I'm so happy to see you react to this song. It's something that needs to be shared with everyone who likes music.

This is a first class duet 😊. Gives me the shivers.

This isn’t the original version you read about in the background information. This is a version featuring Mary J. Blige, recorded in 2006. The original has a much more subdued atmosphere and fits better with what you read aloud earlier.

This is awesome.....Mary J. kickin it  boyeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!

This live at the Grammys will make you weep. Mary SLAYS!!!!!!

You need to hear the album version, it's just as good.  This album is one of the best ever.  It's never received enough votes to get picked by the Patreon group, which is such a shame because the album is absolutely incredible.    Mary J also collaborated with the Disclosure brothers 3 times and they are all exceptional tracks too.

They performed this together at the Grammys. And I was there! It was a great performance among many.

One is a wonderful song. But this One is ❤

A little splash of Mary is all you ever need.😎😍💪

This song is one of the few rare cases where I love every version of it for different reasons. I love the original, it’s more heartbreaking, this one is an excellent version which is powerful, and the Johnny Cash version is also beautifully unique

I love how when you're overwhelmed. by the talent and emotion, you kind of shake your head like, 'nothing to add, nothing to say, 'k, thanx, bye'.

I saw it on your Phil Collins 'In The Air Tonight' reaction first , and I liked it a lot.

🔥🔥🔥 Cracking duet....gives me goosebump

Thank you for reacting to this epic collaboration of Mary and Bono together. That is one of my favorite songs by U2 but adding Mary J Blige to it was brilliant. Thanks again.
❤🎉❤🎉❤🎉❤🎉

the song "As" with George Michael & May J is another great duet, video is very cool to!!!!

This song is so badass!  Gives me chills when Mary’s part comes in!  This has been a constant on my playlist!

One is in my top 5 songs ever. It's perfection and as moving and true as a song can get. And the version with the queen of all is amazing, but I like the original even better. I'm in tears at Mary's grace, though.

As others said, DEFINITELY check out U2’s original version.

Context on the info you read at the beginning… U2 were the biggest band in the world in the 80s after the Joshua Tree album.  They followed that up with Rattle and Hum, a double album of live tracks from the Joshua Tree Tour and new songs.  They also decided to make a film… it started as a simple tour documentary/performance film but ended up becoming a major motion picture release in theaters everywhere.  Musically, Rattle and Hum was further exploration of American music.  They recorded some songs in Sun Studios in Memphis, the legendary studio where Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis and others recorded their music.  They did a song with BB King, even had a country song called Love Rescue Me in the album.  It was meant as a tribute and exploration as fans of American music, but many critics and much of the general public took as U2 exalting themselves among the greats.  They suddenly went from the darlings of the music world to vilified and hated by many.  Add to that their social conscience, and more people saw them as self-righteous jerks, which hurt them quite a bit.

On 12/31/89, they played the final show of the JT/Rattle and Hum tour at home in Dublin.  Bono announced that this was the end of something for U2… that they needed to “go away and dream it all up again.”  Many news outlets took that as the band breaking up, but they were tired, burned out, a little shell-shocked and knew they needed a change of direction.

They took a break for a year, during which Bono and Edge worked on figuring out a new sound.  They had ideas and decided to book Hansa Studios in East Berlin, where David Bowie (one of their heroes) had made some landmark work and get away to record a new album.  They ended up flying into Berlin on the last plane ever to fly into East Germany as the Berlin Wall fell, thinking that would provide inspiration.  The problem was that they hadn’t really communicated with Adam and Larry very well, so when they got to the studio, those two were confused and not fully onboard with the new sound.  There were also some hurt feelings about being left out of choosing this new direction and as you read, Edge’s marriage was coming apart so he was in a difficult headspace.  U2 have always given equal songwriting credit to all 4 members… one of them might have an idea of a song, but their process is to jam together in the studio, record everything and then go back and listen to find the bits and pieces that have potential to become a song and focus on those.  

But weeks into the Berlin sessions, they were banging away for hours every day, they’d go back and listen and weren’t finding anything they really liked enough to keep developing.  The lack of musical progress and the collective hurt amongst them was taking a toll, and they were arguing more… it was a tense time.  Bono was beginning to think maybe those news outlets were right.. because if it came down to U2 or their friendship, U2 would have to go.

One day, they came into the studio and were working on the song that would eventually become Mysterious Ways.  They thought it needed a middle 8 or bridge section and Edge had come up with 2 different chord sequences to serve as the bridge.  He played each for them and asked which they preferred.  The band liked both…. In fact, he might be on to something.  They asked him to play them both, one into the other.  The band fell in and One came out in 15 minutes.  That song saved them.

The lyrics are incredible… there are elements of all kinds of relationships throughout it, but at the end, it’s “We’re one, but we’re not the same.  We GET to carry each other.”  A lot of that song is referencing them as a band and how they made it through their struggles together.

It’s enough to make you cry

I don't care what anyone says. I have loved U2 for years and still do!

MARY ❤❤❤