U2’s latest best of leaves behind the group’s best since the “Joshua Tree” album and still hasn’t found what it’s looking for.

The Irish rockers’ newest disc, “Best of U2 1990-2000,” doesn’t bring them any closer.

The disc is much like any other “Best of” compilations. Fans of the group are usually left wondering why certain tracks were left off and others made the final cut. Like U2’s other “Best of” compilation (Best of 1980-1990), the album comes with a disc of “B-sides.”

It is easy to figure out why most of the B-Sides selected weren’t flipped to the other side. There are a few new mixes of songs that are worth listening to. The “Solar Plexus mix of Mysterious Ways,” features a marching band drumline-style track that adds another dimension to an already powerful song.

The compilation features several songs from U2’s “Pop” album, which is home to many of the band’s weakest songs. “Stuck in a Moment you Can’t get out of” and “Beautiful Day” are the only songs from U2’s Grammy-winning album “All that You Can’t Leave Behind.” Many of the better songs from the group’s 2000 studio album were left behind.

The group’s biggest hit from the Pop album, “Staring at the Sun,” is rehashed on the disc with a new bongo-like drum beat and a second counter-melody line through the chorus by The Edge, indicating that Bono isn’t the only one who’s “happy to go blind.”

The remix of the song “Gone,” which is also from the “Pop” disc, sounds much like the band’s live performances of the song which should lead many to wonder where the energy was the first time the band recorded the song.

Two new songs are featured on the CD, “Electrical Storm” and “The Hands that Built America.” The second of the two is also the theme to the movie “Gangs of New York.”

“Electrical Storm” is on both the main disc and the B-sides disc. An acoustic version is on the main disc and a whining, jumpy guitar riff is featured on the second version.

The riff can’t save the disjointed song that features lyrics “Car alarm won’t let you back to sleep” and “Let’s go places no one else has been,” in the same verse.

“The Hands that Built America,” a pretty powerful ballad, is few decibels short of pushing the message home. The song also features what sounds like Bono singing an opera-type chord throughout the refrain.

Bono said last week in an online interview the band is currently in the preliminary stages of putting together a new studio album, but didn’t have a timetable ready for when that CD would hit the markets.

So diehard fans may have to wait at least a couple of years to find another album from U2 as good as “Joshua Tree” or “Achtung Baby.” Hopefully the next big thing from U2 won’t be “Best of 2000-2010.”