Sitting in a hotel room in Dublin, Bono recalls the
afternoon his U2 cohorts stopped him from hastily
rejecting the tune "Beautiful Day." "We were laying the song down in the studio, and the Edge just cut loose a riff that could only be described as classic, early-days U2," he says, contorting his voice to imitate the riff. "It was a sucker-punch -- a truly brilliant moment that made everyone's hairs stand on end. But I froze and said, 'Oh, no, we can't use that. It sounds too much like a quintessential U2 riff.'"
In that instant the Edge shot a glare from across the room that spoke volumes. "It said, 'Fuck off, we are U2, and this is how I play guitar.' And I got it. I understood that it was time for us to reclaim who we are. It set the tone of the album."