All musical instruments are useful for love and exhortation. Only one is essential for war. The drums. The drums are thin skin stretched tightly over… - Bono

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All musical instruments are useful for love and exhortation. Only one is essential for war. The drums. The drums are thin skin stretched tightly over hollow volumes, mostly of wood, which gives them their earthiness, their sexiness. Slapping without the tickling. The hand or the stick bounces across the skin of the drums, throwing the listener forward into a dance, into a physical response. For war, and in particular marching to war, wood was replaced by metal. The snare, as it’s known for good reason, supplies body armor to the already athletic muscular choices available. There is a particular violence built into the snare drum, and the rat-a-tat of a military tattoo was exactly what we were looking for with the opening of “Sunday Bloody Sunday.