Charity With An Edge

April 18, 2007

by Lyndsey Parker


U2 is a band inextricably connected in the public's mind with philanthropy and all-around social consciousness--but usually in association with the charity efforts of the band's recently knighted mouthpiece, the almighty Bono. However, U2 guitarist the Edge is equally committed to giving back. Case in point: Music Rising, the charity organization he co-founded in 2005 with legendary producer Bob Ezrin and Gibson Guitar chairman Henry Juszkiewicz, to help aid musicians and preserve music in post-Katrina New Orleans.

Gearing up for Music Rising's "Icons Of Music" auction -- which takes place at Julien's Auctions on April 21, 2007, and will sell memorabilia donated by the likes of Bruce Springsteen, the Rolling Stones, Madonna, Bob Dylan, and the Edge himself -- the always eloquent Edge took time out of his busy philanthropic schedule to speak with Yahoo! Music's Lyndsey Parker on the phone from his native Dublin. The two discussed Edge's love for New Orleans' music, his hope to rebuild the hurricane-ravaged city, and even what U2 are doing musically when they're not out making the world a better place. Here's how it went...

YAHOO! MUSIC: So, can you tell me a little bit about Music Rising, and how this venture came about?

THE EDGE: The idea came together pretty spontaneously after the Katrina disaster. I was kind of inspired to do something for the music culture of the area, knowing a little bit about it -- having been there a few times myself and seen for myself what a unique place it was for music. I was trying to figure out what to do, and I happened to meet Bob Ezrin, the producer, and he was speaking the same as myself about trying to do something. We hooked up with others, and this charity came about as a response to, really, the jeopardy that we felt was surrounding the whole culture of the area. Because the music there is a tradition that's handed down -- it's not really a formal kind of musical approach that could documented. It's about fathers passing it on to their sons and grandfathers passing it on to their grandkids. It occurs in church halls and in schools in these parts of New Orleans, many of which were destroyed by Katrina. So the people with the traditions and the knowledge have been scattered all over America. So Music Rising tried to encourage the music to continue in whichever way we could. The first thing we managed to do was put instruments back in the hands of professional musicians -- the tools of their trade, their guitars or their horns or their drums or their keyboards. That was the first priority. We managed during the first six months to get to over 2,000 professional musicians. We've got to the point now where we feel we've managed to reach most of them, and now we want to concentrate our efforts on the areas themselves that have been swept up away by the hurricane -- the Lower 9th Ward, St. Bernard Parish, and other areas of the Gulf Coast. It's in these districts that these people with these incredible traditions of music lived, and we want to try to make it as easy as possible for the music to come back. So the idea now is to get the schools and the churches up and running with their music programs. So we're concentrating on music, but we hope that through that, there will be a general kind of encouragement for rebuilding. Because it's been our experience, having been there, that wherever music is being played, there's an outpouring of positivity and hope for the future. You know, although New Orleans is still with us, still there, it's a reduced city, and I think the danger is in the reshuffle -- that in the act of trying to get it back up and running, the music will not be considered a priority. We're concerned that it's going to be overlooked, so we want to try and keep people's attention on this incredible treasure.

YAHOO! MUSIC: Did you ever visit New Orleans in the Katrina aftermath, and see the destruction firsthand?

THE EDGE: I was there a few months after the disaster, so I was there really when many areas of the city were still closed. I had a contact in the police force down there, so I was actually able to go down and see some of the areas, and it was quite overwhelming, the level of destruction. I'm used to seeing areas that have been hit with smaller-scale problems -- I've seen firsthand bomb sites and all that -- but this was on a totally different scale. This was not just a block or a few buildings. This was square kilometers of suburban development that were totally annihilated. I found it quite overwhelming to see just the scale of it. I saw things very few people would have seen. I got to see the dump where the authorities had been piling up the detritus of lives -- the ruined cars, the ruined ovens and refrigerators and air-conditioning units, all these things. Acres and acres of ruined family possessions. When you see that, it's on just this unbelievable scale. It's hard to explain, really, if you haven't seen it. But the jeopardy is now that, it's difficult sometimes to negotiate all the hurdles and get these places rebuilt, to give people a chance to come back to their areas. It seems there's been such a delay, such inertia, that it may not happen. That, I feel, would be a real mistake.

YAHOO! MUSIC: Are you at all concerned that in the re-gentrification of New Orleans, the old culture will be lost, and it will just become a city of Starbucks franchises?

THE EDGE: Yeah, I do fear that. I fear that a lot. Because I do feel that in many ways the areas that I'm interested in, as a fan of New Orleans music, are areas that would be seen as marginal. If you talk to members of the police force down there, they talk about these being "troublesome" areas. If you talk to the politicians, they say these are the areas with high unemployment, that they are "challenged" economically. You talk to the engineers, and they say those areas are fairly low-lying and it's difficult to build there safely for the future. So everyone is thinking, "Well, maybe we won't get around to actually rebuilding there. We'll leave the people where they are and we'll do something else over here." But if you're a fan of music, these are not marginal areas. This is the absolute epicenter of everything that's exciting about New Orleans.

