When Bono Met Alison Stewart: New Year’s Day
The iconic song by Irish rock band U2, New Year’s Day, will be 43 years old in 2025, but still evokes the same feelings of new hope and transformation for lead singer Bono.
First performed live in December 1982, it was released as a single on 10th January 1983 and was a track on the band’s third studio album, War, one month later.
Starting out as a love song for Bono’s wife, it became a political anthem recognising the divisions of the Cold War and the Polish Solidarity movement.
The haunting opening riff, made even more atmospheric by being played in minor keys, is one of the best-known intros of any song in chart history. Bono, now 64, has lost none of his enthusiasm for performing the track live.
The song’s message is about the power of love and surviving against all the odds, according to the star. Its “inspirational and timeless” theme inspires the feelings of hope, understanding and transformation associated with the beginning of every new year.
Band members U2
Six years earlier, U2 had formed when the band members Bono (Paul Hewson), Adam Clayton, Larry Mullen Jr and David ‘The Edge’ Evans were pupils at Mount Temple Comprehensive School in Dublin.
The first famous meeting between Bono and Adam Clayton, bass player for U2, took place as a result of an advert placed on the school’s bulletin board, asking students interested in forming a rock band to respond.
Larry Mullen Jr, then aged 15, posted the ad in September 1976 and initially, the resulting band was called Feedback. They played cover versions of famous hard rock songs, with plenty of long guitar solos. Soon, they started writing their own songs, with Bono and Clayton becoming good friends since their first meeting at 16.
Born in Dublin in May 1960, Bono grew up listening to his idols David Bowie, Marc Bolan and Bob Dylan, but didn’t sing himself until he joined Feedback. His close childhood friends included singer Gavin Friday and Derek Rowen, alias artist and musician Gucci, who collectively went on to form punk band Virgin Prunes. For Bono, U2 represented his first foray into rock music and set him on the lifelong road to success.
Adam Clayton, born in Oxfordshire in 1960, spent part of his childhood in Nairobi, Kenya, when his pilot father joined East African Airways and emigrated for his job. The family moved to Dublin in 1965, and Adam grew up listening to rock operas such as Hair and Jesus Christ Superstar. He took piano lessons, and bought his first guitar at 13, learning basic chords to replicate the music of his idols the Beatles, the Who and the Grateful Dead.
Changing their name to The Hype, the band eventually became U2 in 1978. Bono learned to play guitar and was lead vocalist, although he admitted he wasn’t a great musician and mainly stuck to singing.
Clayton played bass and guitar, The Edge played lead guitar and keyboards and sang backing vocals and Mullen Jr was on drums. Initially, The Edge’s older brother, Dik Evans, had also joined, but left for the Virgin Prunes.
U2’s four founder members have remained the same since the band’s formation in 1976. After playing their first gig in April 1977 at local high school St Fintan’s, they won the Pop Group ‘78 talent competition in March 1978 during Limerick Civic Week.
U2 success story
The band rapidly rocketed to success, recording demos with producer Chas de Whalley, a CBS talent scout, in August 1979 at Windmill Lane Studios. Three of the songs were released by CBS on an EP called ‘Three’, giving U2 their first chart success, reaching number 19 in the Irish singles chart.
In 1980, after signing for Island Records, U2 released Boy, their debut album, followed by October in 1981 and War in 1983. As lead singer, U2 frontman Bono wrote many songs based on his own feelings and experiences, which was how New Year’s Day came about.
Bono had started dating Alison Stewart in 1976, who was in the year below him at Mount Temple school. They had known each other since Bono was 13 and became close following his mother’s death in 1974. They have been married since August 1982 and have four children.
Bono wrote New Year’s Day for Alison, known as Ali, with the first verse proclaiming, “I want to be with you night and day,” but later, it became a symbol of the political climate at the time. The lyrics originated in a love song, but it was reshaped and adopted by the Polish Solidarity movement as a symbol of their struggles.
The New Year’s Day video was filmed outdoors in Sweden in December 1982 against a sprawling backdrop of heavy snow. It was one of three songs from the War album – the others being Pride (In the Name of Love) and Sunday Bloody Sunday – that helped to establish U2 as a socially aware group.
Critics lauded the “earnestness and passion” of the single and noted how it connected with the band’s growing fanbase, recognising how massive U2 could become in the future.
War became their first number one UK album, while their fifth album, The Joshua Tree, in 1987 turned U2 into global superstars, selling 25 million copies and producing their iconic number one singles, I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For, and With or Without You.
Today, U2 are still going strong and have become one of the biggest selling artists in the world, having sold 170 million records globally. Winners of 22 Grammy Awards (more than any other band in history), U2 were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2005.
Bono and Adam Clayton have been close friends for 48 years and remain a strong songwriting team. Clayton was best man at Bono and Alison’s wedding. In 2011, he became an ambassador for the Walk in My Shoes mental health facility of St Patrick’s Hospital in Dublin.
U2 participated in the Band Aid charity single, Do They Know It’s Christmas, in 1984 after being enlisted by Bob Geldof. Bono took part in Band Aid 20 in 2004 and Band Aid 30 in 2014. U2 also performed at the Live Aid charity concert in aid of helping famine victims in Ethiopia.
