A cryptic comment from Bono in a new U2 interview has got fans dreading that their new album, out next week, could be their last.
It comes as the band this week announced the first shows of an upcoming world tour, which will start in Mexico in February and is set to conclude in Dublin, possibly in 2028.
The group releases their 16th album, Carnaval de Luz, next Friday, weeks after playing a secret concert at their old school, Mount Temple in Dublin.
A cryptic comment from Bono in a new U2 interview has got fans dreading that their new album, out next week, could be their last
An interview recorded on the day of that concert with Apple Music's Zane Lowe, in which U2 discuss the new record at length, was released this week on the same day the tour was announced.
And one remark Bono made during the chat has got some fans fearing that the rockers, who are celebrating 50 years together this year, are preparing to wind the operation down.
Lowe suggests the band's return to their old school, which will soon be knocked and rebuilt, amounts to them saying hello and goodbye at the same time.
He describes that as 'symbolic… because I feel like Carnaval de Luz is almost a goodbye and a hello again', then asks: 'Does that make sense to you?'
Bono says in reply: 'Mm-hmm. Carnaval de Luz is definitely more goodbye. That's for sure.'
Lowe suggests the band's return to their old school, which will soon be knocked and rebuilt, amounts to them saying hello and goodbye at the same time
There is a brief pause before the singer changes the subject without elaborating further.
The comment has sparked some debate among fans online, who are divided over its gravity.
One fan of the band wrote on X: 'Considering that it's nine years since their last album and the fact [that] Larry is seemingly limited these days, I can't imagine them going on much longer.'
Drummer Larry Mullen Jr underwent high-risk neck surgery after years of struggling with chronic pain caused by a congenital fusion in a facet joint.
He missed the band's 40 shows at The Sphere in Las Vegas in 2023 and 2024, and has suggested he may only play for an hour each night on the upcoming tour.
Another fan noted it was not the first time Bono has made such a comment, but pointed out that most of the band members will be almost 70 when the next tour ends, so it will be 'hard to keep producing and touring at that stage'.
Another said: 'I think this is [the] last big tour cycle, that's for sure.'
Other fans played down the remark, arguing that Bono was simply speaking of the themes of the upcoming album.
And one wrote: 'They seem to be having a real burst of creative energy so maybe it's goodbye to an era and also the start of something different.'
Still other fans pointed to a recent interview in The New York Times as proof that there is plenty of life in the old dogs yet – though in the same interview Bono acknowledges that they do have a shelf life.
Another fan noted it was not the first time Bono has made such a comment, but pointed out that most of the band members will be almost 70 when the next tour ends, so it will be 'hard to keep producing and touring at that stage'
The interviewer asks if the band has 'some sense of how you want [your] story to end', to which guitarist The Edge says: 'We're still creatively extremely inspired and active, and there are lots of songs that have yet to be released, yet to be finished. So I can't see that ending anytime soon.'
Bono then says: 'More likely, I think, is that people tire of you and that we tire of going the distance to meet them, resulting in them tiring of you.
'I think if we keep playing live till we drop, there will always be people. But we have one problem in this regard, which is that we pledged to each other when we were 18, 17, 16, that we would never, ever walk onto a stage without it being everything.
'We haven't betrayed that yet. We've had fistfights onstage, we've had them backstage, we've had madness, but we've never betrayed that.'
The band announced the first details of their Greatest Show On Earth World Tour this week.
Eleven stadium shows have been announced for a first Latin American leg kicking off in early spring 2027, while 12 European summer shows were also revealed.
Further shows are going to be announced, including another European leg, but whatever comes next, the band has promised to finish the tour in Ireland.
Eleven stadium shows have been announced for a first Latin American leg kicking off in early spring 2027, while 12 European summer shows were also revealed
A band press release said that with plans 'already in the works for 2028, the band is looking ahead to their all-important return home to Ireland'.
The Edge said: 'We can't say too much about the next leg of The Greatest Show On Earth – we're still figuring it out – but what we can say is, we'll be wrapping it up in Ireland.
'There's nowhere else we'd want to be for that party.'
Elsewhere in the Mount Temple interview with Lowe, The Edge says that U2 'don't have really a musical genre that we fit into' and are AI-proof.
'I discovered this recently very clearly when I was playing around with some of these AI music programs,' he said.
He went on: 'I was trying to see if it could come up with a U2 song. It couldn't.
'And I realised that it is possible to get it to write a country song because it's very strictly codified.
'But nothing we do… I mean, my guitar would probably be most [distinctive]… I suppose I go certain places sonically. But our songwriting is never a formula. We don't know how to do that.'
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