Partyslammer
War Child
- Joined
- Feb 10, 2005
- Messages
- 661
Caught my 31st, U2 concert dating back to 1981 last night (LA Forum night 2). Almost exactly a year to the day from seeing them last year on their 2nd night of their Joshua Tree tour Rose Bowl stand. I have never seen a truly awful U2 show, and most of them have been really good to excellent concerts with a few I’d rank as in the top 10 shows I’ve ever seen.
However, last night’s show ranks at the very bottom of this long streak of shows I’ve seen from U2. It’s not really due to performance issues, Bono still sounds pretty solid in his late 50’s, the rest of the band still plays well even if the use of backing tracks and additional unseen live backing (under)stage to pad out songs including backing vocals is more prominent and sometimes distracting then ever these days. And to be fair, there were plenty of people happy with the show during and afterwords.
The stage production, much the same as in 2015’s IE arena tour although there’s some worthy new tricks this tour involving the huge suspended video screen that divides the arena floor down the middle. The sound was arguably better in the Forum last night versus the 2015 tour which imo, was over the threshold of being painfully loud at least on the floor. Last night, it loud but not painfully so, however the bass and drums seemed more muddy and boomy then I recall in 2015.
No, the basic problem with this show and the tour as it stands in general is the poorly paced setlist heavy with (imo) mostly mediocre songs from the last 2 studio albums, even more than usual pontificating from Bono (at times with a bullhorn, no less) and some arrangements of songs which in most cases absolutely guts them of whatever power and impact they had in previous performances or original album versions. I will readily admit I am no fan of the last two albums which certainly colors my opinion of the current shows and I can’t believe more than a couple songs if any from these two albums will make it into future tours.
The overall concept of the show is a near-Broadway style production vacillating between Bono’s somewhat abstract “Innocence and Experience” and the ham fisted lecturing of how America has apparently suddenly gone down the toilet since Trump won/stole (depending on one’s pov) the election. In the past, similar points were often succinctly addressed in the confines of vastly superior songs such as the visuals addressing growing European fascism in the 1993 Zooropa tour version of “Bullet The Blue Sky” or the opening run of Boy/October songs early in a typical Vertigo tour setlist. Now, audiences are hammered with a brace of new, mediocre songs and visuals making similar points in a much less elegant way.
Still, there were high points. The introduction into “Love Is All We Have Left” is poignant. When the band kicked into “I Will Follow” playing the song as basically the four guys who originally wrote and performed the song, the band and crowd lit up. That momentum carried through a somewhat rushed, out of time performances of All Because Of You and Beautiful Day (Edge barely had time to switch guitars between those songs). But once the set settled into a rather muddy sounding version of The Ocean with Bono awkwardly explaining the “Innocence” portion of the set, the air was out of the building and only briefly returned during Raised By Wolves and especially for Until The End Of The World for the first set. I will admit I was disappointed to not get Gloria or Red Flag Day. It used to be that 2nd or final shows of a multi-date stand would be the better nights, especially for U2 – that no longer seems to be the case.
Say what you will about burnout tracks Elevation and Vertigo, but the audience still gets into the songs which led off arguably the best part of the show in the 2nd half. Acrobat especially is a great performance of the song although the awkward McPhisto bit before the song needs a lot of fine tuning.
The acoustic version of You’re The Best Thing About Me ranks right up there with the current version of Sunday Bloody Sunday as the worst reimagining of one of their songs ever. Simply kills the song and while the acoustic version of Staring At The Sun is better, it’s still frankly boring to sit through.
Pride kicked off the “political” portion of the set with an extended bass and drums intro as Adam and Edge took stations on small risers on the floor at half court. Along with footage of rioting and protests from the last few years featuring much KKK footage, Bono blairs about “This is not America!” through his megaphone. This led to the absolutely cringe-worthy posturing/lecturing of “Get Out Of Your Own Way” and “American Soul.” This was Bono/U2 at their most insufferable. Nice of them to hang a gigantic American Flag blocking off the view of the entire section behind the stage while Bono yells at the audience to “Stand up for America.” Honestly, a song like City Of Blinding Lights as the single big “classic” upbeat encore rocker is never going to come close to Where The Streets Have No Name and comes up short, too little, too late. Many in the audience were streaming out in droves after City Of Blinding Lights, many thinking the show was over or just getting a head start on the traffic getting out of Inglewood. I will say I (and apparently Bono) was surprised at the audience carrying the chorus of “Love Is Bigger~” at the end of the song. After the true finale of the show after closing song “13,” the remaining crowd response was subdued confusion (“that’s it?!?”).
The show seemed pretty close to if not completely sold out by 8:30. The band came on late (for them) around 8:45. The vibe in the audience (even for notoriously stoic LA crowds) was very different from every previous U2 concert I’ve ever seen. Sure, the absence of any Joshua Tree and many other big warhorse favorites had something to do with it but the show simply lacked the well-crafted buildup, peak and fulfilment of a typical U2 concert, something that could easily be addressed without negating the overall theme of this tour or falling back on the usual Joshua Tree/Achtung Baby crowd-pleasers.
