"Love and Peace (Soul)" (2000)
Demo Song
Background Information
“Love and Peace (Soul)” is a title that U2 worked on for All That You Can’t Leave Behind, which eventually became “Love and Peace or Else” on 2004’s How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb. It was first mentioned in the summer of 2000, in an issue of Propaganda, there is an interview with The Edge and Danny Lanois as they work on the album, All That You Can’t Leave Behind, and during that interview the song “Love and Peace (Soul)” is mentioned:
There’s a large whiteboard hung on the studio wall. On the left-hand side, the band have listed twelve tracks, followed by boxes with ticks inside them — big or small — indicating the progress of lyric, arrangement, recording and so on. On the right hand side of the board is another list, with another eight songs. Surely not a double album? “The songs on the left are those that are favorites for the album,” explains Edge “The songs on the right are those that are fighting for a place on the album.” As he says this he suddenly remembers another track presumably from another list that is fighting to be remembered to get on a whiteboard to get on the album. “Peace on Earth,” he says to Lanois. “Danny, we’ve forgotten to put up Peace on Earth.” “That’s true,” says Lanois. “But you know, we might only need nine great songs to make a great album.”The names of the songs are working titles and may well be entirely different by the autumn, but for the record, the column on the right reads: “Original of the Species”; “Stuck in a Moment”; “Elevation”; “Kite”; “Yesterday and Tomorrow”; “Sometime”; “Home”; “In a Little While”; “The Sun, The Moon and The Stars”, and “Wild Honey”. The column on the left features “When I Look at the World”; “Beautiful Day”; “Jubilee”; “Bulldozer”; “Love and Peace (Soul)”, “Stranded and Grace”. “Wow!” says Lanois, scribbling in his notebook as the tape rolls again. “‘Lonely Soul’.” “No that wasn’t ‘Lonely Soul’,” says the guitarist, “That’s ‘Morning’ he’s singing.”
In the same article it is also mentioned that Edge suggests ways of musically re-editing “Home” to the engineer. At the end of the article they move “In a Little While” from the left side of the board, moving it to the right, and then adds “Peace on Earth” on the board.
In 2003, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland Ohio opened a U2 exhibit, with multiple floors focused on U2. As part of that exhibit there was a notebook of song titles that were identified as having belonged to the recording sessions for “All That You Can’t Leave Behind”. The list for this album was long, containing 53 different titles. A few of these songs were eventually released such as “Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own” (here it was marked the DooWop Version), “MIracle Drug”, “Grace” (listed here as the TV mix), “A Man and a Woman” (A note says that Bono and Brian call this “Boomerang 3”), “Love and Peace”, “Stuck” (a note says to work on the song with three different vocal approaches), and “Always” (with the “With or Without You” vocal approach). In the notes beside each song are clues to what the song was, or what work was left on the song. “Love and Peace” was one of these songs. It’s included on one line with two other titles, “Harder” and “Night Shift”. It is not known if this is three separate songs that they were working on as a group, or if they are multiple titles for one song.
On January 19, 2004, quoting industry sources, U2Log.Com name a number of songs months before the new album was announced:
“Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own”… is a version of the song Bono sang at his father’s funeral in 2001. This one you probably knew; it’s been buzzed about since 2001 — note, however, one source suggests it’s “Can”, not “Can’t”. “Sky Hawk”… was described to us as “epic, highbrow rock,” and is intended for the soundtrack to a major 2004 superhero film — and therefore, could end up as the first song to reach the public. “Love And Peace Or Else”… is reportedly “bluesy.” “Jahweh”… is a title that, you may recall, we slipped to you a while back. One source made a case for it as “one of the greatest songs U2 have ever recorded.” Make of that what you will…