By the end of Soul Mining: A Musical Life it felt like Daniel Lanois and I were friends. As if Lanois himself had read me these stories. I began listening to albums I’d never heard before as well as reinterpreting albums I was very familiar with. Now his captivating signature sound is as recognizable to me as a guitar solo by U2′s The Edge or Bob Dylan vocals.

For most fans of drummer Larry Mullen. Jr, bassist Adam Clayton, guitarist The Edge, and vocalist Bono, these are the periods that define their loyalty to a band known as U2. But this devotion only covers two-thirds of a career that spans three decades. In the last 10 years alone U2 have released three albums: All That You Can’t Leave Behind (2000), How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb (2004), and most recently, No Line on The Horizon (2009), which means that kids who are 18 years old today were nine when the smash hit single, “Beautiful Day,” first hit airwaves.