I've found these comments really helpful. For some reason I always interpreted this song a bit more politically - still about a father son relationship but also about how those of us who look at difficult periods of recent history from the outside are "looking for explanations" while those caught up in them are the first to admit that they "don't even understand", and to warn that "nothing's as simple as you think". "You can't even remember what I'm trying to forget". On the page of the Zooropa album booklet where the Dirty Day lyrics are printed are the words "Nie Wieder" (Never again) which I always took to be a direct reference to the Nazi period but could perhaps apply to more recent painful periods like the Troubles or the contemporary (to Zooropa) war in Bosnia and Croatia. These kind of father son conversations about what happened during those dark periods are happening now.
@MDC1975 They wrote the album right after the Soviet Union's Iron Curtain came down and Germany was no longer West & East Germany (where East Germany was controlled more or less by Soviet Union). U2 witnessed the Berlin Wall being taken down. So, you are right about "Never Again" could mean Nazi Germany, that period was not as long but 1 could argue even worse, but "Never Again" could mean that, and more....no longer will another nation control us like Soviet Union controlled Poland, E.Germany and the other nations in the Warsaw Pact.
@MDC1975 They wrote the album right after the Soviet Union's Iron Curtain came down and Germany was no longer West & East Germany (where East Germany was controlled more or less by Soviet Union). U2 witnessed the Berlin Wall being taken down. So, you are right about "Never Again" could mean Nazi Germany, that period was not as long but 1 could argue even worse, but "Never Again" could mean that, and more....no longer will another nation control us like Soviet Union controlled Poland, E.Germany and the other nations in the Warsaw Pact.
I've found these comments really helpful. For some reason I always interpreted this song a bit more politically - still about a father son relationship but also about how those of us who look at difficult periods of recent history from the outside are "looking for explanations" while those caught up in them are the first to admit that they "don't even understand", and to warn that "nothing's as simple as you think". "You can't even remember what I'm trying to forget". On the page of the Zooropa album booklet where the Dirty Day lyrics are printed are the words "Nie Wieder" (Never again) which I always took to be a direct reference to the Nazi period but could perhaps apply to more recent painful periods like the Troubles or the contemporary (to Zooropa) war in Bosnia and Croatia. These kind of father son conversations about what happened during those dark periods are happening now.
@MDC1975 They wrote the album right after the Soviet Union's Iron Curtain came down and Germany was no longer West & East Germany (where East Germany was controlled more or less by Soviet Union). U2 witnessed the Berlin Wall being taken down. So, you are right about "Never Again" could mean Nazi Germany, that period was not as long but 1 could argue even worse, but "Never Again" could mean that, and more....no longer will another nation control us like Soviet Union controlled Poland, E.Germany and the other nations in the Warsaw Pact.
@MDC1975 They wrote the album right after the Soviet Union's Iron Curtain came down and Germany was no longer West & East Germany (where East Germany was controlled more or less by Soviet Union). U2 witnessed the Berlin Wall being taken down. So, you are right about "Never Again" could mean Nazi Germany, that period was not as long but 1 could argue even worse, but "Never Again" could mean that, and more....no longer will another nation control us like Soviet Union controlled Poland, E.Germany and the other nations in the Warsaw Pact.