Joshua tree set list speculation

[georgemccauley]

It could go either way, I like to think they won't be opening with streets and the more I think about that the more it makes sense. Basically put, if they open with streets then we will be getting the whole album in sequence....

However I'm on the side of building up to the album. That way you're going to get the energy right from the get go, just like what they did with the I+e tour.

Something like

Out Of Control,
I Will Follow,
Vertigo,
Elevation

To start with

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

The more I think about it, the more it seems that they would need to open with the JT stuff, even if they don't necessarily play it in order. There's going to be a lot of casual-types filling up the stadiums and I just don't know how comfortable the Dublin boys are going to feel if Streets is like Song #11 in their setlist which means by the time they get to Song #19-21 they'll be performing One Tree Hill, Exit and Mothers of the Disappeared - not exactly the best attention-getters when you're two hours in and your stadium has 30,000 people that are just as interested in buying hot dogs and expensive beer.

Might make more sense to get that B-side of JT out of the way while the audience is nice and attentive just as they tossed in a lot of those forgettable Songs of Innocence tunes early during the last tour and then really wowed the audience with a bunch of hits and classics at the end. The way that both the band and a lot of fans have proposed so far, the setlists would be a reverse of SOI&E's shows where the classics would come out early and then the album being toured would appear at the end. Granted, this isn't without merit. Based on past history for these sort of concerts, practically everybody expects a band to do the album in Set #2 as otherwise you're opening with a very predictable setlist, but how many other bands touring a classic LP are going to be playing to 70,000 people?

springsteen played stadiums on The River - and these stage setups are more 40-50k, not 70.

alas, people are looking at the setlist in the vein of i/e - a set 1 and set 2, plus encore. that's where i think the mistake is.

springsteen on the river tour is an anomaly as it was a double album, so can't really use that as a comparison. a better comparison would be when he played full album shows to close out Giants Stadium.

this was the Born To Run night...

1. Wrecking Ball
2. Out in the Street
3. Outlaw Pete
4. Hungry Heart
5. Working on a Dream

Born To Run Album
6. Thunder Road
7. Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out
8. Night
9. Backstreets
10. Born to Run
11. She's the One
12. Meeting Across the River
13. Jungleland

14. Waitin' on a Sunny Day
15. Raise Your Hand (Eddie Floyd cover) (Instrumental)
16. It's Hard to Be a Saint in the City
17. My Love Will Not Let You Down
18. Because the Night
19. Human Touch
20. Lonesome Day
21. The Rising
22. Badlands
23. No Surrender

Encore:
24. 4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)
25. Bobby Jean
26. American Land
27. Dancing in the Dark
28. Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)
29. Twist and Shout



4-5 songs then right into the full album, 10 more songs to follow - with a 6 song encore.

now i don't expect U2 to play 30 songs on this tour... probably more around 24-25.

i think it'll flow sort of like this

1. I Will Follow/Electric Co
2. Out of Control/Gloria
3. Desire
4. Beautiful Day

5. Where The Streets Have No Name
6. I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
7. With Or Without You
8. Bullet The Blue Sky
9. Running To Stand Still
10. Red Hill Mining Town
11. In God's Country
12. Trip Through Your Wires
13. One Tree Hill
14. Exit
15. Mother's Of The Disappeared

16. New Year's Day
17. Elevation
18. Angel of Harlem (b stage)
19. Sweetest Thing (b stage)
20. All I Want Is You (starts on B stage)
21. Bad

Encore
22. Pride
23. Mysterious Ways
24. One
25. 40

 

[Axver]

I think Headache's probably on the money here, though I would predict the opening section to be longer and there to be only 2-3 old songs after JT. Say something along these lines:

1. I Will Follow
2. Out of Control or Gloria
3. Sunday Bloody Sunday
4. New Year's Day
5. Pride
6. Bad or A Sort of Homecoming
7-17. The Joshua Tree
18. All I Want Is You
19. Beautiful Day
20. Vertigo

21. One
22. Every Breaking Wave or Sweetest Thing
23. Mysterious Ways or EBTTRT
24. New song
25. 40

 

[kabigon]

1. Vertigo
2. Elevation
3. I Will Follow
4. Beautiful Day
5-16.TJT
17.Angel Of Harlem
18. Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of
19. Every Breaking Wave
20. Pride (In The Name Of Love)

21. Mysterious Ways
22. One
23. Bad
24. 40

Dreamfest -California, +Mysterious Ways and Bad

Hope it's a little more adventurous than this.

 

[superchuk5]

After listening to XXX, I'm betting it will get snippeted at every show. Perhaps as part of the Bullet rant.

 

[prbiker15]

After listening to XXX, I'm betting it will get snippeted at every show. Perhaps as part of the Bullet rant.

Agreed, it would work great.

