Best Dressed Band 1980

This is the cover of U2 -18 Singles, the Best Of album released by the Irish group in 2006. Except for selected tunes from U2's 27 year long life span, it contains The Saints Are Coming - a collaboration with Green Day.

I was never a U2 fan growing up. My fascination began when I heard Veritgo in 2004. It was a raw explosion of energy and it changed the way I looked at U2. I bought the Best Of to discover some of their earlier material. I have heard all of the songs before but never acknowledged the greatness of them.

What also strikes me is how good they looked. Anyway before Bono picked up those ridiculous red sunglasses and Edge bought all his ugly hats. The book that accompanied the release of the CD contains many great photos of the group. The cover (above) is one of them. Most of the pictures, anyway in the CD booklet, are taken by Anton Corbijn (legendary photographer and director of the video to Joy Division's Atmosphere).


The cover though, is shot by David Corio in York 1980.Edge's hair looks great, anyway better than Bono's. Adam Clayton's glasses and jumper are spot on and Bono's shirt is flawless.

This tells us a few things: People change. Not always for the better. Some bands will always make good music. Stylists are important. Or are they? I bet that when this photo was taken in 1980, U2 didn't have a stylist. They had barley started shaving! And it was some marketing tosser who came up with the idea to use sunglasses and hats as part of the brand.

There is nothing like young innocent rock'n'roll...