The Dalton Brothers (band)

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The Dalton Brothers were a short-lived fictional, spoof country and western band, created and performed by U2 as an opening act on two dates (November 18, 1987 - Los Angeles and December 12, 1987 - Hampton) of their Joshua Tree tour^[1] - "fictional" only in that they did not exist separately from U2. On those occasions, the band members appeared on stage wearing wigs, cowboy hats and country-style boots^[2], introducing themselves with "Dalton" pseudonyms, much in the style of the Lucky Luke Daltons: Alton Dalton (Bono), Luke Dalton (The Edge), Betty Dalton (Adam Clayton) and Duke Dalton (Larry Mullen, Jr.). In Los Angeles, Bono introduced the band by stating: "We play two kinds of music: country and western", after which they performed two songs: U2's own composition "Lucille" and a rendition of Leon Payne's/Hank Williams' "Lost Highway". Both songs were performed in an exaggeratedly dragged-out country and western style, and with heavy Western-American accents from Bono and The Edge, respectively singing lead vocals^[3]. At their appearance in Hampton, they only performed "Lucille".

A video of the whole Los Angeles performance is featured as an Easter egg on the bonus DVD included in the Joshua Tree 20th Anniversary box set. To access the video, viewers have to enter a password by highlighting and selecting boxes with letters and numbers, the correct sequence being "Betty Dalton" - Adam Clayton's pseudonym^[4].

As a band, the Dalton Brothers simply disappeared after the two performances on the Joshua Tree tour. However, San Francisco's U2 tribute band Zoo Station dressed up as the Dalton Brothers for a one-night-only performance at Slim's in late 2007, including a country/rock rendition of Johnny Cash's hit Ring of Fire^[5].