Fifteen years ago, the members of U2 celebrated their thirtieth anniversary in the band. That was a big deal, especially when one considers that the same four guys have been in the band all along…there haven’t been personnel changes like one finds in other bands with long-lasting careers, such as the Rolling Stones or Pink Floyd. No acrimonious splits or public fights between band members have come along to sully the band’s reputation. I credit that success to love. In fact, the concept of love is an important one in the band’s ethos. Love for each other has kept these four guys together over all these years. Love for others has spawned some of the band’s most successful and beloved songs. Love for what they do has kept the band at the forefront of music’s most popular and beloved acts for forty-five years now. It has all been a labor of love, and that is the reason that this alternate video for U2’s song “Window in the Skies” is so appropriate.
To mark the thirtieth anniversary of the band, this video, which showcases images and pictures from over the band’s career with a focus on the early years, was created by Jonas Odell and his crew of video technicians. There are literal windows in the sky that the camera flies through, each time revealing more fantastic images of the band. There are some famous shots included here, pictures which the hardcore U2 fans will recognize, and there are even a few less well-known shots, which are a real treat. One image that I think I noticed (It is a little hard to pick out as the pictures move so fast) was a picture from same photo shoot as the image on the back side of the picture disc commemorating the fortieth anniversary of the single “Fire,” this year’s Record Store Day release from U2.
The video takes us through a pictorial review of U2’s past in black and white, as Bono sings “Oh, can’t you see what love has done?” I confess that when I first saw the video, I thought it was neat, but I did not really get the importance of it. Now that some time has passed, I recognize a couple of things that I missed at the time of the video’s release. The first is that this video came out in the year of the band’s thirtieth anniversary, so a look back at the past was certainly proper and fitting. The other thing that I missed was the connection between the song’s lyrics and the anniversary. As I mentioned above, it has all been a labor of love for U2, and this video was a nice way to stop and take a look back before moving headlong into the future. This year is the forty-fifth anniversary of the formation of U2, and I’m still excited to see what the future holds for the greatest band of all time.
Next week, I will be reviewing a little bit of an oddity, the collaborative video for “The Ballad of Ronnie Drew,” which features U2 along with a plethora of other important Irish acts. In the meantime, please leave some comments below on this “Window in the Skies” video, letting me know your thoughts and feelings on the piece.