U2 bassist Adam Clayton confirmed what rumours have been suggesting for the past few months - a new U2 album will be with us in the first half of 2016.

In an interview with RTÉ's Shay Byrne for the Walk In My Shoes radio to promote World Mental Health Awareness Week, Clayton revealed that work on the new album remains ongoing.

"We've been working on a record and we've been humming and hawing on whether it's finished or not," he says. We've decided it's not finished - we're going to work up until Christmas."

The follow-up to 2014's Songs Of Innocence has been touted as a sequel of sorts to that record, entitled Songs Of Experience, with up to 50 songs reportedly in the mix for inclusion, with The Edge comparing the tone as similar to 1993's Zooropa album. Live dates have also been touted for Autumn 2017.

"I wish we were a little bit more definite about our scheduling because people have been expecting it," Clayton told Byrne, "but it'll be out next year, maybe March/April. That's the plan, but I'm not confirming it."

Speaking elsewhere to 2fm's Eoghan McDermott, Clayton shared his thoughts on US Presidential Candidate Donald Trump, following U2's onstage condemnation of Trump at a US concert last week:

"I think we were so prepared to call out Trump because he's just a very dangerous man, " Clayton says. "He'll say anything and he's exactly the type of person you don't really want having access to power... He's a businessman. He's not a politician."

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