50 Fun Facts About U2

At which Dublin school did the members of U2 meet in 1976?

Mount Temple Comprehensive welcomed them back in September 2026, when the band played for about 1,000 pupils and staff to mark 50 years since their first rehearsal.

Which band member posted the notice board message that brought U2 together?

Larry Mullen was 14 when he pinned up a handwritten note reading "Drummer seeks musicians to form band"; the group first met in his parents' kitchen that September.

What did the future U2 call themselves first, before they became the Hype?

Feedback gave way to the Hype in 1977 and then to U2 in March 1978, on the eve of a talent contest: the band feared that winning as the Hype would leave them stuck with the name.

Which Dublin punk musician suggested the name U2 to the band in 1978?

Steve Averill of the Radiators from Space offered a list of names, and U2 was the one the band disliked least; he went on to design their album sleeves for decades.

Which early member left U2 with a farewell concert in March 1978, walking offstage mid-show?

Dik Evans, the Edge's older brother, walked offstage during a set played as the Hype; the other four came back later in the show as U2, and he joined their friends the Virgin Prunes.

What did U2 win at the Pop Group '78 talent contest in Limerick?

£500 and a CBS demo session: the win came as a surprise, because the inexperienced Dublin teenagers were not generally rated the best band on the night.

Hot Press journalist Bill Graham introduced U2 in 1978 to which man, their manager for the next three decades?

Paul McGuinness stayed until 2013 and was known as the fifth member: under their original deal, the band split its earnings with him in equal shares instead of paying a manager's percentage.

At which Dublin studio did U2 record their debut EP in 1979 and their first album in 1980?

Windmill Lane Studios drew so many pilgrims that fans covered its walls in graffiti; when the old building was demolished in 2015, a stretch of the graffiti wall was spared.

Who produced U2's debut album Boy after Martin Hannett was passed over?

Steve Lillywhite had a rule against making a second record with the same band, yet he came back to produce both of U2's next two albums as well.

What did Bono lose backstage at a Portland nightclub in March 1981, as U2 prepared to record October?

A briefcase of lyrics: Bono had to write October's words again in the studio, and the case only came back 23 years later, after a woman found it in the attic of a rented house in Tacoma.

Which U2 album was their first UK number one?

War knocked Michael Jackson's Thriller off the top of the UK album chart in 1983, though in America it stalled at number 12.

What did Bono famously wave during performances of "Sunday Bloody Sunday" on U2's 1983 tour?

A white flag: filmed through rain and red-lit mist at Colorado's Red Rocks that June, the image went into heavy rotation on MTV and broke the band across America.

Which two producers first worked with U2 on The Unforgettable Fire in 1984?

Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois were hired over the objections of the band's label boss, and Bono recalls American fans asking what they were doing with a "hippie Eno album"; the partnership lasted 25 years.

Where did U2 record part of The Unforgettable Fire in 1984?

Slane Castle: the band moved into its ballroom three years after opening for Thin Lizzy in its grounds, and came back in 2001 to headline two sold-out concerts of their own there.

Where did U2 play Live Aid on 13 July 1985?

Wembley: midway through the song Bad, Bono left the stage to dance with a fan pulled from the crowd, and was gone so long that the rest of the band began to panic.

Which single gave U2 their first US number one in 1987?

With or Without You got there first, and "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" followed later in 1987; by 2025 no other U2 single had topped the US chart, Desire stalling at number three.

Which photographer shot The Joshua Tree's desert sleeve images with U2 in December 1986?

Anton Corbijn shot the cover at Zabriskie Point in Death Valley; the lone Joshua tree was spotted from the road, and a fan later set a plaque at its site asking, "Have you found what you're looking for?"

Which working title did U2's album The Joshua Tree carry before its name was changed?

The Two Americas came from Bono's sense of "the mythic America and the real America"; the name changed after a photo shoot in the Mojave introduced the band to the tree.

U2 recorded three Rattle and Hum songs, including "Angel of Harlem", at which Memphis studio?

Sun Studio, where Elvis Presley made his first records: U2 squeezed the session into a single day between tour dates in November 1987 because, Bono said, "this is where rock and roll was invented".

In which city's Hansa Studios did U2 begin recording their seventh album in October 1990?

Berlin: they landed on the day Germany reunified, but the sessions split the band so badly that Bono spoke of a wall down the middle of the studio, until the song One pulled them back together.

Bono described which U2 album as "the sound of four men chopping down the Joshua Tree"?

Achtung Baby even opens with a burst of distorted noise, meant to make listeners think their stereo was broken or that they had been sold the wrong record.

Which East German cars were gutted and hung as lighting rigs on the Zoo TV Tour?

Trabants: the band had grown fond of the little car, by then a symbol of the fall of Communism, while recording in Germany, and their stage designer turned recycled ones into spotlights.

Which alter ego did Bono adopt for the encores of U2's European stadium shows in 1993?

MacPhisto, an ageing, world-weary devil with horns, took over from the American-style Mirror Ball Man; in London he shared the stage with Salman Rushdie, who was then in hiding.

Which 1995 film soundtrack featured U2's "Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me"?

Batman Forever got a cast-off: the song was dropped from Zooropa at the last minute, rewritten for the film, and became a bigger hit than anything on that album.

In the video for Pop's lead single "Discothèque", U2 dressed as which group?

The Village People: director Stéphane Sednaoui set the video inside a mirrorball, with each member in a different disco-era costume, from motorcycle cop to cowboy.

