Every U2 Album, Ranked
The same four Mount Temple schoolfriends have made every U2 record since Boy in 1980, so this vote ranks what one lineup made in the studio. Album rankings by Louder, MOJO, SPIN, Far Out and Newsweek only set the tiers your votes order: upper for 3 or more top-five places, lower otherwise, a skip counting as a miss, off-list records ignored, places quoted as printed. U2-credited studio albums get in, strong or weak, so Passengers' Original Soundtracks 1 misses, as do all-live albums, best-ofs, remixes, EPs and any album wholly re-recording songs U2 already released, like Songs of Surrender, and no reissue gets an entry: deluxe and anniversary sets file under their parent, and songs on one stand alone only if recorded for it, not left over, and put out by themselves on an album or EP. Printed years don't pick links: each is the earliest Spotify issue holding every original song under its first title, else the earliest holding them all; anything ListWorld already links keeps that link, and entries flag what a copy adds, drops or retitles.
U2 — Achtung Baby (1991) is #1 on “Every U2 Album, Ranked”.
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U2 — Achtung Baby (1991)
Daniel Lanois got the Edge to play two chord progressions back to back, and the band improvised One out of them while working on an early Mysterious Ways. The Fly went out on 21 October 1991, a month ahead of the album, and became their second UK number one. Louder and Newsweek put the record first, and Far Out's seventh is the lone miss among the five, so it holds 4 of 5.
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U2 — The Unforgettable Fire (1984)
Recording began in May 1984 at Slane Castle, where the band lived while they worked, and ended in August at Windmill Lane. Bad ran to 12 minutes at Live Aid while Bono climbed down to dance with a fan, and every earlier U2 album came back into the UK chart. The link is the 2009 remaster the Edge directed, every title tagged, and each ranking counted here puts the album fifth or better, 5 of 5.
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U2 — The Joshua Tree (1987)
Sessions moved between Danesmoate House and Windmill Lane through most of 1986. With Or Without You, out as the lead single in March 1987, gave U2 their first American number one, with the Edge adding sustained notes on a prototype Infinite Guitar. SPIN and MOJO rank the album first, nobody goes lower than Far Out's third, and that makes 5 of 5 inside a top five on a link to the 2007 remaster, every title tagged Remastered.
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U2 — War (1983)
Steve Wickham offered the Edge his violin at a bus stop, spent half a day in the studio, and his electric part was the last one added to Sunday Bloody Sunday. The record replaced Thriller at the top of the UK chart, U2's first number one album there. Every ranking but MOJO, which has it tenth, places it in a top five, 4 of 5, and the link is Spotify's 2008 remaster, every title tagged Remastered 2008.
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U2 — Zooropa (1993)
The band cut it in Dublin from February to May 1993, in a six-month break between legs of the Zoo TV Tour. Johnny Cash sang The Wanderer on a visit to the city, and the Edge took the lead vocal on Numb. Newsweek's fourth and a fifth each from SPIN and Far Out make 3 of 5, while Louder only reaches seventh and MOJO eighth, and the album won a Grammy for Best Alternative Music Album.
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U2 — All That You Can't Leave Behind (2000)
Bono wrote Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of for his friend Michael Hutchence of INXS, and it peaked at number two in Britain. Kite was one of the few ideas kept from three weeks of demos at Hanover Quay late in 1998. Far Out names the whole record its number one, and with Louder ninth and Newsweek eighth, that single top-five spot makes 1 of 5.
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U2 — Boy (1980)
Steve Lillywhite produced the debut at Windmill Lane between July and September 1980, and I Will Follow opens it. MOJO alone, at third, has Boy in a top five, which makes 1 of 5 against Far Out's fourteenth, and Spotify carries it as the 2008 deluxe remaster: the 11 album songs, each tagged Remastered 2008, the eleventh also naming the unlisted Saturday Matinee fragment, then a 14-track bonus disc of single versions, B-sides, outtakes, an unreleased mix and live tracks.
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U2 — How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004)
Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own is about Bono and his dying father, and it was Song of the Year at the 2006 Grammys. A demo copy belonging to the Edge was stolen at a magazine photo shoot in France in July 2004. MOJO's fourth is the album's single top-five placing, 1 of 5, and the link adds Fast Cars after the eleven album songs, as the Japanese, UK and Irish CDs did.
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U2 — Rattle and Hum (1988)
Jimmy Iovine produced this mix of new studio songs, live recordings and covers, three of the new songs cut at Sun Studio in Memphis, and Desire became the band's first UK number one single, while Spotify tags seven of the album's tracks Live and two Excerpt. Louder's fifth is the one top-five placing, and MOJO's survey of every studio album leaves it out, calling it "über-trad, half-live" in the introduction, which counts as a miss: 1 of 5.
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U2 — October (1981)
Bono's briefcase of lyrics and ideas went missing backstage at a nightclub in Portland, Oregon, and only came back in October 2004. Gloria opens it, and with Louder and Far Out both at eighth, as high as the album goes, it lands at 0 of 5 for a top five; the link carries the deluxe remaster, its album titles tagged Remastered 2008, adding a 17-track disc of live recordings, BBC session takes, non-album songs and a remix.
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U2 — Pop (1997)
Manager Paul McGuinness booked the PopMart Tour before the album was finished, and Bono called the result "the most expensive demo session in the history of music". Wake Up Dead Man began as an upbeat song in the 1991 sessions and turned darker before it landed here. Newsweek's sixth is the album's best placing, which makes the top-five count 0 of 5.
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U2 — Songs of Innocence (2014)
Apple put it in the purchased libraries of more than 500 million iTunes customers at no cost on 9 September 2014, a month before the CD reached shops. Lykke Li sang on The Troubles twice, first in Los Angeles without the band and again in London after the key changed, and Far Out's ninth is the best any ranking does for the record, 0 of 5 for a top five.
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U2 — Songs of Experience (2017)
Pulled from a late 2016 release and finished on the 2017 Joshua Tree tour, it has Get Out Of Your Own Way, sung to Bono's daughters, passing to Kendrick Lamar on the way into American Soul. Louder's eleventh is the album's best, 0 of 5 in a top five, and the deluxe link adds an Ordinary Love remix, Book Of Your Heart, a string Lights Of Home and a Kygo mix of You're The Best Thing About Me.
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U2 — No Line on the Horizon (2009)
Sessions started in May 2007 at a hotel in Fez, Morocco, and ran until December 2008 at Olympic in London. Cedars Of Lebanon closes it with a war reporter narrating, over a sample of Against The Sky by Eno and Harold Budd. The album opened at number one in 30 countries yet sold below expectations, and twelfth, from Louder and Newsweek, is the highest anyone ranks it, which leaves 0 of 5.
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