got to put the women and children first
But you've got an unquenchable thirst for New York

New York, New York, New York
New York, New York, New York

In the stillnes of the evening
When the sun has had its day
I heard your voice a whispering
Come away child

New York, New York

Grace, she takes the blame
She covers the shame
Removes the stain
It could be her name

Grace, it's the name for a girl
It's also a thought that changed the world
And when she walks on the street
You can hear the strings
Grace find goodness in everything

Grace, she's got the walk
Not on a ramp or on chalk
She's got the time to talk
She travels outside of karma
When she goes to work
You can here the strings
Grace finds beauty in everything

Grace she carries a world on her hips
No champagne flute for her lips
No twirls or skips between her fingertips
She carries a pearl in perfect condition

What once was hurt
What once was fiction
What left a mark
No longer stings
Because Grace makes beauty
Out of ugly things

Grace makes beauty out of ugly things