The Edge says U2 once pretended a Ramones song was theirs to get on Irish TV

Virgin Radio

7 Sep 2021, 10:28

As one of the biggest bands in the world for many years, U2 have filled massive stadiums, headlined Glastonbury, sold countless albums, and won numerous awards, so it’s strange to think that they had to hustle to get their big break all those years ago. But, as guitarist The Edge has admitted, the band had to tell a little white lie to secure their first TV appearance. 

Speaking on Tom Morello’s Maximum Firepower podcast, The Edge explained to the Rage Against The Machine legend how, all the way back in 1978, his band pretended that a Ramones’ song was their own during an audition to play on Irish national television.

"Somehow, don't ask me how, but some producer from the national broadcast company came to our school looking for youth talent for some new show that they were pulling together,” The Edge told Tom. 

The U2 guitarist continued: “One of our teachers said, 'Well there's somebody who plays the flute in the fourth year, there's kind of an okay ballet dancer in sixth class, oh and there's a rock 'n' roll band that's just started and they're rehearsing on a Saturday and Wednesday. And it happens to be Wednesday so they're probably in rehearsal right now.’ So, somebody came over and said, ‘You probably won't be interested but would you want to be on national television?’” 

As you would expect, the young band were indeed interested in appearing on TV, and agreed to allow a producer to come and check out one of their songs. The Edge said that the band then had a ten-ten minute argument over which song they were going to play. He explained: “We were still in the midst of the argument when everyone walked in the room, so now we're like, no plan, no idea. Bono just says, 'The song of ours we should play is Glad To See You Go and he's looking at Larry, me and Adam and we all go, 'OK'. The Ramones song? Cool. So we just played a Ramones song and the guy said, 'So that's one of your tunes?' Yep!”

The untruth paid off and the band, who were called Hype at the time, got to play on the show, where they performed their own number, Street Mission.

The rest, as they say, is history. 

The Edge told Tom that he even got the chance to share the anecdote with Joey Ramone. “One of the great thrills was being able to meet Joey Ramone years later and being able to tell him that story, and he rolled around the floor laughing at that one,” he said. 

On the podcast, Tom and The Edge also chatted about the redemptive potential of rock ‘n’ roll and the positive impact of music.

“I think it starts when you’re a music fan, and music changes your life,” The Edge said. “You start to understand that music is way more powerful than a form of entertainment.”