What fruit was the giant mirrorball on U2's PopMart stage shaped like?

A lemon: the band rode out of it for the encores, except when it jammed; in Oslo it failed to open, leaving them stuck inside, and it broke down again on later dates.

In which city did U2 become the first major group to play after the Bosnian War, in September 1997?

Sarajevo: the connection went back to 1993, when the band beamed live satellite link-ups from the besieged city into their Zoo TV shows.

What did Bono reveal inside his jacket at the end of U2's Super Bowl XXXVI halftime show?

An American flag lining: he opened the jacket as the set ended, moments after the names of the September 11 victims had scrolled up a giant screen behind the band.

Which album did Rolling Stone call U2's "third masterpiece"?

All That You Can't Leave Behind was a deliberate retreat from the band's 1990s dance experiments; their manager called it a good idea to make a record that "actually sounded like U2 again".

Which single launched U2's How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb to first-week US sales of 840,000?

Vertigo doubled as an iPod television advert, and the album's first week nearly doubled its predecessor's; the album and its singles then won all eight Grammys they were nominated for.

In 2008 U2 signed a 12-year deal handing their tours, merchandise and website to which concert promoter?

Live Nation had already been promoting the band's tours for years; announcing the deal, Bono joked, "We've been dating for over 20 years now. It's about time we tied the knot."

U2's 360° Tour was the highest-grossing tour in history until 2019, when which singer's tour overtook it?

Ed Sheeran's Divide Tour took the record with crowds about half the size of U2's and cheaper tickets, simply by playing 255 shows to their 110.

Which company gave U2's Songs of Innocence away free to all of its music-store customers in September 2014?

Apple put the album into every iTunes library unasked, and the backlash was such that Bono later apologised in his memoir, calling the stunt an overreach born of his own "vaunting ambition".

Which producer led the sessions for U2's Songs of Innocence?

Danger Mouse worked on it with the band for more than two years; they then brought in Paul Epworth and Ryan Tedder, among others, to help finish the songs.

What was U2's Songs of Surrender, released in March 2023?

Forty back-catalogue tracks re-recorded: the Edge produced them during the pandemic lockdowns as a companion to Bono's memoir, whose 40 chapters are each named after a U2 song.

Which new Las Vegas venue did U2 open in September 2023 with a 40-show residency?

Sphere went on sale with just five U2 dates; demand stretched the run to 40 shows, built around the band's 1991 album and played beneath a wraparound 16K screen.

Which country legend sings lead on "The Wanderer", the closing track of U2's 1993 album Zooropa?

Johnny Cash recorded the vocal during a visit to Dublin, after Bono had written the song with his voice in mind.

What is Bono's real name?

Paul David Hewson was renamed by friends in his teenage gang after Bonavox, a Dublin hearing-aid shop; he disliked the nickname until he learned it could be read as Latin for "good voice".

Where was the Edge born, to Welsh parents?

Barking, Essex: the family moved to Ireland when he was one, yet he only became an Irish citizen in 2025, joking that he was "a little tardy with the paperwork".

Which member of U2 was born in Oxfordshire, England?

Adam Clayton followed his father's flying career: the family lived for a time in Nairobi, where his father was an airline pilot, before settling in Malahide, north of Dublin, when he was five.

Which U2 single won 2001's Record of the Year Grammy?

Beautiful Day won with a sound the band had set aside in the 1990s: the Edge brought back the guitar tone of their earliest records. It took Song of the Year the same night.

Who inducted U2 into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2005?

Bruce Springsteen called them the keepers of "some of the most beautiful sonic architecture" in rock; the band had been voted in at the first attempt, in their first year of eligibility.

Bono and the Edge wrote the songs for a troubled 2011 Broadway musical about which superhero?

Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark opened more than a year late after a run of accidents and rewrites, and closed in 2014 having lost about $60 million, a Broadway record.

Which record label did U2 sign with in 1980 for their debut album?

Island signed them after a gamble paid off: still without a deal, the band booked Dublin's 2,000-seat National Stadium and a label scout was in the crowd. Their manager said everyone else in the world had passed.

Whose face appears on the cover of U2's debut album Boy?

Peter Rowen, brother of Bono's friend Guggi, was six when he posed for Boy; he came back on the cover of the band's third album, his innocent gaze replaced by a haunted stare.

U2 wrote the Golden Globe-winning song "Ordinary Love" for a 2013 film about which leader?

Nelson Mandela was the subject of Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom; the band broke off work on their own album in late 2013 to write the song in his honour.

Who stood in for Adam Clayton when he missed a 1993 Sydney show after an alcohol blackout?

His guitar technician, Stuart Morgan, played bass at what was the dress rehearsal for a worldwide TV broadcast; Clayton made the filmed show the next night and gave up drinking soon afterwards.

In which Moroccan city did U2 record sessions for No Line on the Horizon in 2007?

Fez: the band set up in the courtyard of a riad during the city's festival of sacred music, hoping to write what Bono called "future hymns".

To which country did U2 move their publishing business in 2006 after Ireland capped its artists' tax exemption?

The Netherlands: the band moved the business soon after Ireland capped artists' tax-free income at 250,000 euros; Bono defended it by saying tax competitiveness had taken Ireland out of poverty.

Which Indian musician joined U2 on the 2019 single 'Ahimsa' ahead of their first concert in India?

A. R. Rahman, the Oscar-winning composer of Slumdog Millionaire, joined them on a song titled with the Sanskrit word for non-violence, the principle that Gandhi passed on to Martin Luther King.