A couple things.....
You guys goitta understand that this is...well, U2. They aren't the most polished of musicians live and they are notoriously rusty the first half dozen shows. To see and hear them playing at the fairly high level they are playing only 3 shows into the tour is very encouraging.
I remember hearing about 20 versions of "The Fly" through shows and boots from the Elevation tour and in just about every performance, someone, usually The Edge or Bono significantly screwed up a part of the song. I mean, I'm talking about whole sets of verses switched around, blown solos, You name it, they fucked it up at one show or another in '01. I think that right there was the main reason they canned the song in the set midway through that tour.
When I heard the go into The Fly at SD#1, I was right under the lighting rid on The Edge's side and probably because I was directly under the bank of suspended speakers, I thought The Edge's guitar tone was completely harsh and overdriven and kind of made the song unpleasant to hear. I even mentioned elseware that maybe Edge should switch to a Strat and a bit of a smoother tone from his rig.
After hearing boots from both SD shows, it sounds a lot better despite Bono's issues with the lyrics and I think they'll quickly nail it on a night to night basis.
I for one am really happy it's in the set and hope they stick with it for most of the tour.
Now "Elevation" is a different story. It's the one song being played so far this tour I do not like. On the '01 tour, it was a great opener but this tour burried in the last 3rd of the set in it's somewhat stripped down arrangement, it just doesn't move me. I'd rather hear just about any other burned out song like "I Will Follow" or "Until the End of the World" instead of that tune.
T.B.