YAHOO! MUSIC: U2 is involved with a lot worthy causes. Why is this cause so close to your heart?

THE EDGE: There's some poetry here for me, and that is the fact that I earn my living as a result of this great musical idea called "rock 'n' roll." If it wasn't for that movement starting up in America, I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing -- there's just no doubt about that in my mind. It's brought me places and given me things that I couldn't have achieved otherwise. I think many of the people who've contributed to the Icons Of Music auction feel the same way. It's unique to America. You could say that jazz and rock 'n' roll are America's unique contribution to world culture. That's America, in cultural terms. And this is where it all came from! Louisiana had this very remarkable, liberal attitude towards African culture in the 19th century, and there was this place Congo Square -- which is in New Orleans to this day -- where on weekends African music was played, drums were brought out. It was just this genuine blending of the cultures in New Orleans. I suppose the French were just a bit more laid-back than the English when it came to that sort of thing. Down through the years, various traditions were preserved as a result -- things like the jazz funerals, which still go on to this day, and the second-line jazz bands. A lot the traditions would go back to Africa, West Africa. It's highly likely that as a result of this intermingling of African rhythms in Congo Square and these bands that were playing a lot of Western hymns, that there on the streets of New Orleans was the beginning of this blending. You got the melody from Europe and the rhythm from Africa. The scene was set for a very interesting hybrid form to come through. It did, and it's been incredibly resilient over the years; it's still around in its raw form. From that came all kinds of wonderful music: ragtime, jazz, R&B. So it's just this real fertile culture, but it's all very particular to these communities and these areas. Everyone who visits New Orleans goes to the French Quarter and they get a sense of the place, but it's not really the French Quarter where this stuff goes on. That's the stage, where it gets played and everyone gets to see it, but actually where it's preserved and maintained is in these suburbs. New Orleans, if it lost its suburbs, would not survive as we know and love it. It would certainly become a much less interesting place. Funny enough, when I first went to America, most of what I knew about the country was through movies and TV, and when I got there, I discovered that there's so much more diversity to the culture. When people talk to me about the United States of America being a homogenized place, I say, "You've got to be kidding!" It's totally not. I just cite New Orleans as an example. The diversity there is astonishing. You've got the French-speaking districts, zydeco...it's all there, within a 100-mile radius of New Orleans, this incredible diversity of music and history. To me, this area is one of the things that I love about America the most. And I feel like in the hustle and bustle of trying to deal with a very difficult situation, it could easily get lost.

YAHOO! MUSIC: How do you feel about how the U.S. government responded to the Katrina crisis?

THE EDGE: I guess I was surprised that there didn't seem to be the kind of urgency I would have expected. I know it's a difficult thing. I'm not suggesting that dealing with a disaster of this magnitude could or should ever be easy. It just seemed that there wasn't that kind of urgent response. It seemed to take a very long time to get going, and momentum has been very hard to achieve. There's political inertia of all kinds down there. I don't think it's probably very helpful to start finger-pointing, it is what it is, but the problems are still unfortunately there. It seems to be incredibly difficult to get things going. It seems a lot of non-government agencies are having a lot more luck! Habitat For Humanity are in there doing great work, and I hear a lot about a lot of musicians doing different things that are helping. A lot of it doesn't seem to be government stuff. But what do I know? There's probably protocols between the state and the federal government that complicate it. But it seems like the red tape is winning -- which is completely terrible!

YAHOO! MUSIC: Tell me more about the Icons Of Music auction, and the items that celebrities donated to be sold.

THE EDGE: I was totally bowled over by the response. It's incredible, people's reactions, and I think that really speaks a lot about New Orleans' music and how musicians feel about it. Yes, obviously people were responding to my involvement, but really what they were responding to is the New Orleans music scene. They obviously felt it was very much worth supporting. So I was delighted, amazed, to get some incredible things. People have been incredibly generous. I think the auction is going to raise a lot of money, and I think it's going to do an awful lot of good on many levels. First of all, there will be a lot of music groups that will be up and running again because of this. But also I think the sort of karmic, cosmic support that it shows will raise people's spirits in New Orleans. Which is really good, because it's an issue that's very much drifted off the newspaper headlines. I mean, it's not even page 14 at this point. So it's a very good thing.

YAHOO! MUSIC: How much money do you expect to raise?

THE EDGE: I don't know exactly, but I'm sure it will be in the millions. I haven't done the math. You know, schools and churches are more expensive to equip that individual musicians. A church is maybe a five- or six-piece band plus their PA system, and then with a school, you're talking a full brass band, full orchestra. So that's hundreds of thousands of dollars. But I think we're going to be able to help a lot of schools and churches with this.

