U2 producer Daniel Lanois has claimed that the Irish rock group are sounding "hungry" again on their new material.

Lanois told Billboard magazine that the band are currently sounding as good as they were on their seminal album Achtung Baby.

He said: "It feels like the Achtung Baby period, when everybody was really hungry to do something fresh.

"They have everything, and they've done everything. But the thing they should never assume they still own is the ability to be original and invent something that's never been heard before."

He added: "I'm not coming in with new flavours of the month of waving a magic wand. I don't have an abbreviated name. But my eyes are burning a hole through their hearts, and I'm inviting them to come to where I come from."

U2 are currently working on their 12th album, the follow up to 2004's How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb.