Carnaval de Luz U2 - album lyrics + track listing

Album guide · U2 · Carnaval de Luz · 13 November 2026

Fifty years after four Dublin teenagers answered a handwritten note on a school noticeboard, U2 have marked the anniversary with Carnaval de Luz, their 16th studio album and their first collection of new songs since 2017's Songs of Experience. Island Records confirmed the release on 24 September 2026, the same day the second single, “Silencio”, arrived. The album lands on 13 November 2026.

Bono promised a record of celebration rather than lament, and it arrives as the answer to the band's two 2026 EPs: Days of Ash, released on Ash Wednesday as songs of defiance, dismay and lamentation, and Easter Lily, its more personal and spiritual Good Friday follow-up. Both EPs came out of the same sessions. Carnival is the feast before Lent's fast, so as Bono put it to The Irish Times, this album is really the prequel to both of them.

Twelve songs about spirituality, friendship, freedom and endurance, recorded “all over the place”.

Carnaval de Luz track listing and lyrics

Every track below links through to its own lyrics and themes page. Tap a title to go deeper.

1. Go (Carnaval De Luz) — co-written with Brian Eno, who also plays synths
2. La Reina
3. Street Of Dreams — first single, released 7 July 2026
4. The Mirror Maker (Rosalía)
5. Superficiality
6. If The World Is At War We Better Not Be
7. Silencio — second single, released 24 September 2026
8. The Greatest Show On Earth — co-written with Brian Eno, who also plays synths
9. Glorify — co-written with Martin Garrix
10. Midnight Sunshine
11. Can't Stop Us Now — co-written with Brian Eno, who also plays synths
12. Torn (Feat. Dolly Parton) — pedal steel by Daniel Lanois

The sleeve was photographed by Viviane Sassen and designed by Shaughn McGrath, with Gavin Friday as creative director.

Album facts and credits

Album: Carnaval De Luz, U2's 16th studio album

Release date: 13 November 2026

Label: Island Records / Universal Music

Tracks: 12

Producer: Jacknife Lee

Additional production: Ryan Tedder on “Silencio”

Co-writing and synthesizers: Brian Eno on “Go (Carnaval De Luz)”, “The Greatest Show On Earth” and “Can't Stop Us Now”

Co-writing: Martin Garrix on “Glorify”; Dolly Parton and Johnny McDaid on “Torn”

Pedal steel: Daniel Lanois on “Torn”

Also in the studio: Steve Lillywhite, during the final week of recording and mixing

Cover photo: Viviane Sassen

Cover design: Shaughn McGrath

Creative director: Gavin Friday

What the band say it's about

Island describe the record as twelve songs exploring spirituality, friendship, freedom and endurance in the face of dark, encroaching forces. Sonically, the label points to echoes of U2's most experimental work sitting alongside tighter, more disciplined songwriting on The Greatest Show On Earth, Glorify and Midnight Sunshine. Against that, Silencio is pitched as a two-minute-35-second nod to the insolence of early surf-punk.

Bono, in the album announcement

He opens with a ringmaster's “roll up, roll up”, invites listeners to bring their purple socks and broken hearts into a hall of mirrors, and promises loud guitars, deep bass and a few silver tears. Then comes the turn: just outside the carnival of light are all kinds of creatures, because the same imagination that produces creativity also produces monsters. His answer is to make the drums louder, build a bigger fire, and keep the songs shining, on the grounds that if the world is in darkness, we had better not be.

The Edge was blunter, calling it a messy, provocative, sacred collection of songs, and noting that it features the first use of flat-wound strings on a U2 record. It's a small technical detail that tells you something about the band's mood: after nine years away, they were still hunting for a sound they hadn't used before.

How the album was made

Work started before 2024, but recording began properly in late that year once Larry Mullen Jr. returned full time after a series of surgeries in 2023 and 2024 that were intended to let him keep drumming. Earlier material was set aside and the band started afresh with him. Per U2Songs, sessions ran at Curlews in Dublin, Universal Studios in Los Angeles, Bono's house in the South of France and various mobile setups, which is what the label means by “recorded all over the place”.

Jacknife Lee produced, and has spoken about the four of them playing together in one room being the priority this time, describing a band rediscovering what only they can do together. Daniel Lanois confirmed his and Brian Eno's involvement in July 2026, framing it as guest appearances across a handful of songs. Steve Lillywhite, who produced U2's first three albums, joined for the final week of recording and mixing before the record went to the label.

The singles, and the road to release

Street of Dreams came first, announced on 6 July and released the following day after a planned June date slipped. Its cover shows the band in carnival costume coming out of the ocean, and the song rode a wave of attention from public video shoots in Mexico City before turning up across Fox and Telemundo's FIFA World Cup coverage. A remix, the “La Calle de los Sueños Mix”, has aired on U2 X-Radio without a wider release. Our longer thematic reading of Street of Dreams goes further into it.

“Silencio” followed on 24 September, a day before the band's 50th anniversary, with a video shot in Mexico City and directed by Cliqua, the Mexican-American duo Pasqual Gutiérrez and Raúl “RJ” Sanchez. Footage for it was captured during the same May shoot that produced the “Street of Dreams” video. More videos were filmed in Los Angeles in June, though which songs they belong to hasn't been revealed.

“Torn”: Dolly Parton's last recorded vocal

The album closes with Torn, a duet between Bono and the late Dolly Parton in what has turned out to be her final recorded vocal performance. She co-wrote it with the band and Snow Patrol's Johnny McDaid, and the band describe it as a tender country song about broken family ties whose meaning reaches well beyond one household. Daniel Lanois plays pedal steel. U2 have called it the song that connects the album to the two EPs, which makes its placement at the very end feel less like a farewell than a handover.

Formats and release details

Carnaval De Luz will be available as Limited Edition Deluxe Vinyl and CD boxsets, various limited edition coloured and bespoke vinyl variants, standard CD, standard vinyl and digital download. “Silencio” is out now as a digital download and across streaming services.

Two 2026 singles are not on the album: the Martin Garrix collaboration Fireflies, and the band's cover of The Pogues' “Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah”, which appears on a Shane MacGowan tribute record in November. Counting the EPs, the singles and the album, U2 will have put out 24 new songs across their 50th year.