...ON MUSIC

Bono: Sometimes I have a guilt complex about our roots. We don't have funky black roots. We don't have white rock roots. Our music almost doesn't seem to have roots. It's like totally our own.

Bono: I don't have a musical background as such. I used to paint and draw, and if I got very highly strung about things around me, I used to write the feelings down on paper. I think an awful lot about the things I se around me. My father, for instance,who's worked in the civil service since he was 14. He's also a self-taught singer, actor and painter, but work is killing the creative side of him; he's still got paintings around which are left unfinished, like him really. I'm determined that's not going to happen to me.

Bono: I don't write stories. The music is more like a painting or a picture. That's why the sound we get is very much like a cinema sound. It's very big, it's very grainy, and it's got a lot of depth to it.

Bono: I think all singers, when they're dragging things out of themselves that they didn't know were there, become very aware of their spirit - the third part of their being. Music is one of the few areas in life where we can sort of express ourselves. We can actually scream or break something. For me it's been a release while my belief in God is so personal that I just shut my mouth all the time lest I trash it into the ground because I feel so awkward trying to express it.

Bono: Upward movement is essential for any artist. It provides the change and the challenge that keeps you from becoming stagnant. It also has a quickening effect on the adrenalin of the group and that has a productive effect on the music. I'm constantly thinking about possibilities for the next record. Nobody even wants to talk to us about the next record, but I can't stop thinking or talking about it.

...ON THE BAND

Bono: As a band, we have a giant collective ego. It picks us up. Anyway, I don't think I'd be a good bank clerk, or a hot dog salesman. I might be a good president.

Bono: I believe we combine the aspects of contemporary music that I find exciting; which is performance, aggressive live rock music, that is at the same time lyrical, because we mean what we say. We are talking. We are not just writing on topics, we come from the heart.

Bono: The whole U2 phenomenon is probably going to amount to little real change. I think we're quite sanguine about that, but that's not the only reason we would be doing this. We're doing it because it's worth doing and we think it's the right thing to do.

Bono: The hope that's in the music comes from the hope that's in the band. I believe it's time to fight back in your spirit - right down deep inside. There is a great faith in this group.

Bono: The most important thing about the beginnings of U2, is just the fact we were four people before we were four musicians.

Bono: We want to be big, musically, and we need air, we need power, we need softness, we need all those things ... and we'll use certain devices to get them. There's no point in constant change, progression out of affection - that won't affect anything.

Bono: We feel there's a rare spirit to the band, and we've spent the last five years trying to develop it and protect it at the same time. It's the songs we server. That is our complete goal. If your ambition for fame and fortune and you achieve that, you are then ambition-less and you've come to the end. But that's not what we are. We have this light in the distance. I don't know what it is, a musical goal or what. But we're certain that we're going toward it. We're always arguing with each other and pushing people out of the way so we can get there. But it's for the music, it's not for other things.

Bono: In the very start, even though we couldn't really get it together musically, there was something there and I call it the spark. I called it something you must have. We've built on a spark, we haven't tried to put a spark on the music. Our main influences in this group are each other. They're not outside. They're very definitely each other.

...ON HIMSELF

Bono: I think people understand now that I'm not religious, they understand that I'm nearly anti-religion. When I talk of religion, I'm talking about the force that cut Ireland in two. I'm not religious at all but I do believe in God very strongly, and I don't believe that we just exploded out of thin air, I can't believe it. I think it's the spiritual strength that's essential to the band. People have got to find their own way, I'm not into standing up and saying "Hey, you should be into God!" My own life is exhilarating through and experience I feel, and I feel there's no point in talking about something which should be there in your life anyway. You don't have to preach about it.

Adam: I like to see Bono working under pressure, 'cause he's a great improviser, and I think he sings notes, sings words much better when he's a bit desperate. That's when the soul comes through.

Edge: I used to get a little worried about Bono's stage performances... There was something that used to disturb me slightly, and I could never figure it out. I also noticed that whenever he told a story, he'd never stick to the facts, he'd always embroider and jazz it up until it was a great story. The essence of what he was saying was true, but the actual facts were ... very different! And this used to bother me, but I've just realised that the facts aren't that important, and as long as there's some relation to the original, that's fine. And now I've applied that to what he's like on stage and I feel a little more happy. In some sort of intuitive way, not in a cynical way, he's very aware of performance and whether it's effective and powerful. He's not really worried about justifying it, it's always heartfelt, but he will intuitively go for the thing that works.

Bono: I must say, I don't feel very qualified to be a pop star, and I feel very awkward at times in the role. I think there are other people far better suited than me. I sometimes think it might have been a mistake - you picked the wrong guy! Look, I'm built more like a mechanic or something, a carpenter. I mean, take a look at these hands - these are the hands of a bricklayer.

Bono: I've changed as it's gone through. When it started I was very drunk on being in a band. When I started I was very drunk on being in a band, very confident, it was everything. I couldn't see the wood for the trees. You get bitter, you knock other bands ... I had a lot of hate. That's changed in my life, U2 has broadened my experience and allowed me to realise that wherever you go in the world people are still flesh and blood, and if they would only realise and stop hitting each other over the head.

Bono: Just the giving of names, it was like, well, we didn't choose our names, so why not choose one now? That was the idea. Bono was always a term of affection, so when I have an audience call me Bono, there's something warm about it.

Bono: I warn you , I am completely unable to explain myself at times ... even to string three words together can be hard, and this is very tragic if people think you supposedly have the gift of the gab.

...ON DUBLIN

Bono: I feel part of Dublin, I feel part of Ireland. I climb over the wall and I get out of here sometimes because the place'd make you tear your hair out. But I love its people and I love its places and as a city ... oh, it's a very interesting city.

Bono: I don't want to leave Ireland. Without sounding overly patriotic, I love my country and where I come from, and want to live there.