1. U2 - Rattle and Hum

In junior high I overheard from my sister's room something that sounded really good, so when she wasn't in there I snuck in, borrowed the cassette, and listened to it in my room.  I think there were several instances when she wanted to listen to it and had to retrieve it from my room.  This is when I began to really notice the lyrics, poetry in the music of U2's album Rattle and Hum.  I had a mobile cassette player that you could hit pause while transcribing the lyrics.  I did this often.  I wanted to see the words on the paper, understand them, imagine them.  The words sounded great sung, but I didn't fully understand the overall meaning until I read it clear on the page.  This was before Google, and the cassette didn't have liner notes with the lyrics printed.
First, "Helter Skelter." Driving energy.

"You ain't no lover but you ain't no dancer."

Then, of course, the anthem "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For." Being in my early teens and hearing that song it fit my junior high angst, my outcast status.  Later, in college, I would analyze the lyrics for a paper in an English class, re-establishing a stronger connection to the song.

I have spoke with the tongue of angels
I have held the hand of a devil
It was warm in the night
I was cold as a stone.

"Pride (In the Name of Love)": Initially I didn't know it was referencing Martin Luther King, Jr.'s speeches and assassination, but I liked the message nonetheless.  It only became more important to me when I learned the lyrics honored a historical figure who fought and stood for others' rights.  And it's an honest love, a community love.

Early morning, April four
Shot rings out in the Memphis sky.
Free at last, they took your life
They could not take your pride.

Growing up in central Mississippi and seeing the cotton trailers go by my rural route house, the creeks and pond alongside, oak trees, raccoons, opossums, and watching the sunsets in the delta from my uncle's house in Rolling Fork... Of course the poetry of "Heartland" was going to ring true for me.  He sang of a place I knew.  And the song travels out of the delta into the midwest, into deserts, into valleys across the country.

Mississippi and the cotton wool heat
Sixty-six - a highway speaks
Of deserts dry
Of cool green valleys
Gold and silver veins
All the shining cities
In this heartland

History plays a role in a lot of U2's lyrics because the band's concerned with social issues and human rights, injustice and hypocrisy.  "Bullet the Blue Sky" had scenes that resonated in my imagination of people and places I didn't know, feelings of isolation and alienation, unrest.  And a phrasing like these lines could never have left me.

As a man breathes into his saxophone
And through the walls you hear the city groan.
Outside, is America
Outside, is America
America.

Of course the sexy "Desire" or romantic "All I Want Is You" songs have their influences on my relationships and how I have approached love at some point or another, the give and take, the comfort and support, the honesty of love, and with all our promises how often we break them:

You say you'll give me eyes in the moon of blindness
A river in a time of dryness
A harbour in the tempest.
All the promises we make, from the cradle to the grave
When all I need is you.

Note: A few years ago I wrote a blog entry about U2 as a music memory exercise.  I have re-posted it here on Ramblin' Anne.  It talks about my long-standing connection to U2's other albums, whereas this entry is only about Rattle and Hum as an album that changed my life.
Also, visit the Wikipedia articles on Rattle and Hum and U2, in addition to the band's website.