"Sunday, Bloody Sunday"

The Troubles, U2, and rock

I have written about music in the past, talking about how music can either bring a family together or divide it.

Why I like the Sultans of Swing

Today, I would like to look at a different aspect of the music I have been listening to: songs that discuss “The Troubles” in Ireland. To this end, I will be talking a lot about history. Ultimately I will touch on two songs, Invisible Sun by The Police and Sunday Bloody Sunday by U2.

Just to remind you, this is not complete, neither is it the “be all and the end all” in Irish history. I was inspired by this song to look into this piece of history.

The Bachman Beat

Tal Bachman, son of the Bachman of Bachman-Turner Overdrive, writes about the dawn of U2 in his series of articles on Steyn Online. He talks about how what he considered the “greats” of rock ‘n roll were overshadowed by the coming of disco and punk, ruining the rock of the 70s as the 80s dawned.

“The first blow was disco. Hardcore rock fans saw it as garbage. Moderate fans saw it more as a joke; but commercially and culturally, it was no joke at all… disco music was nothing less than the élan vital of an exciting new way of being… It was also one in which every man and woman, on any given dance floor on any given Saturday night, could and would become a star in their own right…”

The next blow to 70s rock was, psychologically, even more damaging. Whereas disco had merely ignored the rock titans (after all, disco was too busy partying to take aim at anyone), the new punk movement out of England savagely attacked them. Rock's behemoths, said the punk bands, were ridiculous, obsolete, pretentious, and inauthentic…

But there was more to the punk criticism of arena rock than mere mockery. There was moral condemnation… The punks were holy warriors fighting a sociopolitical holy war against an unjust status quo represented by Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, and all their pals…”

—Tal Bachman: New Year's Day, part one

You have to take into account that he is the son of a rock-star in Randy Bachman. I personally like some punk (see this, this, and this article). But he does have a point: disco is very “me me me”; punk is very political and rebellious (but isn’t rock also that?).

But, according to Bachman, there was one band that broke free from this: U2. In the next two articles he lifts up the hood and shows what he thinks are the good things that U2 had for them to make them what they became: a band that would change the world.

Now, that is interesting… maybe extreme. But, anyway, lets look at it. Before we can understand the song, we need to understand what exactly “The Troubles” are, and why was U2 singing about them.

A quick history of “The Troubles”

It was a time roughly from the mid-60s to the late 90s where Ireland was in a crisis over where their borders were.

Now, this seems simple, since it is an island—but not so fast, the British (on the most complicated island in the world) are involved, so it is not so simple.

Now, back in the time of Oliver Cromwell, there was a British conquest of Ireland (1649–53). They threw out tons of people from their homes, established their own set of lords (or whatever hairbrained idea Cromwell had of governorship), and imported a whole bunch of immigrants to colonize Ireland, including lots of Scots.

What these Englishmen and Scotsmen also brought was their religion: Protestantism. Ireland had been relatively untouched by the Reformation in England, and so were staunchly Catholic still.

Fast forward over the fall of Cromwell; the Battle of the Boyne (which was a defining moment in the Glorious Revolution that ended the reign of the Stuarts and started the Protestant tradition of the Orange Walk); all the kerfuffle over who actually was King of England (it was James the Old Pretender btw); the Revolutionary War in America (which made Ireland Charles Cornwallis’s retirement home after the siege of Yorktown); the Civil War (a very busy time for the British); and past the era of Edwardian England to the time of Young Indiana Jones.

This glosses over a ton of history, so don’t be mad at me. I am not writing a book, only an article about a rock song.

Bear with me, we are getting closer to The Troubles.

The Easter Rising

In late April of 1916, at the height of the First World War, a group of Irishmen decided they had had enough. They declared the Irish Republic in a post-office in Dublin. The British went on to lay siege to the post office. After days of fighting, where Dublin was made into a war-zone, the rebels finally surrendered. Many of them were executed.

Honestly, I don’t know how accurate the scenes from Young Indiana Jones are, but they are what sparked my interest originally.

But this stand started a movement in Ireland to end the tyranny of the British, and make a free Ireland. The political movement Sinn Féin, which is still an active party in Ireland, was started as a result of this rising.

But everything was not hotsy-totsy yet for the Irish. They still had a lot of fighting yet to get their Republic.

But we don’t have time for every fight the Irish ever had. I’m sorry.

Let’s just say for now that by the 1960s things were sufficiently ironed out that there were two countries on one tiny island: Ireland (the official name is just that, no “Republic”¹) and Northern Ireland (part of the UK).

It was a lot like what happened in India in the 30s, there were two religions in Ireland: Catholicism and Protestantism. The Catholics were generally found in the Republic, while the Protestants were generally found in Northern Ireland.

But, if you know anything about Catholics and Protestants, you know that there are tons of fighting between the two groups. For good reasons, they cannot leave each other alone.

