The Edge

David Howell Evans (born 8 August 1961), better known as the Edge or simply Edge, is an English-born Irish musician, singer, and songwriter.

He is best known as the lead guitarist, keyboardist, and backing vocalist of the rock band U2.

A member of the group since its inception, he has recorded 15 studio albums with them as well as one solo record.

His understated style of guitar playing, a signature of U2's music, is distinguished by chiming timbres, use of rhythmic delay, drone notes, harmonics, and an extensive use of effects units.

David Howell Evans was born on 8 August 1961 at the Barking Maternity Hospital in Barking, Essex, the second child of Welsh parents Garvin and Gwenda Evans.

Both of his parents were from Llanelli.

His father was an engineer who worked for the local electricity board, and subsequently worked for the electronics company Plessey.

Evans has an elder brother called Richard (often called Dik) and a younger sister called Gillian, and is a cousin of actress Juliet Aubrey.

The family initially lived in Chadwell Heath.

Around 1962, Garvin was offered a promotion which took the family to Dublin.

During his childhood in Dublin, Evans talked in two different accents, using a Welsh accent at home and an Irish accent whenever he was outside.

He later said, "The reason for this dual identity was mainly to be understood by my peers but also to be accepted."

He later commented that there were times of frustration for him growing up in a Catholic country, and this may have played a part in his musical development.

Evans received his initial formal education at St. Andrew's National School in Malahide.

As a child, he also received piano and guitar lessons, and practised music with Dik.

He received his first guitar at the age of seven when his mother bought him a Spanish guitar.

He did not know how to properly tune it or hold it and referred to it as "little more than a toy", but he was fascinated by how cool it was.

At the age of nine, the "first proper guitar" came to the Evans household when his mother purchased an old acoustic guitar at a jumble sale for a pound.

He and Dik both experimented with this instrument, replacing the rusty wire strings with nylon ones and learning to properly play it.

Born in England to Welsh parents and raised in Ireland, the Edge formed the band that would become U2 with his classmates at Mount Temple Comprehensive School and his elder brother Dik in 1976.

Inspired by the ethos of punk rock and its basic arrangements, the group began to write its own material.

While the Evans brothers were at Mount Temple Comprehensive School in Dublin in 1976, they went along to a meeting in response to an advert posted by another pupil, Larry Mullen Jr.., on the school's noticeboard seeking musicians to form a new band with him.

Among the several other pupils who also responded to the note were Paul "Bono" Hewson and Adam Clayton.

U2 began its public performance life in small venues in Dublin in 1977, occasionally playing at other venues elsewhere in Ireland.

The band went through a number of reformations before becoming known as U2 in March 1978 (Richard Evans having left before this to join another band, leaving his younger brother as the lead guitarist).

Early in the band's career, Evans was given the nickname "the Edge" by members of the Lypton Village surrealist street gang to which Bono belonged.

The nickname is commonly believed to be derived from the angular shape of Evans' head.

However, the origin of the name is disputed and other theories include a description of his guitar playing and his preference for not becoming fully involved and therefore remaining on the edge of things.

In December 1979, they performed their first concerts outside Ireland, in London, and in 1980 began extensive touring across the British Isles, developing a following.

Their debut album Boy was released in 1980.

The Edge said in 1982 of this early experimentation, "Me and my elder brother Dik both played it, plonking away, all very rudimentary stuff, open chords and all that."

They eventually became one of the most successful acts in popular music, with albums such as 1987's The Joshua Tree and 1991's Achtung Baby.

Over the years, the Edge has experimented with various guitar effects and introduced influences from several genres of music into his own style, including American roots music, industrial music, and alternative rock.

With U2, the Edge has also played keyboards, produced their records Zooropa (1993) and Songs of Surrender (2023), and occasionally served as co-lyricist.

The Edge met his second wife, Morleigh Steinberg, through her collaborations with the band.

As a member of U2 and as an individual, the Edge has campaigned for human rights and philanthropic causes.

He co-founded Music Rising, a charity to support musicians affected by Hurricane Katrina.

He has collaborated with U2 bandmate Bono on several projects, including songs for Roy Orbison, Tina Turner, and Martin Garrix, and the soundtracks to the musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark and the Royal Shakespeare Company's London stage adaptation of A Clockwork Orange.

As a member of U2, the Edge has won 22 Grammy Awards and has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Several music publications have ranked the Edge among the greatest guitarists of all time.