Australia & the old stuff

[Maquaman]

Why is it that Australia doesn't get considered for much of the really old stuff (pre UF)?

I just did an interesting little exercise taking their last Australian show on from the Unforgettable Fire Tour (their first tour to Oz) and seeing how many songs from that setlist have been played since. Info came from the the u2-vertigo-tour.com website.

24 September 1984 in Perth.
* Out Of Control - played once in Australia (12 Oct 89) since this show. Played elsewhere on JT, Elevation & Vertigo tours.
* Twilight - this is the last show this song has been played at.
* An Cat Dubh - not played in Australia since this show. Played elsewhere on the Vertigo tour.
* Into The Heart - not played in Australia since this show. Played elsewhere on the Vertigo tour.
* The Unforgettable Fire - Played a few times on the Lovetown tour in Australia and elsewhere. Not played since.
* Surrender - Not played anywhere since the UF tour
* Two Hearts Beat As One - Played once since the UF tour (27 Dec 89 in Dublin)
* Seconds - Not played anywhere since the UF tour
* Sunday Bloody Sunday - Played for the first time in full band version on 7 Nov 06 in Brisbane since this show. Australia got an accoustic version with Edge singing solo on the Popmart tour. Played elsewhere in full band format in JT, ZooTv, Elevation & Vertigo tours
* The Cry - not played in Australia since this show. Played elsewhere on the Vertigo tour.
* The Electric Co. - not played in Australia since this show. Played elsewhere on the JT & Vertigo tours.
* I Fall Down - Not played anywhere since the UF tour
* October - Played on a few dates in the Lovetown tour. Not played anywhere since.
* New Year's Day - Played on every tour to Australia
* Pride (In The Name Of Love) - Played on every tour to Australia
* Gloria - Played a few dates in Australia on the Lovetown tour. Played elsewhere on the JT & Vertigo tours.

encore
* Party Girl - Played twice in Australia during Lovetown. Played elsewhere on JT, ZooTV, Elevation & Vertigo tours.
* 11 O'Clock Tick Tock - Not played in Australia since. Played elsewhere on JT, Lovetown & Elevation tours
* I Will Follow - Played in Australia on Lovetown & Popmart tours. Played elsewhere on JT, ZooTV, Elevation & Vertigo tours.
* 40 - Played as the main closer on Lovetown tour & not played here since. Played elsewhere on JT, Popmart & Vertigo tours.

Now obviously I'm not suggesting the setlist be full of songs from Boy <-> War but Australia really has got a raw deal as far having some of these songs in the setlist when they are appearing elsewhere. Consider we haven't had Electric Co or 11 O'clock for 22 years, Out of Control & full band SBS once in 22 years and Gloria, Party Girl & '40' for 17 years when all of these songs have had outings elsewhere in the meantime. As much as I enjoy songs like UTEOTW, NYD, BTBS, etc it would be nice to see some of the old favs getting a run as well.

I'll get off my soapbox now!!!

 

[AndrewCowley]

Interesting analysis. Rather flawed though. Two of the post UF tours never came to Australia. And we have only had 1 Vertigo concert so far. The fact is that the majority of these songs (the first 8 and then numerous of the others) were practically retired after the UF and JT tours. This was the case for the whole world. We are no different here.

You do have a point though. The point being that U2 have an "ugly" habit of dropping songs for good, sometimes never to play them ever again. But I don't think Australia is any worse off than the rest of the world in this regard since the setlists we get here are generally the same as the rest of the world (indeed that raises another setlist issue... static setlists throughout a tour).

This is a "global" issue not something isolated to Australia! And there's plenty of discussion in these forums about U2 setlist habits. Probably not worth starting another!

 

[annabelle]

it would be nice to see some of the old favs getting a run as well.

 

[Maquaman]

Interesting analysis. Rather flawed though. Two of the post UF tours never came to Australia. And we have only had 1 Vertigo concert so far.

The fact is that the majority of these songs (the first 8 and then numerous of the others) were practically retired after the UF and JT tours. This was the case for the whole world. We are no different here.

Don't think it is flawed. I think that we missed out on JT, pre Zooropa ZooTV, Elevation post UF and all the tours prior to UF actually supports what a raw deal we've had on the first three albums.

Originally posted by AndrewCowley You do have a point though. The point being that U2 have an "ugly" habit of dropping songs for good, sometimes never to play them ever again. But I don't think Australia is any worse off than the rest of the world in this regard since the setlists we get here are generally the same as the rest of the world (indeed that raises another setlist issue... static setlists throughout a tour).

That is the total opposite to the point I was trying to make. Obviously no one gets the songs that are permanently retired but there a many songs that have been played elsewhere on quite a few occassions since that we just haven't got either through setlist content or missing out on a tour altogether. I would also expect that we are very unlikely to get any of them on the Australian leg of Vertigo because of the inclusion of some of the newer material that we haven't had before here (ie Walk on, Kite, Miss Sarajevo, Saints, etc. Throw in UTEOTW, Angel of Harlem, etc and it is hard to see where in the setlist they will put any of the pre UF material they have played elsewhere other than NYD & SBS which I think will probably make every show. & the list of other pre UF songs played so far on Vertigo elsewhere in the world is Electric Co, 40, IWF, The Ocean, The Cry, Gloria, An Cat Dubh, Into the Heart, Party Girl & Out of Control. Let's see how many of them we get... I also doubt very much whether we'll get many if any at all of the other UF or JT songs songs that they have played elsewhere on the Vertigo tour being Bad, MLK, ISHFWILF & RTSS.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about the show they are putting on. The Brisbane show was right up the with the shows from Lovetown which were my previous favourites. It just would have been nice to have another 1 or 2 of the oldies in there especially when you know that they have already had a few outings in this very tour.

 

[Av]

Electric Co. and Out of control

Definetly would love to see these two make an appearance in theis leg of the vertigo tour.

 

[belgarath68]

Hawkmoon. Didn't they play that here? If they played it in Melbourne I...

 

[Axver]

I'm still holding out hope that The Electric Co. and I Will Follow will be done at Sydney III.

Hawkmoon. Didn't they play that here?

Yes, seven out of its eight performances were in Australia.

 

[belgarath68]

I'm gonna listen to Hawkmoon now. Man...I know it's not very likely, but I would just go crazy if they played that.

 

[Axver]

Well, to look on the bright side, Hawkmoon was snippeted once on Elevation!

I truly hope it comes back live one day. The beautiful slide solo intro that Edge did on Lovetown was just amazing. It feels like shades of it shine through at the start of COBL live this tour.

 

[xxxl]

On this topic ... my hope for this tour was to get one of:

11 O'clock tick tock,
Gloria, or
The Unforgettable Fire

I'm going to 13 November in Sydney

Judging by the set lists so far .. don't like my chances ... !

 

[The Lalat]

Maquaman might have a point, but on the other hand (as some have already alluded to) we have been fortunate to get some stuff that not many other countries got to hear on the Lovetown & Zoomerang:

* God Part II, Hawkmoon, Love Rescue Me, Van Diemens, "original" versions of All I Want, and a nice brassy Angel

* Dirty Day, Crashed Car, Lemon, (and from memory, not many got to hear full band Stay as we did).