Earlier this week, I was listening to a  band who isn’t U2, (I’m not going to say who because this isn’t about tearing anyone down), and I remembered reading about how the particular record I was spinning was recorded with each band member recording their parts separately, in different studios in different parts of the country. “What an impersonal way to make music!” I thought, which seems to be a real shame because there’s nothing more personal than music, and recording it with someone should be an intimate experience that joins two souls together. Of course, this kind of thing isn’t all that rare in today’s music industry, and I couldn’t help but think of it in terms that related to U2. Isn’t it cool that even all these years later our guys are still excited to be playing together? U2 really is a band in the truest sense of the word, with each member making unique and important contributions to the recording process on their own, and that’s cool enough in its own right, but the most magical thing seems to happen when these four guys get together to make their music. Truly, what comes out of those studio sessions with multiple band members present is the very definition of “greater than the sum of its parts”. That’s when things seem to really “go off” in a way that excites the band, their collaborators, and the fans, and the fact that they haven’t lost that enthusiasm is just another reason that I love U2.