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

I don't see how it would work within the bullet spoken word part, but I do agree that it's likely to be snippeted at some point

 

[Mack_Again]

Kendrick should just tour with U2 and rap over everything they do.

 

[mikal]

If they open with Streets, I will lose my shit. I really think they should play the full album to start the show.

 

[Tommy WM]

This:

 

[brooklynmike]

Desire
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Out of Control/I Will Follow
New Years Day
Bad
Where the Streets Have No Name
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
With or Without You
Bullet the Blue Sky
Running to Stand Still
Red Hill Mining Town
In God's Country
Trip Through Your Wires
One Tree Hill
Exit
Mothers of the Disappeared

Encore:
Until the End of The World
Vertigo
Mysterious Ways
Elevation
Beautiful Day
One
Pride

 

[birdman]

Desire
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Out of Control/I Will Follow
New Years Day
Bad
Where the Streets Have No Name
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
With or Without You
Bullet the Blue Sky
Running to Stand Still
Red Hill Mining Town
In God's Country
Trip Through Your Wires
One Tree Hill
Exit
Mothers of the Disappeared

Encore:
Until the End of The World
Vertigo
Mysterious Ways
Elevation
Beautiful Day
One
Pride

Desire
Sunday Bloody Sunday/No Line on the Horizon
Out of Control/I Will Follow
New Years Day/California
Bad

Encore:
Until the End of The World
Vertigo

People Get Ready

Mysterious Ways
Elevation
Beautiful Day
One
Pride

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

I think the odds that I'll open for the band at MetLife on kazoo are better than the odds of them alternating Sunday and NYD with No Line and California.

 

[birdman]

I think the odds that I'll open for the band at MetLife on kazoo are better than the odds of them alternating Sunday and NYD with No Line and California.

But how would you know, if its alternating?
I want NLOTH early in the set, fukmerite

 

[Headache in a Suitcase]

K... this was the speculation thread, not the your ideal setlist thread.

 

[birdman]

K... this was the speculation thread, not the your ideal setlist thread.

I thought there was a grey line, but there isn't..!

 

[Hewson]

This:

Video needs to end with Edge falling off stage, then it would be the greatest thing ever...well at least the greatest thing this morning.

 

[superchuk5]

Got a nice 25-song setlist:

Beautiful Day
I Will Follow
Vertigo
Elevation
Until the End of the World
Desire
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Pride (In the Name of Love)
Every Breaking Wave
Bad
Where the Streets Have No Name
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
With or Without You
Bullet the Blue Sky (with XXX snippet)
Running to Stand Still
Red Hill Mining Town
In God's Country
Trip Through Your Wires
One Tree Hill
Exit
Mothers of the Disappeared

Even Better than the Real Thing
Mysterious Ways
One
40

Conservative picks, but this is what I think the show will look like. JT + songs played at iHeartRadio + Dreamforce + Other Big Hits. They may rotate some songs out, but I really don't see room for much variation on this tour.

 

[BVS]

Got a nice 25-song setlist:



Beautiful Day

I Will Follow

Vertigo

Elevation

Until the End of the World

Desire

Sunday Bloody Sunday

Pride (In the Name of Love)

Every Breaking Wave

Bad

Where the Streets Have No Name

I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For

With or Without You

Bullet the Blue Sky (with XXX snippet)

Running to Stand Still

Red Hill Mining Town

In God's Country

Trip Through Your Wires

One Tree Hill

Exit

Mothers of the Disappeared



Even Better than the Real Thing

Mysterious Ways

One

40



Conservative picks, but this is what I think the show will look like. JT + songs played at iHeartRadio + Dreamforce + Other Big Hits. They may rotate some songs out, but I really don't see room for much variation on this tour.

This would be such a bizarre setlist. I just mean that it lacks any theme.

My hope would be that this tour has some theme to it, such as; our beginnings, JT, how we chopped it down, the future, and then who we will always be.

 

[AndrewCowley]

This would be such a bizarre setlist. I just mean that it lacks any theme.

Lacking a theme? It'd be consistent then with their last stadium outing (the 360 tour).

Seriously though, the theme is The Joshua Tree. Whatever they bookend it with is irrelevant as far as any over-arching theme is concerned. Likely it'll be a bunch of hits and of course it'll be the same every night.

Skip to the end of the tour and I'll be amazed if they haven't found some flimsy reason for not playing JT in entirety. They'll drop one of the 'deep cuts' and replace it with IALW or some other rubbish.

 

[BVS]

Lacking a theme? It'd be consistent then with their last stadium outing (the 360 tour).

Seriously though, the theme is The Joshua Tree. Whatever they bookend it with is irrelevant as far as any over-arching theme is concerned. Likely it'll be a bunch of hits and of course it'll be the same every night.

Yeah, 360 had a very iffy theme, but there was an attempt, it just didn't fit with the current album.

