It wasn’t a “reading”. But neither is a concert. What was that with Bono in Berlin’s Admiralspalast? Of course, the evening revolved around his autobiography “Surrender”, but only in excerpts and with a lot of music. Actually, it was more of a play. There were only a few chairs and a table on the stage, a cellist and a harpist were seated in the background, and producer Jacknife Lee was standing at the mixing desk on the edge. The audience was able to concentrate well on all of this, because all mobile phones had to be locked away – a fact that the comedian Michael Mittermeier, for example, did not find so wrong, because for once not dozens of people asked for selfies with him.
Few people are as in their element as soon as they step up to the microphone as Bono. Right at the beginning he says he got permission from The Edge, Larry Mullen Jr. and Adam Clayton to sing a few U2 songs in this context – and later he very lovingly introduces the three musicians individually – who are they, what do they mean to him? It’s not a cliché that this band doesn’t have a leader, it just is. Bono is just the one who draws a lot more attention outside. Luckily, he largely omits all the meetings with politicians that take up a lot of space in “Surrender” on his show (a quick thank you to Merkel and Scholz for their development aid commitment will have to do) and concentrates on the really important relationships in his Life.
Please excuse me if I don’t give you an exact sequence of the evening – I dropped my pen on the third song because Bono sang “With Or Without You” with so much fervor that it sounded like new again. And then you just had to surrender to the story, see book title. Bono tells the story somewhat chronologically, but with a clear focus on the early years of his life and that of the band, the funniest thing he embellishes is the encounter with Luciano Pavarotti. Here it shows that the singer is also an impersonator – he speaks in different voices, recreates dialogues, describes all scenes not only with words but physically. Sometimes it gets a bit too theatrical, especially at the beginning – maybe that’s a clever protective measure: It’s difficult to have to keep telling about a heart operation that almost cost him his life. If he can act it out like a movie scene, it’s probably a little bit easier. Incidentally, it becomes clear that this Bono is also a good draftsman – his sketches of people and scenes projected in the background, often with scrawled writing, underscore the narration as simply as it is effective. (Actually, what can’t the guy do? Oh yeah, shut up.)
As in the book (“me book that I have written myself”, as he emphasizes several times), the family stories are the most touching on this evening. At its core, the almost two-hour show is primarily a necromancy. Bono keeps talking to his late father, Bob Hewson, and reminiscing about his mother, Iris, who died when he was 14. From then on, she was never spoken of again in the Hewson house – an incredibly brutal situation for a teenager. Of course, the pent-up grief and anger made Bono Bono – he openly admits it. And in his own self-mockery (which is often overlooked by critics), he also constantly pokes fun at his overblown ego. His autobiography is now the pinnacle: “I’ll give even more to all the people who already had enough of me anyway!” What does that remind us of? “You give it all, but I want more”, of course. Still true.
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