U2, longtime protesters of nuclear energy, have had a complete backflip over the nuclear threat. Bono and The Edge are now for nuclear energy, not against it.
Back in 1992, U2 and Greenpeace staged demonstrations at nuclear energy plants.
In 2002 Bono and his wife Ali were vocal about shutting down nuclear plants. ‘This is an issue of acute, personal concern to every Irish resident,’ Ali said in 2002. ‘We are sitting ducks just waiting for an accident to devastate our lives and our country.
In 2023 it’s a different story. Bono and U2 even have a cute new song about nuclear energy called ‘Atomic City’.
As they begin their Las Vegas residency, Bono says in reference to Las Vegas of the new song “Las Vegas was known as Atomic City because they had atomic bomb tourism in the 50s. Come and watch the mushroom clouds. The atomic explosions were as big an attraction as gambling back then.”
Bono and The Edge talked to Apple Music ahead of the first Vegas show telling fans there is now nothing to fear. In fact, Bono says Nuclear is the answer to the climate crisis. “But now all the fear and dread in the atom and using it as a weapon of mass destruction, they may be clues for how we get out of the climate crisis. Fusion rather than Fission. Fission which is regular nuclear energy is getting safer and smarter and we’ve campaigned against nuclear energy but we have kind of turned around a little bit on that one. So the lyric “atomic Sun for everyone” is that reference. We are using it in a comic sense Atomic City. Actually by not splitting the atom, by using the atom, you have unlimited energies>
U2:UV Achtung Baby Live at Sphere opens at Sphere at the Venetian Resort, Las Vegas, 29 September, 2023.
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