"With or Without You" is a song by U2. It is the third track on their fifth studio album, The Joshua Tree (1987) and was released as the album's lead single. The song was the group's most successful single at the time, becoming their first number-one hit in both the United States and Canada.

The sessions for “The Joshua Tree” started in earnest in 1986 and the group was recording at the Georgian mansion Danesmoate House in Dublin. Under the direction of co-producers Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, the Edge pursued more ambient guitar playing, Adam Clayton turned up the volume on his bass and Larry Mullen Jr. experimented with an electronically enhanced drum kit. Despite the work they continued to put into the track, the group considered abandoning the song, as they could not find an arrangement they liked.

Bono and his friend Gavin Friday continued to work on the song after Lanois and Eno declined to do so.  Bono credits Friday with rescuing the song and rearranging it, believing it could be a hit. The song's fate was still in doubt when the Edge was sent a prototype of the Infinite Guitar by Canadian musician Michael Brook, with whom he had collaborated for the soundtrack for the Anglo-French film, “Captive”.

The instrument allowed sustained notes to be played, producing a high frequency, atmospheric sound that’s heard at the beginning of the song.

Listening to the backing track to "With or Without You" in the control room, Bono and Friday heard the sustained effect that the Edge was creating with the Infinite Guitar in the other room. The combination of the two playing simultaneously caught their attention. According to Lanois, "I said, 'That sounded pretty cool,' so we listened back, and I said, 'Jesus, it's better than I thought.'"  The Edge immediately recorded an Infinite Guitar part in two takes.  The band considers the song's recording to be one of the album sessions' breakthrough moments, as it was recorded amid concerns that they had run out of ideas.

This was a song that caught Bono torn between a life of domesticity and free-spirited artistry. Bono, who had been married to Alison Stewart for five years by the time “The Joshua Tree “was released, described the lyric as "pure torment."

Various Sources