The Ground beneath her Feet

"...There are bands that are hit machines, bands that earn the respect of the music crowd, bands that fill stadiums,bands that drip sex; trascendent bands and ephemeral boy bands and girl bands, gimmick bands and inept bands, beach and driving bands, summer and winter bands,bands to make love by and bands that make you memorize the words to every song they play... And in the whole half-century-long history of rock music there is a small number of bands, a number so small you could count to it without running out of fingers, who steal into your heart and become a part of how you see the world, how you tell and understand the truth, even when you´re old and deaf and foolish.On your deathbed you´ll hear them sing to you as you drift down the tunnel towards the light..."

The above words are taken from the novel The Ground Beneath her Feet by Salman Rushdie(born June 19, 1947) .

Written on a scale of epic, even immortal, proportions, The Ground Beneath Her Feet is a story of love, death and rock 'n' roll. This skillfully crafted tale of higher, though wholly earthly, love is Salman Rushdie's seventh novel. Writing in a manner both seductively insidious and entirely moving, Rushdie draws the readers into an alternate reality to our own and lets the power of the narrative wash over us. The author keeps the story gritty and real while imbuing it with a sense of the mystic and of an otherness that is believable and in no way alien to the reader. Recounted by the photographer Rai, The Ground Beneath Her Feet is the story of Vina Apsara and Ormus Cama, 20th century rock stars and pop icons. After Vina's untimely death in an earthquake, Rai, her backdoor man for years and life-long friend to both Vina and Ormus, sets out to tell their immortal story, in which, he claims "his own love's mortal tale is nowhere to be heard." "Vina significat humanitatem," he says; it was Vina who was the sign of our humanity.

So the description Rushdie writes of the band that "you´ll hear in your deathbed " is not U2. Or is it? Certainly for some of us it will be, what´s more U2 (I know is a cliché, but not less true) has given the soundtrack to my life as to many fans.

OK, this is not about U2...However...Bono came up with the idea for the song after reading a manuscript of Rushdie's novel. In the novel, the fictional character Ormus Cama writes the lyrics as a lamentation for his lover, Vina Apsara, who had died recently. U2 uses these lyrics almost word for word, however omitting the following line:
She was my ground, my favorite sound, my country road, my city street, my sky above, my only love, and the ground beneath my feet.
Rushdie, himself, was very pleased with the song, claiming it had "some of the most beautiful melodies [Bono] had ever come up with." In reference to the song, Rushdie said, "So I always knew, you know, that it wasn't going to be an uptempo foot-tapper, because it's a sad song. I think it sounds like, I hope, one of those big U2 ballads for which Bono's voice, actually, is beautifully well suited."

"The Ground Beneath her Feet"is a song by U2 from the film, The Million Dollar Hotel, and featured on the film's soundtrack, The Million Dollar Hotel: Music from the Motion Picture. The Million Dollar Hotel is 2000 tragic comic romantic film based on a concept story by Bono of U2 and Nicholas Klein, and directed by Wim Wenders...

The circle closes with a song...