Brian Eno is MORE DARK THAN SHARK

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Rolling Stone OCTOBER 26, 2009 - by Will Hermes

U2: THE UNFORGETTABLE FIRE

This transitional, hit-or-miss set, U2's first collaboration with producers Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, followed 1983's breakthrough, War. When things click, it bridges that record's fight-the-power arena rock with the texture fetishism of its follow-up, The Joshua Tree. The transcendent Bad is the triumph, but the bonus disc adds fascinating experiments, including the excellent Bowie-drag outtake Disappearing Act and some funky B sides that borrow from Eno's Talking Heads playbook (see Boomerang II). They're working notes from the band's first great reinvention; it wouldn't be its last.