No Line on the Horizon – U2

No Line on the Horizon, U2’s thirteenth album, has generated glowing reviews by most music critics (detractors at Pitchfork excluded): Rolling Stone calls it the band’s best album “in textural exploration and melodic grip” since Achtung Baby, while NME crowns it a “sweeping, brave record,” and Paste praises it as “a well-crafted, classically-sturdy rock album.”

No Line shines, stepping forward with innovative combinations of guitar and piano in “Breathe,” calling on an uncharacteristically muted reverie in “Ceders of Lebanon,” and offering the best of The Edge and U2’s ethereal electric charm in “Magnificent.” The album, which was written in Fez, Morroco, has a decidedly different feel than any of U2s other records, proving, once more, that the world’s most creative and successful bands refuse to stay comfortable while still managing to maintain the sound that has earned them their fan base.