After the whole U2.com fanclub/Verified Ticket fiasco and the disappointment from last night’s show, I will have to think long and hard before committing to seeing this band again.
However, last night’s show ranks at the very bottom of this long streak of shows I’ve seen from U2. It’s not really due to performance issues, Bono still sounds pretty solid in his late 50’s, the rest of the band still plays well even if the use of backing tracks and additional unseen live backing (under)stage to pad out songs including backing vocals is more prominent and sometimes distracting then ever these days. And to be fair, there were plenty of people happy with the show during and afterwords.
The stage production, much the same as in 2015’s IE arena tour although there’s some worthy new tricks this tour involving the huge suspended video screen that divides the arena floor down the middle. The sound was arguably better in the Forum last night versus the 2015 tour which imo, was over the threshold of being painfully loud at least on the floor. Last night, it loud but not painfully so, however the bass and drums seemed more muddy and boomy then I recall in 2015.
No, the basic problem with this show and the tour as it stands in general is the poorly paced setlist heavy with (imo) mostly mediocre songs from the last 2 studio albums, even more than usual pontificating from Bono (at times with a bullhorn, no less) and some arrangements of songs which in most cases absolutely guts them of whatever power and impact they had in previous performances or original album versions. I will readily admit I am no fan of the last two albums which certainly colors my opinion of the current shows and I can’t believe more than a couple songs if any from these two albums will make it into future tours.
The overall concept of the show is a near-Broadway style production vacillating between Bono’s somewhat abstract “Innocence and Experience” and the ham fisted lecturing of how America has apparently suddenly gone down the toilet since Trump won/stole (depending on one’s pov) the election. In the past, similar points were often succinctly addressed in the confines of vastly superior songs such as the visuals addressing growing European fascism in the 1993 Zooropa tour version of “Bullet The Blue Sky” or the opening run of Boy/October songs early in a typical Vertigo tour setlist. Now, audiences are hammered with a brace of new, mediocre songs and visuals making similar points in a much less elegant way.
Still, there were high points. The introduction into “Love Is All We Have Left” is poignant. When the band kicked into “I Will Follow” playing the song as basically the four guys who originally wrote and performed the song, the band and crowd lit up. That momentum carried through a somewhat rushed, out of time performances of All Because Of You and Beautiful Day (Edge barely had time to switch guitars between those songs). But once the set settled into a rather muddy sounding version of The Ocean with Bono awkwardly explaining the “Innocence” portion of the set, the air was out of the building and only briefly returned during Raised By Wolves and especially for Until The End Of The World for the first set. I will admit I was disappointed to not get Gloria or Red Flag Day. It used to be that 2nd or final shows of a multi-date stand would be the better nights, especially for U2 – that no longer seems to be the case.
Say what you will about burnout tracks Elevation and Vertigo, but the audience still gets into the songs which led off arguably the best part of the show in the 2nd half. Acrobat especially is a great performance of the song although the awkward McPhisto bit before the song needs a lot of fine tuning.
The acoustic version of You’re The Best Thing About Me ranks right up there with the current version of Sunday Bloody Sunday as the worst reimagining of one of their songs ever. Simply kills the song and while the acoustic version of Staring At The Sun is better, it’s still frankly boring to sit through.
Pride kicked off the “political” portion of the set with an extended bass and drums intro as Adam and Edge took stations on small risers on the floor at half court. Along with footage of rioting and protests from the last few years featuring much KKK footage, Bono blairs about “This is not America!” through his megaphone. This led to the absolutely cringe-worthy posturing/lecturing of “Get Out Of Your Own Way” and “American Soul.” This was Bono/U2 at their most insufferable. Nice of them to hang a gigantic American Flag blocking off the view of the entire section behind the stage while Bono yells at the audience to “Stand up for America.” Honestly, a song like City Of Blinding Lights as the single big “classic” upbeat encore rocker is never going to come close to Where The Streets Have No Name and comes up short, too little, too late. Many in the audience were streaming out in droves after City Of Blinding Lights, many thinking the show was over or just getting a head start on the traffic getting out of Inglewood. I will say I (and apparently Bono) was surprised at the audience carrying the chorus of “Love Is Bigger~” at the end of the song. After the true finale of the show after closing song “13,” the remaining crowd response was subdued confusion (“that’s it?!?”).
The show seemed pretty close to if not completely sold out by 8:30. The band came on late (for them) around 8:45. The vibe in the audience (even for notoriously stoic LA crowds) was very different from every previous U2 concert I’ve ever seen. Sure, the absence of any Joshua Tree and many other big warhorse favorites had something to do with it but the show simply lacked the well-crafted buildup, peak and fulfilment of a typical U2 concert, something that could easily be addressed without negating the overall theme of this tour or falling back on the usual Joshua Tree/Achtung Baby crowd-pleasers.
After the whole U2.com fanclub/Verified Ticket fiasco and the disappointment from last night’s show, I will have to think long and hard before committing to seeing this band again.
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kind of a weird note (or song) to end on if you ask me.
Sums up my thoughts when reading that yesterday.
