10. POP (1997)

“Mother, you left and made me someone / Now I’m still a child, but no one tells me ‘no.’”

— “MOFO”

I guess I must value ambition over execution, since I’m ranking the problem-child POP ahead of the good-son Atomic Bomb. After a decade or so of legacy-minded backpedaling, it’s easy to forget now that in the 90s U2 had Radiohead-like creative aspirations and the Rolling Stones’ determination to sell out football stadiums. They’ve told the story many times of how they rushed this album out undercooked (despite having labored over it for at least a year) because they had committed to dates for the all-stadiums PopMart Tour before the record was finished.

There was also the little matter of U2’s most dynamic and expressive instrument — that would be Bono’s Vox — having suddenly gone limp due to poor vocal technique and smoking, which he’d started 15 years into his singing career. (For a smart guy, Bono can be quite stupid.) Their other iconic element, Edge’s guitar, is largely buried (the wailing “Gone” is a welcome exception), though when it descends for a strafing run at the crescendo of the full-on techno track “MOFO,” it’s probably the most thrilling moment on the album.

The band’s wish to explore dance music was sincere, but so was America’s utter disinterest in hearing U2 try to sound like the Chemical Brothers. When they dressed up like the Village People for the video for lead single “Discotheque” — the mere title sounded horrifying at the time — plenty of former fans decided they’d stay home and listen to The Joshua Tree or more likely, OK Computer, thankyouverymuch.

Still, the desperation that’s palpable throughout this album — much, if not all of it, intentional — gives it a gravitas that holds up. It’s U2’s darkest set of songs, and for all the electronic bleeps and bloops (courtesy of Howie B., Nellie Hooper, Flood, and a cast of thousands), their most naked. The bent ballad “If You Wear That Velvet Dress,” the muso “Sunday Bloody Sunday” update “Please” and the ecclesiastical lament “Wake Up, Dead Man” make a closing triptych that’s nothing at all to be ashamed of.