YAHOO! MUSIC: Which auction items are you most excited about?

THE EDGE: There's a beautiful acoustic guitar that Paul McCartney gave us, which means a lot, and there's one from Lou Reed which is incredible. Joe Perry from Aerosmith gave us a beautiful guitar. But there's other things as well, like a Beatles concert ticket from Shea Stadium. That's a little piece of history. The posters from Woodstock, Grateful Dead posters...and obviously a Jimi Hendrix guitar, and Jimi Hendrix's incredible pink flared pants! For a guitar player like me, that kind of stuff is wild. I'd love to get some of that. I don't know, I think I'm going to be quite disappointed on the day because the prices are going to go through the roof! But there's quite a few things that...

YAHOO! MUSIC: ...you'll bid on yourself?

THE EDGE: Yes, I think I will! Everyone that I show the auction catalog to feels the same: "Wow! I want to get that, and that, and that..."

YAHOO! MUSIC: What personal items did you donate to the auction?

THE EDGE: My Gibson white Les Paul, which was the third guitar I bought after we got our record deal. I felt like it would be appropriate to donate an instrument that I've actually used extensively, so that was the one. It's a guitar that I've used for 20 years. I've used it on every tour, every album, so there's a lot of history there.

YAHOO! MUSIC: Wasn't that guitar hard to part with?

THE EDGE: I'll miss it, there's no doubt. It means a lot. But at the same time, it just felt right and proper. It's the right thing to do for this event. I'll get another one, I'll try to find another guitar, and hopefully it will be just as inspiring, in a different way. The thing about instruments is they're all different, and you'll never get the same tone, the same sound. If I find a replacement, who knows? Maybe it will inspire me in new ways.

YAHOO! MUSIC: You could always bid on the auction and buy it back!

THE EDGE: That's true! The thought crossed my mind. I've donated some other things--some T-shirts that I've worn at events connected to New Orleans. One is the T-shirt that I wore at the performance U2 did with Green Day at the reopening of the Superdome. Then there's the T-shirt I wore at the Super Bowl at the Superdome when we played in 2002. The significance of that is quite interesting, because just before we went onstage to perform, we got word that there had been a flood in Dublin and our equipment lockup had been totally flooded. Which was a shocking piece of news because I realized what we had in there, very precious instruments and amps and equipment. And a lot of it got destroyed. We lost an awful lot of stuff in that flood. But the key pieces of equipment that I use all the time were all with me in New Orleans. So in a weird way, the fact that I happened to be in New Orleans for the Super Bowl saved a lot of my most precious instruments from a flood. It's just weird, that twist of fate -- that New Orleans gets flooded out three years later. So that T-shirt is in the auction as well.

YAHOO! MUSIC: U2 have always been so socially active. What other charitable causes are you guys supporting these days?

THE EDGE: Well, we choose the causes that we get involved with quite carefully. We have been, famously, supporting Amnesty International, and I think there's something coming up with them, so watch that space. And then there's Greenpeace, and our own and Bono's work in Africa through the One campaign. We don't obviously agree to do everything -- you can't. So we choose the things we're going to do, and do them wholeheartedly, and really give it everything and be consistent. That way, we feel, we can be the most effective. If you spread yourself too thin, the result could be that people get turned off. So we try to keep our focus on a few things and really make it count. Because in the end, the only reason we can do stuff like that is we still make music that people want to listen to, and people still come to our concerts and want to see us perform. So that gives us the license to do these other things, and we never forget that. So we don't want to become so involved in other things that our music starts to suffer.

YAHOO! MUSIC: So, what is U2 doing musically nowadays?

THE EDGE: We're actually going through a very creative period, songwriting-wise. We're not really thinking in terms of what this material is going towards, but we're writing a lot, and really enjoying the process -- and the fact that it's not destined for any particular release or project. We're just really getting lost in it, and it's great. There's no sense of responsibility, we're just doing it for the love of doing it. It's the best way to write -- just for creative reasons.

YAHOO! MUSIC: So I have to ask you...have you heard about these "U2charist" church services, where they play U2 music instead of regular hymns? And how do you feel about that?

THE EDGE: I have heard about that...though I've not attended a service! You know, I think a lot of my favorite music has a spiritual side. Bob Marley, Prince...you know, just great rock 'n' roll. In that sense, I don't think it's unique to U2 that our music could be put into this context. I guess our stuff has dealt with a lot of spiritual issues, so maybe it is the contemporary music most suited to that use. But we never expected it! Who would have thought that our music would actually be in a church service? But I'm fine with it! It always surprises me when I hear what people do with our music, and the songs they choose. Like people telling me they played "One" as the first dance at their wedding! I think to myself, "Have you listened to the lyrics?" It's far from a wedding song. But people listen to music and get different things from it, and our best songs operate on so many different levels -- I think that's a strength. It's got a duality to it, which means it connects in a more complex way.

source: yahoo