By the mid-90s, U2 were caught in a beautiful identity crisis. Fresh off the ironic, hyper-modern glitz of Zooropa, and years before their “back-to-basics” 2000s reinvention, they took a left turn so hard it nearly slipped past the mainstream radar. That detour was Passengers: Original Soundtracks 1, a curious, ambient-leaning collaboration with Brian Eno credited not to U2, but to the mysterious-sounding Passengers. The concept was deliberately strange: original music for non-existent films. Born from improvisation exercises that Eno had given the band when they started obsessing about small details, U2 carried on the experiment with Eno when they returned to the studio after their Zoo TV tour. After working on a soundtrack that never came to fruition, Eno suggested they record music that would be suitable for film, as he had done on his album Music for Films. The result is one of the most divisive, and fascinating, entries in their discography. This Record Store Day, Island Records and UMe are reissuing Passengers: Original Soundtracks 1 for the first time since its release in 1995 on 2LP heavyweight recycled black vinyl.
The album opens with “United Colors” an ambient, sci-fi/horror sounding track that gives the impression of being stuck in a nightmare, running from unseen pursuers. “Slug,” a dreamy, slow-build that feels like a spiritual sequel to Zooropa’s “Stay.” It’s got just enough melodic structure to ground it, but everything is filtered through hazy electronics and delay-drenched guitars. Bono’s voice drifts in and out like a radio signal from another dimension. It’s one of the more conventional tracks here and one of the best. Then, the boundaries start to dissolve. “Always Forever Now” throbs with industrial menace, driven by processed drums and flickering synths. “Beach Sequence,” on the other hand, is pure ambient Eno, with The Edge’s minimal piano drifting over a bed of shimmering pads. It’s hard to even spot U2 on tracks like this, but that’s the point: ego is subsumed by mood. “Your Blue Room” is another more conventional song that you can easily imagine in an actual movie where the character is at a crisis point.
The one track that managed to reach the broader public is “Miss Sarajevo.” Inspired by Bono’s humanitarian work in Sarajevo and witnessing a beauty pageant that a group of women held there during the Siege of Sarajevo. Featuring operatic tenor Luciano Pavarotti, it’s a strange, moving ballad about beauty and resistance in the face of war. Bono sings with restraint and aching sincerity before Pavarotti’s solo detonates the song into something transcendent. Parts of the album plays like a series of sound experiments, like “Ito Okashi,” with its Japanese lyrics and fluttering electronics or “A Different Kind of Blue,” barely tethered to melody.
This is not an album that aims to please. It’s opaque, sometimes frustrating, often beautiful. For U2 fans, it’s a test of patience and open-mindedness. For Eno disciples, it’s a glimpse of what happens when a stadium band surrenders to texture and mood. To really help the listener imagine how the song would be in a film, the inner sleeve contains liner notes that describe the plot of the “film” that the song is “from.” The “1” in Original Soundtracks 1 hints at a series that never came to be. However, it is a satisfying window into the experimentation that happened between two of U2’s most divisive albums; Zooropa and Pop. It may not be a landmark in the classic sense, but Passengers is a rewarding detour—enigmatic, atmospheric, and unlike anything else in U2’s canon. The remastering on this reissue sounds fantastic, making this a must-have vinyl for any fan of 90s-era U2.
One Response
Nice review of an interesting album. However, it is (unusually) Bono playing piano on “Beach Sequence,” not the Edge.