U2 Honored With 2025 Woody Guthrie Prize (2025 In Review)

By Editorial Staff | Published: Jan 03, 2026 4:03 PM EST

Photo courtesy full coverage communications

U2 Honored With 2025 Woody Guthrie Prize was a top 25 story of October 2025 in our look back at the Year In Rock. Here is the original report: U2 were honored with the Woody Guthrie Prize during a ceremony at the Woody Guthrie Center in Tulsa, OK to "honor the spirit of folk icon Woody Guthrie".

According to the announcement, frontman Bono and guitarist The Edge cacepted the award and participated in an on-stage conversation about art and activism with legendary producer and musician T Bone Burnett. The evening included a surprise six-song performance from Bono and The Edge.

We were sent these quotes from Bono: "Bob Dylan really did bring us to the place where the song was an instrument to open up worlds. And the world of Woody Guthrie, I wouldn't have entered if not for Bob."

"America is the greatest song still yet to be written. The poetry is there but it's still being written... don't imagine it will continue to be extraordinary on its own, that if you fell asleep and woke up in twenty years, the world would be fairer or freer. It won't, that's not the way it works."

The Edge: "Our favorite protest songs always had a sense of vision, something to aim for...you don't talk about the darkness, you make the light brighter"
"I believe music can actually change the mood of the room and actually shift a culture."

Woody Guthrie's granddaughter Anna Canoni: "Woody and U2 have been aligned for decades... Whether it is protesting against war and violence, standing up for humanitarian rights, singing about greed, corruption and injustice"