U2 Had a Big Hit With This Song in 1987, Even Though Bono Says It’s Still Unfinished

By 1987, U2 was enjoying a long string of hits at radio, including “Pride (In The Name Of Love)”, their first Top 40 hit in the United States, and “With Or Without You”, which became their first No. 1 hit in the US.

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In 1987, the Irish band released “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For“. The song is followed by “Where The Streets Have No Name”, their third consecutive hit single from the iconic The Joshua Tree album. “Where The Streets Have No Name” is written by Bono, the lead singer and one of the founders of the group.

“Where The Streets Have No Name” begins with, “I want to run, I want to hide / I wanna tear down the walls that hold me inside / I wanna reach out and touch the flame / Where the streets have no name / I wanna feel sunlight on my face / I see that dust cloud disappear without a trace / I wanna take shelter from the poison rain / Where the streets have no name.”

Bono was inspired to write “Where The Streets Have No Name” after visiting Ethiopia. It’s where he came up with the song’s title.

“Musically it’s great,” Bono says (via Songfacts). “And the band deserve credit for that. But lyrically, it’s just a sketch, and I was going to go back and write it out.”

“‘Where The Streets Have No Name’ is not a great lyric,” he adds. “I just wouldn’t have rhymed ‘hide’ with ‘inside.’”

What Bono Says About Writing “Where The Streets Have No Name” For U2

If the lyrics to “Where The Streets Have No Name” seem ambiguous, they are that way. Bono reveals he intentionally made the song open to listener interpretation.

“I was just trying to sketch a location. Maybe a spiritual location, maybe a romantic location,” says the singer. “I was trying to sketch a feeling. I often feel very claustrophobic in a city. A feeling of wanting to break out of that city, and a feeling of wanting to go somewhere where the values of the city and the values of our society don’t hold you down.”

Bono may have had the idea for “Where The Streets Have No Name” while in Ethiopia. But the song also draws inspiration from his home country.

“An interesting story that someone told me once is that in Belfast, by what street someone lives on, you can tell not only their religion, but tell how much money they’re making,” Bono says. “Literally by which side of the road they live on. Because the further up the hill, the more expensive the houses become. That said something to me, and so I started writing about a place where the streets have no name.” 

Photo by Ebet Roberts/Redferns