In 1984, U2 had just arrived in Auckland, New Zealand from a long 24-hour flight for The Unforgettable Fire Tour. It was late, but Bono was restless and could not sleep due to jet lag. And so he went out into the city that night, meeting some locals, including a man named Greg Carroll, who had been hired as a stage hand by U2’s production manager. Carroll and the others took Bono up a volcano called One Tree Hill (Maungakiekie), which is spiritually significant to Māori people.
After the Auckland show, U2’s manager recognized that Carroll was very helpful at the show and ended up hiring him for the rest of the tour. Over time, Carroll became good friends with Bono and his wife.
Then in July 1986, Carroll was doing a favor for Bono by taking his motorcycle home when he was killed in an accident. The band was devastated by the loss of their friend, with some of them later noting the accident gave many of the young men their first real experience with death.
At the time of Carroll’s death, U2 was working on the songs that would become part of The Joshua Tree album. Later, Bono noted that Carroll’s death ” brought gravitas to the recording of The Joshua Tree. We had to fill the hole in our heart with something very, very large indeed, we loved him so much.”
One Tree Hill
Bono wrote the lyrics for the song “One Tree Hill,” which would eventually appear on side two of The Joshua Tree, about grieving the loss of his friend Carroll. He started writing the song after returning from Carroll’s funeral in New Zealand. The song references Bono’s first experience with Carroll on the volcano called One Tree Hill.
The band developed the music while jamming with Brian Eno. The lyrics reflect the grief one feels over a loss. In the song, Bono sings:
I’ll see you again,
When the stars
Fall from the sky;
And the moon
Has turned red,
Over One Tree Hill.
We run like a river
Runs to the sea;
We run like a river
To the sea.
And when it’s raining,
Raining hard;
That’s when the rain will
Break my heart.
One verse of the song refers to Chilean political activist and folk singer Víctor Jara, who was tortured and killed during the 1973 Chilean coup d’état. “Jara sang his song,/A weapon/ In the hands of one;/Though his blood still cries/
From the ground.” U2’s bass player Adam Clayton has explained that with the reference to Jara, “One Tree Hill” forms a trilogy of songs with “Bullet the Blue Sky” and “Mothers of the Disappeared” that illustrate Bono’s anger at the involvement of the United States in the Chilean coup.
During The Joshua Tree Tour in 1987, the band did not initially perform the song because Bono did not think he could sing it due to his grief over Carroll’s death. But eventually the band played the song periodically, and they had even recorded a performance for the Rattle and Hum documentary, although the performance was not used in that film.
In the 2017 performance of “One Tree Hill” in Cleveland below, Bono gives a powerful performance following an introduction about the song’s meaning to the band. He talks about Carroll and explains how everyone faces similar losses.
He leads into the song by stating, “There’s no end to grief, that’s how we know there’s no end to love.”
And that is the Story Behind the Song “One Tree Hill.”
Leave your two cents in the comments. Photo via Youtube.
