- published: 30 Sep 2008
- views: 1191279
"Angel of Harlem" is the second single from U2's 1988 album, Rattle and Hum. It peaked at #9 on the UK Singles Chart, #8 on the Dutch Top 40, #14 on the Billboard Hot 100, and #1 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks. Written as a homage to Billie Holiday, it was released with two different B-sides; one was an original U2 song called "A Room at the Heartbreak Hotel", while the other was a live version of Rattle and Hum's "Love Rescue Me".
The lyrical content of the song refers to various New York City-area landmarks, including JFK airport, WBLS radio and Harlem. It also refers to jazz-related history including John Coltrane and A Love Supreme, Birdland club, Miles Davis and Holiday herself ("Lady Day").
"Angel of Harlem" was written during 1987's Joshua Tree Tour and the in-studio performance on the Rattle and Hum movie dates from a recording session at Sun Studios in Memphis, Tennessee during the later stages of the tour's third leg.
The song was a regular on 1989's Lovetown Tour and was played with B.B. King's band. A stripped-down acoustic rendition was performed on the Zoo TV Tour in 1992 and 1993 on a b-stage positioned in the midst of the crowd. It was then not played again until 2001's Elevation Tour, when it was sometimes performed acoustically and sometimes in its original electric style, albeit without the brass section.
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands. Harlem was annexed to New York City in 1873.
Harlem has been defined by a series of boom-and-bust cycles, with significant ethnic shifts accompanying each cycle. Black residents began to arrive en masse in 1904, with numbers fed by the Great Migration. In the 1920s and 1930s, the neighborhood was the focus of the "Harlem Renaissance", an outpouring of artistic and professional works without precedent in the American black community. However, with job losses in the time of the Great Depression and the deindustrialization of New York City after World War II, rates of crime and poverty increased significantly.
New York's revival in the late 20th century has led to renewal in Harlem as well. By 1995, Harlem was experiencing social and economic gentrification. Though the percentage of residents who are black peaked in 1950, the area remains predominantly black.
It was a cold and wet December day
When we touched the ground at JFK
Snow was melting on the ground
On BLS I heard the sound
Of an angel
New York, like a Christmas tree
Tonight this city belongs to me
Angel
Soul love...this love won't let me go
So long...angel of Harlem
Birdland on fifty-three
The street sounds like a symphony
We got John Coltrane and a love supreme
Miles says she's got to be an angel
Lady Day got diamond eyes
She sees the truth behind the lies
Angel
Soul love...this love won't let me go
So long...angel of Harlem
Angel of Harlem
She says it's heart...heart and soul...
Yeah yeah...(yeah)
Yeah yeah...(right now)
Blue light on the avenue
God knows they got to you
An empty glass, the lady sings
Eyes swollen like a bee sting
Blinded you lost your way
Through the side streets and the alleyway
Like a star exploding in the night
Falling to the city in broad daylight
An angel in Devil's shoes
Salvation in the blues
You never looked like an angel
Yeah yeah...angel of Harlem