Watch U2 - The Joshua Tree: Classic Albums now for £1.49

Re-released and repackaged to commemorate its 20th anniversary, U2’s The Joshua Tree remains perhaps the band’s most definitive album, the one that sent them into the rock stratosphere and confirmed them to many as the world’s greatest band.

“They [have] never made a more universally beloved album,” said Rolling Stone’s Rob Sheffield.

“There’s a lot more Bono than Edge, not to mention a lot more LA than Dublin. The songs are U2 at their most abstract, milking the metaphor of Bono’s strain to reach the high notes. Yet the best moments connect on a physical level - the glistening bass groove of With Or Without You and the Hendrix-worship guitar storm of Bullet The Blue Sky.”

Featuring a brace of global hits, including Where The Streets Have No Name and I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For, The Joshua Tree finds Ireland’s most famous export in its pre-ironic but perhaps most magisterial days, with frontman Bono lauding it over the cinemascope proceedings as only a man in a stetson can.

Produced by Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, it sold more than 16 million copies worldwide and won them a Grammy for Album of the Year in 1987. Two decades on, it retains its impressive clout.

“Broad, bold and unified, U2’s fifth studio album catapulted them to the level at which they remain today,” said Evening Standard’s John Aizlewood.

“For the most part, it stands up well. U2 would make better albums, but none so important to their career.”

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