'The Joshua Tree'

I've always associated The Joshua Tree with the early 1980s, the defining opus of U2's early career.

In fact, The Joshua Tree was the band's fifth album, released in 1987. The band has recorded and released a total of 12 albums. If the career arc of The Beatles is any indication, that would make The Joshua Tree their Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Kinda.

Sgt. Pepper noted a sea change in The Beatles' recording process, career and art. The Joshua Tree is a perfect cap to the 1980s following the greatest albums they would ever make, Boy, War and October. The Joshua Tree didn't do to U2 what Sgt. Pepper did to The Beatles. But it was just as good if not better than those other albums and the band, afterwards, didn't near match that output.

I'm as big of a U2 critic as there is, but I do not deny their early ability to scrape out their own style and sound. And it's a style and sound I like. I can listen to The Joshua Tree today just like I could 10 years ago when I first discovered it.

That album is 23 years old and it's entirely more important than their last three albums put together.