10.14.04 - Uncut Magazine

Next month, U2 release the eagerly-awaited new album, How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb. However good it is, however, it'll go some to Achtung Baby - an audacious act of supergroup mid-career reinvention that raised the bar for dozens of 90's megabands to try and copy - or fall by the wayside.

A decade on from its original release, we look back at U2's radical transformation from earnest musos to manic cyber-rockers in an eye-opening investigation into the circumstances surrounding the tortured making of Achtung Baby, which story involves the collapse of The Edge's marriage, Adam Clayton's self-destructive drinking, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the band allegedly getting involved in drugs and their dark side, a satanic aspect to their character hitherto well concealed.

As a bonus for U2 fans, there's also an exclusive track by track preview of the new album, which goes on sale in November, as well as a chance to win a VIP trip to Berlin, where much of Achtung Baby was famously recorded.

Elsewhere in this month's issue, we celebrate Martin Scorsese's classic mob epic GoodFellas, and a year on from his death we look back at Johnny Cash's legendary concerts at Folsom and San Quentin prisons. We also spend some entertaining time with the outrageous Tony Scott, director of high concept blockbusters like Top Gun, True Romance, Enemy Of The State and Days Of Thunder, who regales us with tales of Tom Cruise, Bruce Willis and Robert De Niro, meet Bo Hopkins, one of Sam Peckinpah's famous stock company and uncover the truth behind the mysterious death of American singer-songwriter Elliott Smith, who died of apparently self-inflicted knife wounds to the chest in October 2003.

To complete this month's package, our free CD, Mob Life, collects 16 great tracks from classic Scorsese movies, and includes music from Roxy Music, van Morrison, Johnny Thunders, Frank Sinatra, Little Richard, Tony Bennett and BB King.