No Line on the Horizon
| U2
No Line on the Horizon
No Line on the Horizon is the 12th studio album by Irish rock band U2. It was produced by Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois, and Steve Lillywhite, and was released on 27 February 2009. It was the band's first record since How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004), marking the longest gap between studio albums of their career to that point. The band originally intended to release the songs as two EPs, but later combined the material into a single record. Photographer Anton Corbijn shot a companion film, Linear, which was released alongside the album and included with several special editions. --Wikipedia
Critic Reviews
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Rolling Stone
U2’s first album in nearly five years and their best, in its textural exploration and tenacious melodic grip, since 1991’s Achtung Baby.
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Pitchfork
U2 spoiled their followers by consistently questioning themselves while writing songs that straddled the personal and collective consciousness. But Horizon is clearly playing not to lose-- it's a defensive gesture, and a rather pitiful one at that.
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The Guardian
Listening to it, you get the feeling that U2's belief in themselves as boundary-pushers was shaken, perhaps irrevocably, by Pop's relative failure.
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NME
It has the pomp and arrogance of their best work, enough new sounds and interesting new avenues to satisfy the musos and, at its core, is a very good collection of very good songs played very well.
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Washington Post
It's the sound of a band pushing itself forward, figuring out a way to remain relevant while its frontman soap-boxes and saves the world.
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Consequence of Sound
It’s not that the band sounds unoriginal or dated, it’s just that this particular sound has over-saturated the modern music scene.
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The Quietus
Finds Bono and chums making concessions to humour, humanity, and their best work in years
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BBC
No Line On The Horizon proves that U2 really still have faith in themselves.
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The Telegraph
A bold, beautiful and highly speculative re-imagining of U2's music.
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Sputnik Music
A release that does have some genuinely awesome moments and more than a few head-scratching ones.
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AV Music
U2 might try to pass Horizon off as atmospheric, but it’s really just a grab bag of underdeveloped ideas that never seemed to command the band’s full attention.
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Paste Magazine
Represents what October did all those years ago: a decent step forward that nevertheless recalls the past more clearly than it spells out the future.
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Stereogum
Some of No Line On The Horizon works (especially that last part of the record) and too much of it doesn’t.
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Pop Matters
An easy album to dismiss and an even harder disc to love
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Huffington Post
U2 is back to experimenting which has not always been a good thing, but in this case, it’s great.
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Uncut
It’s U2’s least immediate album – but there’s something about it that suggests it may be one of their most enduring.
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All Music
Seems as if it would be a classic grower, an album that makes sense with repeated spins, but that repetition only makes the album more elusive, revealing not that U2 went into the studio with a dense, complicated blueprint, but rather, they had no plan at all.
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The Solute
Despite some great songs with the album and an initial idea that could have been the band returning to big conceptual ideas, they just couldn’t let go of the commercial buck.
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@ U2
An impressive combination of the traditional and the future.
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Time Blimp
It’s a disjointed mess, it takes itself way too seriously, and its full of the bloated excesses that U2 are known for, but when they get all cylinders firing, there’s still no one in pop music today who can keep up…
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Entertainment Weekly
An eclectic and electrifying winner, one that speaks to the zeitgeist the way only U2 can and dare to do.
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Independent
It's pretty much the same dream, plot and scheme that U2 have been recycling for longer than they'd perhaps wish to be reminded.
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Defending Axl Rose
But a confident U2 is an experimental U2, and as such, NO LINE ON THE HORIZON finds the band sliding back into something a bit more interesting.
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Slant Magazine
A compromise between the experimental and the pedestrian that makes for an excursion almost as tricky as walking a tightrope stretched between two distant towers.
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Chicago Tribune
U2's latest a step in the right direction
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Pop Theology
The sweet fruit of a thirty-year collaboration of one of rock’s most talented musical families.
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Christianity Today
It's nothing more and nothing less than quintessential U2, full of the searing, echo-drenched guitar riffs and rousing sing-along choruses that have always marked the band's best work.
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The Irish Times
U2 brought us to a comfort zone of sorts with the last two albums, but here they’re up for taking a few risks and chancing arms, legs and cojones on this big, brash embrace of an album.
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Drowned In Sound
Unfortunately, too much of NLOTH sounds staid and uninspired, again maybe due to the changing musical landscape that was going on all around them during the making of the record.
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Matador Network
No doubt one of their best albums lyrically.
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Music OMH
U2 seem to have finally found what they were looking for.
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All About Jazz
May not be the crowning achievement in U2's illustrious career, but it is one of many great ones.
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Alternative Addiction
Nothing amazing with this U2 album. It's not as good as some people are going to say it is, but it does what U2 does best.
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Los Angeles Times
The 12th studio album by the seminal Irish band reflects on the need -- and perils -- of change.
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Pretty Much Amazing
If you love U2, then you'll love this album. If you hate U2, this record probably won't change that.
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Prefix Magazine
A more visceral and memorable effort than either of the band’s other two 21st century offerings.
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Antiquiet
Certainly not U2’s best, but it’s their best in a long, long time.
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Pogostick
While it’s a quality album, there’s almost a little apathy creeping in, a bit of ‘hey were so stupidly rich now, and getting old, and too busy protesting against the G7’ to care about making the soulful music that characterised the likes of Joshua Tree and Achtung Baby (which by the way is my definite favourite).
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My Vinyl Review
They turn out a solid, if at times uneven record, that in its best moments harkens back to the creative pinnacle of their career, the 1992 triumph, Achtung Baby.
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The San Diego Union-Tribune
Feels more compelling in sound and less strident in message than U2's previous two efforts this decade
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Music Radar
An impressive combination of the traditional and the future.
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The Blewog Blog
Every track on the album is good, but I don’t think every track on the album is very good.
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Journal Star
This isn't the kind of disc that's going to bring many converts to U2. But it's a record U2 fans will embrace, its best outing since 1997's "Pop" and maybe even 1993's "Zooropa."
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PhotogMusic
Its a mix of new and old U2 sounds.
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Spin
Sick of Bono? Maybe. Sick of U2? Not yet.
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Soul Surmise
Those with ears to hear need a whole dose more of this!
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Boston Herald
It's not the glittery, boom-era "Achtung Baby." Nor is it the simple, single-driven "Joshua Tree." "No Line on the Horizon" fits today: as byzantine as the bailout, as fresh as Obama.
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WAAF
If you like U2... you'll probably like this album. If you don't, you may like a couple songs, but it's not a far departure from what they do best.
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Blog Critics
U2 do what they do very well on No Line On The Horizon. No complaints there.
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Music Banter
They promised to set new standards with this one and they delivered!
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Readings
it is a pop masterpiece. Great bass lines and guitar riffs; Bono in fine form out front.
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The Channels
“okay,” but nothing more. This album falls short of fan’s hopes.
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Beats Per Minute
What No Line on the Horizon lacks in radical experimentation it makes up for in sheer strength of melody. The album is loose but never tossed off, joyous but never gratuitously so.
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Riff Raff
Another uptick in the generally downward trajectory of U2's musical output since the early 90s.
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The Music Box
U2 remains in touch with the universe at large as the musicians allow their bodies to become vessels through which the music can flow.
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The Austin Chronicle
Reaches for The Unforgettable Fire's post-War reinvention but misfires this side of Pop without the songs.
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Vintage Rock
Wearing certain trademarks, shades and gradations like an old floppy hat on Sunday, this record burrows out a jagged, inimitable niche for itself among a catalog of classics.
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Cross Rythms
Were it to be their last, it would mean going out on a high point.
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The Piker Press
The band hasn't forgotten what made them great, neither should you.
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