U2 joins TikTok to announce new song from Sing 2 , 'Your Song Saved My Life'
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U2 have joined TikTok, and announced a brand new song to mark the occasion.
On Monday, the Irish rock band debuted "Your Song Saved My Life" on TikTok and shared with fans that all their music would now be available on the video-sharing platform. The band penned the track for upcoming animated flick, Sing 2, in which frontman Bono stars as rock legend lion, Clay Calloway.
The sequel to Garth Jennings' 2016 animated musical, brings back your favorite all-singing, all-dancing animals and this time, they're headed to the big leagues with some seriously A-list backup. Sing 2 sees the furry gang (Matthew McConaughey, Reese Witherspoon, Scarlett Johansson, Taron Egerton, Tori Kelly and Nick Kroll) given a shot at a mega show by a billionaire hotel tycoon (Bobby Cannavale), if they can convince reclusive, rock star lion Clay Calloway (Bono) to join their ranks.
Illumination 'Sing 2'
"We wanted to see the characters go on a journey that would test their ambitions," writer/director Jennings tells EW. "It's all very nice to say to people, 'follow your dreams,' but the story's about just how hard that is."
Luckily for Jennings, getting one of the world's biggest rockers to lend his voice to a singing animal wasn't as difficult as you'd think. A fan of the director's work, the U2 front man says he signed on after a long conversation about the nature of singing and how "some people sing for a living and some people sing to survive."
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Jennings "couldn't believe [Bono's] enthusiasm for it," but Clay really spoke to the singer, who channeled his feline side to pen original track "Your Song Saved My Life" for the character too. "The band recorded this amazing U2 song," says the director. "It's just full of so much emotion and heart and literally did exactly what he said in that first phone call. It just says, 'Okay, here's how we want your audience to feel as they leave the cinema.'"
Gregg DeGuire/WireImage
In addition to the credit-rolling track, U2 lent several of their songs to the flick. "There's a scene in the middle of the film that is about two and a half minutes long of Scarlett [Johansson] singing a U2 song," shares Jennings. "It's just her and the guitar. I remember when we recorded it, it was just fantastic. It's very poignant; it's got to be very emotional. It was a sort of spontaneous moment but she has the talent to be able to do that. When you hear it it sends chills."
While Johansson was seamlessly nailing her renditions of Bono's songs, the musician was just as effortlessly slipping into his catty character. "The lion who's lost his roar touched me and as it turned out, method acting was not a problem here…I just had to get in touch with my inner big cat," he says. "It's a movie for kids and adults — and for an adult who's vowed never to grow up, it was a kick to make."
Sing 2 arrives in theaters Dec. 22. Check out the band's TikTok debut and hear a snippet of their new song above. "Your Song Saved My Life" will be released later this week.
A version of this story appears in Entertainment Weekly's November issue, on newsstands now and available here. Don't forget to subscribe for more exclusive interviews and photos, only in EW.
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