The Catholics in Northern Ireland were especially oppressed. This is what started “The Troubles”.

A sort of guerrilla/terrorist warfare started up between the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the British Army in Northern Ireland. The IRA is called terrorists, but they were different from the ones who crashed into the Twin Towers. When the IRA blew up a building, they would enter it and tell everyone to evacuate. The building, not the people, was their object.

Northern Ireland became a war zone. Just taking a look at scenes from the music video for Invisible Sun is enough to show you what was going on:

This particular song was in reference to a group of IRA members who went on a hunger strike in an English prison. They demanded that they be treated like prisoners of war by the Geneva Convention.

The leader was a man called Bobby Sands, who was elected as a Member of Parliament (MP) while in prison. He was also a poet, which is so Irish².

Another one was Brendan McLaughlin, who is a distant relation to our family.

The song was written by Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, also know as Sting, who was the front-man for The Police. The “invisible sun” is supposed to be a sign of hope for those in prison or in the battle. In other words, you have to have something to hold on to, or you are going to give into despair.

We can debate the morality of the hunger strike all we want. The Catholic Church had a favorable stance officially on this particular one, according to Wikipedia. But, apparently, the local Bishop personally disapproved of it. It is not clear.

But, nevertheless, these guys were doing this for the greater good, on a principle that was bigger than they were. Though I don’t know if these men were Catholic, or were faithful Catholics, I do know that their cause was admirable, being against the tyranny of England that had lasted hundreds of years. Sting might not have thought of this, but I have. The invisible sun is God.

Sunday Bloody Sunday

The song I want to talk about is Sunday Bloody Sunday by U2. This song referred to Bloody Sunday or the Bogside Massacre of 1972.

In a maneuver called Operation Demetrius, the British rounded up suspected IRA members and arrested them without trial (called Internment). In protest of this, the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association organized a march on Sunday, January 30th, 1972 in Londonderry. As the protestors encountered military barriers around the city, they changed their route. The British Army was deployed to help police the march. Eventually, after a few skirmishes between youths and the police, the Army opened fire on the protestors, killing 13 and wounding at least 15.

There was a movie made about it in 2002. I don’t know how good it really is, but the trailer looks interesting.

Very reminiscent of some of the things happening in this country…

Anyway in 1983, The Troubles were still in full swing, and a group of Irish Rockstars wanted to do something about it.

That something was this song, and many more. U2 was a very political band. They were also, at least, nominally Christian. They were anti-war and believed that the conflicts in Ireland could only be solved by stopping the fighting.

This is what Sunday Bloody Sunday is about: the evil of war and bloodshed.

And the battle's just begun
There's many lost, but tell me who has won?
The trench is dug within our hearts
And mothers, children, brothers, sisters torn apart

This song took U2 across the pond to the US, and put them on their way to being the biggest band in the world.

What makes this song (and Invisible Sun) unique is that they are, fundamentally, folk songs. They talk about the history of a people: the Irish and the Troubles.

Some of the best Irish-folk-drinking-songs refer to 20th century events in Ireland, such as the Easter Rising. A family favorite is Johnson’s Motor Car, a song about a group of rebels in 1921 that commandeer a car from a Dr. Johnson from Stranorlar.

Sunday Bloody Sunday is essentially a folk song. The catchy riffs are not really the point, it is the message that the music conveys. That is what I appreciate in U2’s music.

What Tal Bachman says in his series is that U2’s lead man, Bono, used his fame on the right things. Maybe that is true in some cases. Bachman, at least, gives him a bit of credit for the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, which officially ended The Troubles.³

On the other hand, I have written a bit about Bono in the past, touching on him in my research into the World Economic Forum and Agenda 2030:

The World Economic Forum, Agenda 2030, and World Youth Day

Bono is one who has a lot of good ideas. A lot of good intentions. Some of these are mis-spent. But I have to respect his desire to effect some good with his fame. He at least makes it seem convincing sometimes, which is more than most pop-stars can say.

I know that U2 is seen as a band that you are not allowed to like, or that everyone says they like but no one really does. But, I have to say, I find it a little different.

Thanks,

𝕭𝖔𝖓𝖎𝖋𝖆𝖈𝖊

I must remind you that I am just an 19 year old young man who is trying to figure things out. I am not a doctor, lawyer, financial advisor, or theologian. I read the doctors, lawyers, financial advisors, or theologians and try to understand what they are talking about, and then write about it. Don’t listen to me! Listen to the people I listen to.

I am not endorsing every song by every group I have mentioned… there is such a thing as a bad song.

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Also, try the new Substack feature and restack this post by clicking the 🔁 button.

1. You see, the Republic of Ireland portion wanted the entire island to be considered as one country, hence the simple name “Ireland”.

2. The whole thing is really Irish: they fight for their land, a poet leads a protest, and they call it all “the troubles”.

3. I only said “officially”.