I Threw A Brick Through A Window

I agree with both Bayoustorm and Prisz25. I too can't believe hardly anyone has posted about this song!

Anyway, I think Bayou hit the nail on the head with this one. It's about realizing you've backed yourself up against a wall in your life, having not listened to all the advice you were given and not knowing exactly how to get out of the rut. He talks of being blind, clearly indicating that he refused to see or listen to those who warned him and he went and did something anyway that he doesn't know how to get himself out of. It's almost like he's asking his brother for help out of the mess with the line "Be my brother".

This song is about needing guidance when you feel you're going nowhere and how people tend to turn a blind eye when they don't want to believe what they know to be true. If this song were referring to relationships, I would say the quote "Love is Blind" would apply. When people want something so badly, they will not see the truth even when its right in front of them. I think that's what "I threw a brick" is about. :earning from your mistakes and knowing when and how to ask for guidance.

'I love the line "No one is blinder than he who will not see"'

Err... John 9:40-41 actually. I don't think Bono would want to claim credit for that one.

I think this is about realizing you don't like what you've become or where you're at and doing something to change or get out.

How come no one is posting here?? This song is so GOOD! I love the line "No one is blinder than he who will not see" I love it is it talking about the people who refuse to look at what is going on around them! Bono= poetic genius!

I think the title "I Threw a Brick Through a Window" is pretty interesting too. When I first saw it and heard the song I wondered how it went with the lyrics, so I have several theories. Both go along with what Bayoustorm and eirenightshade said.

The title might refer to something bad he did recently - in this case throwing a brick through someone's window - that led him into a negative lifestyle he's now trying to get out of. Bono would maybe be writing from the perspective of a teenager who fell into the wrong crowd, despite warnings from people around him. "He was my brother" hints to me that his brother or someone else important to him persuaded him to do what he did, and "Be my brother" indicates that he wants the person he's singing to to take on the role of an influential 'brother figure' and pull him out of this bad lifestyle.

Another theory I have has to do with the lines, "I walk into a window to see myself and my reflection When I thought about it, my direction Going nowhere, going nowhere." If this window showing his reflection is the window the title refers to, then I think he threw the brick through it because he was frustrated with himself and how he's "going nowhere." He wants to change but doesn't know how, which is why he says "be my brother," and "There is another way out of here, In my Brother" indicating that he wants someone to help him change.

Incredible song! I love all of the great percussion in this song.

This is my 'angry' song, love blasting it through the speakers!

This is one of my favourite songs lyrically. He feels like his life has no direction... The window symbolises his old life, old ideas. He's breaking his old life and taking "another way out of here". Similar idea to the Bruce Cockburn lyrics that Bono quotes in later years : "I'm gonna kick the darkness 'til it bleeds daylight".
The quote from Jesus surely points to new spiritual direction.

It's a song of reconciliation. He was born into this culture where he is enemies with those on the other side of a wall that separates them. He can't hear words of opposition or reason because they fall on deaf ears made by what he's been told to believe. He walks, but the separating wall stops him. He turns around to see his reflection in a window and realizes that he's going nowhere. He realizes that he must open his eyes, his mind, his heart, and change to get of this situation. He talks to his enemy in his dreams with brotherly love, pleading with this perceived enemy as a brother to break out and move on from this current situation that was created by others who came before them.