"Tenterhook" (1995)

Demo Song

Background Information

Brian Eno published his diary from 1995, called A Year with Swollen Appendices. It was published as a book in 1996 by Faber and Faber in the UK. That was the year that Eno worked with U2 on Original Soundtracks 1, and the book makes mention of a number of demos and working titles throughout. “Tenterhook” is one of the songs included in the book.

On May 24’s entry Eno speaks about the song in detail:

Bono starts to form the idea that this could be a song about being besieged, people trying to carry on doing ordinary things (playing piano, buying shoes) while their city is being shelled. Interesting evolution of a vocal idea: he starts with a line that goes, “Is there a time for cutting hair?’, this gradually moving into ‘Is there time for this and that and the other?’, in his new list-making style of writing. Then I suggest that other voices do the first half of each line – I’m thinking Motown – so Edge and I (no known as the E-Notes) sing, ‘Is there a time…’ and Bono responds with the rest of the line.”

The song is obviously “Miss Sarajevo”. In the June 6 list of working titles, “Tenterhook” is no longer listed and the song is now listed as “Miss Sarajevo”.

Related Demo Titles