Will it be the same every night? Yep, for the most part.

If you're still complaining about that after 30+ years; you're following the wrong fucking band. Plain and simple.

Stop acting like that's new.

But I still think U2 will try and incorporate a theme, be it a career spanning timeline one, or a geopolitical one. If I was a betting man I'd say there's no way you'll see BD or UTEOTW prior to going into JT, but we'll see.

 

[trevgreg]

I like how IALW wasn't even played at most of the 360 shows (and probably not at all on the previous or following tours), and yet it's somehow treated like a set list staple. Same for Elevation on the I&E shows.

Unless we're going to each show or downloading each bootleg and listening to it non-stop, it doesn't really matter a whole lot in the end anyway. They're pretty much committed to doing the whole album here too. It's the whole basis for the tour. No reason to get upset just yet.

 

[superchuk5]

This would be such a bizarre setlist. I just mean that it lacks any theme.

My hope would be that this tour has some theme to it, such as; our beginnings, JT, how we chopped it down, the future, and then who we will always be.

There's no theme; it's Hit Parade + JT + Encore.

At least that's what I expect. They could go for something more thematic, but i think this is a hits tour.

 

[georgemccauley]

There's no theme; it's Hit Parade + JT + Encore.

At least that's what I expect. They could go for something more thematic, but i think this is a hits tour.

Aren't all tours a hits tour these days? No way are they going to leave out the likes of Streets, WOWY, Pride, BD etc

 

[trevgreg]

Streets and WOWY... probably not on this tour, no.

Pride actually got a bit of a break during the 360 tour... maybe played at half of the dates there, so it's possible.

Beautiful Day would be a hard one to drop, I'd imagine, but not totally impossible.

 

[superchuk5]

Streets and WOWY... probably not on this tour, no.

Pride actually got a bit of a break during the 360 tour... maybe played at half of the dates there, so it's possible.

Beautiful Day would be a hard one to drop, I'd imagine, but not totally impossible.

I have suspicion Sunday Bloody Sunday may get a break. It's been a nightly feature since 2001 and they had to shake it up for i+e. Also wasn't played at either of the 2016 shows.

I'm not confident enough to predict it, but I wouldn't be shocked if they gave it a break, even with all the geopolitical relevance.

 

[georgemccauley]

I have suspicion Sunday Bloody Sunday may get a break. It's been a nightly feature since 2001 and they had to shake it up for i+e. Also wasn't played at either of the 2016 shows.



I'm not confident enough to predict it, but I wouldn't be shocked if they gave it a break, even with all the geopolitical relevance.

I think the theme of this tour will get that band focusing more than ever on politics etc, if that's the case then Sunday Bloody Sunday is a shoe in to be a regular on this tour IMO

 

[BVS]

I think the theme of this tour will get that band focusing more than ever on politics etc, if that's the case then Sunday Bloody Sunday is a shoe in to be a regular on this tour IMO

I agree. Of course this will be a hits tour for the most part(other than the second side of JT), anyone who thinks otherwise will be in for a shock.

But we'll get RHMT, and many JT songs that haven't been played in a long time.

Now if we get a new song on top of that...

My point earlier is that a tour about celebrating a certain point in their career, I highly doubt will be opened by their biggest 2000's hits and some 90's songs.

But then again it's U2

I'd be willing to bet, but maybe not ALL my pocket lint

 

[RoKKeR]

Does anybody hope that they DON'T play TJT in sequence? My next favorite band after U2 is Yellowcard (RIP, last concert was in March) and one of the last shows they played was an Ocean Avenue show in which they played the album front to back and then did greatest hits at the end. It was a solid show, but playing the album in sequence definitely took a lot of tension out of the room in terms of anticipating what song might come next because... well, we all knew what song was coming next.

I'm not sure how they'd incorporate spreading them throughout the show if they are going to do a more thematic, linear/narrative-based show, but it certainly does remove some of the suspense.

(I know this is a minor point in an age when we can all just look up the setlist beforehand and us diehards know how most nights are going to play out, but still)

 

[trevgreg]

(I know this is a minor point in an age when we can all just look up the setlist beforehand and us diehards know how most nights are going to play out, but still)

Well, that is sort of the be all, end all. And since an album is being touted specifically this time around, I would imagine most people are guessing that it's being played in order.

Regarding the surprise factor... unless we're someone that's going out of our way to not see what's being played until the show, it might not matter a whole lot anyway. I'm sort of used to the site of people looking at setlist.fm on their phones before a show as well, so I'm not too sure how many people these days are going in and not at least having some idea on what's coming up. Or at least for the bigger bands, maybe.

For me personally, it wouldn't really matter, since I'll know what's being played anyway and I'll be basing my opinions on how good it sounds live, as opposed to what order it's played in. But that's just me.