U2’s chart-topping 1991 album “Achtung Baby” was released 30 years ago today.

U2‘s Achtung baby The album is celebrating its 30th anniversary today. Released on November 18, 1991, the album debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, and has been certified eight times platinum by the RIAA.

Achtung baby was the follow-up to the Irish rocker’s 1988 documentary album Rattle and hum. Get away from the American sounds of Rattle and hum, the band returned to a more alternative rock sound to Achtung baby, while adding elements of industrial and electronic music. The new sound was prevalent in songs like “Mysterious Ways” with funk-rock accents and “The Fly” influenced by hip-hop.

U2 has started recording Achtung baby in the Hansa studios in Germany just a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall. Although the group hopes to be inspired by German reunification, Achtung baby became a very dark and personal album. The members of U2 struggled throughout the recording sessions, although things really started to fall into place when they wrote “One,” which became one of the band’s best-known songs. .

Two singles from the album reached the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100, “Mysterious Ways” and “One”, which peaked at # 9 and # 10 respectively. Achtung baby also produced two other top 40 hits – “Even Better Than the Real Thing” and “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses”.

U2 supported Achtung baby with the Zoo TV tour, which used elaborate visuals and other multimedia to emphasize the theme of “sensory overload”. Throughout the trek, Bono dressed up as different characters and the group adopted a more humorous and ironic tone.

Considered by many to be one of U2’s greatest works, Achtung baby returned the group to critical acclaim and paved the way for the group’s continued musical exploration through the 1990s.

here is Achtung babythe complete list of tracks from:

“Zoo Station”
“Even better than the real thing”
“A”
“Until the end of the world”
“Who’s going to ride your wild horses?” “
“So cruel”
“Fly”
“Mysterious ways”
“Try to launch your weapons across the world”
“Ultraviolet (Light My Way)”
“Acrobat”
“Love is blind”

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