Story behind the record cover - War - U2
“Everyone thinks we paid him with a box of Mars chocolate bars,” U2 bassist Adam Clayton once said of the album cover for “War”. That was partly true. The boy on the cover, Peter Rowen, did indeed receive a box of Mars bars from U2, but that was for the picture on the cover of debut EP “Three”. The ‘sweet’ investment resulted in a lasting image of the child with the precocious eyes and the unusually strong gaze. He appeared on three U2 album covers. Besides “Three” he is depicted on the cover of “Boy”, U2's first LP, and on this third, “War”.
Instead of the innocence of the photo from debut album “Boy”, Peter has an angry expression and a bloody lip on this particular cover, very much befitting its title. The idea came from singer Bono: “Instead of putting tanks and guns on the cover, we've put a child's face. War can also be a mental thing, an emotional thing between loves. It doesn't have to be a physical thing."
The theme suits the Irish band. The band members from Dublin grew up with a civil war on their borders, in Northern Ireland. Between the resistance movement IRA on the one side and the Protestant minority and the British army, that had to keep the country within the United Kingdom, on the other. The armed struggle lasted for various decades, from the 1960s well into the 1990s, at the cost of roughly 3,500 lives.
On this third LP the foursome from Dublin – Ireland was officially neutral in the conflict in Northern Ireland, but there was a very broad movement in the country that wanted the brothers from the north to come 'home' - passionately expressed their opinion about the political situation and people in general with songs like Sunday Bloody Sunday. The military-inspired rhythms of drummer Larry Mullen Jr. and guitarist Edge's steadily descending riffs provide the perfect backdrop for vocalist Bono's personal attack on the continuation of the struggle between the IRA and ‘London’. “War” became one of U2's most ‘raw’ albums and debuted at number 1 in the UK charts.
The kid on said covers is a little brother of a friend of Bono's, Derek Rowen, from the early days of U2. The picture was taken at photographer Ian Finlay's home in suburban Dublin. For the American market, the record company, afraid U2 would be accused of pedophilia, replaced the cover with six-year-old bare-chested Peter for a cover with graphically distorted photos of the group members. Much to the anger of Bono, who also had to accept that a traditional band photo was chosen for the cover of their second album, “October”. But headstrong as he is, Bono got his way for third album “War”, and Peter Rowen returned to the cover once again. Three years older, looking angry and with a bloody lip.
U2 grew into one of the biggest rock bands in the world. You couldn't imagine that at the time of “Boy”. In 1981, U2 still performed at pop stage Eksit in Rotterdam. The band's visit was a desperate measure from its manager. The band's manager gave the Eksit programming directors a call. Could they please have U2 on stage. Eksit agreed. The concert wasn't even sold out; only a few visitors had a good time in the dressing room with Bono after the show. Six years later, U2 played to a sold-out Rotterdam football stadium and Bono had become an untouchable star.
And what became of 'boy' Peter Rowen? He became Ireland's skateboard champion and went to work in a skateboard shop in the late 1990s. Today he works as a freelance photographer. His great example is Dutchman Anton Corbijn, who took the famous desert picture for the U2 album “The Joshua Tree” and became more or less the fifth U2 member. On the inside of this album cover there’s already a photo of the band members, made by Corbijn.
If you google the name Peter Rowen, you will see pictures of a man who always looks rather serious and does not smile at all. I don't know if it's because of the state of his teeth after all those Mars bars. It may very well be.
Gerrit-Jan Vrielink