The Joshua Tree

The Joshua Tree album just turned 20 this past week. I've been celebrating by playing my tape of it (actually my brother's tape--I stole it from him back in '91) in my car. I've been listening the way I used to listen to albums--over and over and over, letting the auto-flip take me from Side A to Side B to Side A.
I never noticed before how Lenten this album is, and wouldn't have noticed if I hadn't found out it was released this time of year (as Pop was (ten years later, less one week).
I mean, sure, it's got lots of desert imagery, but it's got a lot of wind and rain too. But that's what my Lenten experience is usually like--these forty days are storm season. "In the howling wind/Comes a stinging rain," indeed. And geez, try to count how many references to crosses there are in these songs! I wonder how they'll sound during Holy Week? (Especially "With Or Without You." Imagine that as one of the Seven Words from the Cross.)
I'd forgotten how much I love "Red Hill Mining Town." It's such a pure listening experience--there's no overlaying of memories of hearing it in concert or on the radio; I have no personal connection to the lyrics; I know nothing about the miners' strike that inspired it. But of course I also love listening to the songs that have layers and layers of meaning added to them, like "Where the Streets Have No Name." I can hear something different in that one every time. In Lent, I hear more longing in it than fulfillment. "The city's a flood"--a forty-day flood, by any chance?
Things have been busy at the 'Bread--grant season. Sent out a request for bananas today. We're having an ice cream social in early May; thought banana splits might be nice.