By Jim Stanford on March 9, 2010
Bono performs at the Delta Center in December 2005. This photo was taken by the guy standing next to me, whose name I wish I could recall to credit.
Tickets have been on sale since late last month, but judging from conversations with friends, not many people realize that U2 is kicking off its 360º World Tour in Salt Lake City on June 3.
The Irish rock band is playing Rice-Eccles Stadium at the University of Utah, with Lenny Kravitz opening. There are plenty of tickets available, although many are spendy ($55 to $250).
U2 last played Salt Lake in 2005. Dozens of Jackson Hole fans made the trek to the Delta Center and were treated to a life-affirming performance, a review of which follows after the jump.
There are few bands I would travel to Utah to see, and U2 is one of them. This time, on an outdoor field of grass, the sound should be even better.
In God’s Country, no less.
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Originally published in the Jackson Hole News&Guide on Dec. 21, 2005:
U2 fans, in Salt Lake, heed the battle call
By Jim Stanford
SALT LAKE CITY — Halfway through his band’s concert Saturday at the Delta Center, U2 singer Bono reached down into the crowd and picked up a small American flag.
“America, this is your song now,” he said, as behind him drummer Larry Mullen Jr. began pounding out the beat of “Sunday Bloody Sunday.”
Guitarist The Edge strummed the familiar opening notes that pierced like bullets and seemed to rain down from the rafters of the arena, as Bono launched into the signature anthem.
The song, written about the conflict between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland, remains remarkably pertinent and powerful 20 years later in this age of war, terrorism, torture and domestic spying. But rather than drive a wedge even deeper between the already-polarized factions in the crowd, Bono, mindful of the walls that once divided Belfast, beseeched the 18,000 or so in attendance — red state, blue state, Mormon, pagan — to come together.
“Tonight we can be as one,” he sang, as a brilliant light show illuminated the stage behind him.
Throughout the two-plus-hour concert, the penultimate stop on U2’s sold-out Vertigo tour of North America, Bono set about mobilizing an army of all ages and backgrounds to join his fight against poverty and tyranny. One of Time magazine’s people of the year walked a fine line between politics, religion and music, preaching and proselytizing as he pranced around the elliptical catwalk that extended more than 100 feet into the audience.
With the show taking place only a few blocks from Temple Square, home of the Mormon church, a religious aura pervaded.
“We’re going to turn this song into a prayer,” Bono said during a stretched-out interlude in “Sunday Bloody Sunday,” tying around his forehead a bandanna adorned with the crescent of Islam, star of David and cross of Christ.
“Jesus, Jew, Mohammed, it’s true,” he chanted. “All sons of Abraham.”
Standing in a shaft of light with his back arched and the bottom of the microphone pointed toward the sky, Bono appeared as much of a prophet as Brigham Young. Each move and exhortation drew screams from the adoring fans.
“Sunday Bloody Sunday” was a call for Americans to rebel against the tyranny of their own government. “You don’t have to become a monster to destroy a monster,” Bono said.
But in the next breath he was dedicating “Bullet the Blue Sky” to the men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces. And he gave props to arch-conservative U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, for working with him to forgive Third World debt.
“We are more powerful when we work together as one,” Bono said, a cue for the band to break into the mega-hit “One,” from Achtung Baby.
The show began with a cascade of confetti and phantasmagoric display of lights, with strings of bulbs suspended more than 50 feet above the stage. Thirty-six thousand hands went up into the air, silhouetted, along with about 5,000 cell phones taking pictures, and for a brief moment it seemed as if one had stepped inside an iPod commercial.
Rapper Kanye West had performed a short, sonically muddy opening set, asking “Y’all come to party?” as the crowd largely sat and stared. It was a shame that his backing band — composed of four women on violins, one on harp and two on cello, along with a male turntablist — couldn’t be heard better, as one of the violinists was kicking.
U2 overcame the acoustic challenges mainly by being loud. It wasn’t until the fourth song, “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For,” introduced by Bono as a “little folk song,” that the sound got properly tuned.
“Still Haven’t Found” started the spiritual march that thumped through “Sunday Bloody Sunday” and “Pride (In the Name of Love),” which had fans singing “WHOA-oh-oh-oh, whoa-OH-oh-oh” for several minutes.
In fact, at times when there seemed to be an echo in the arena, it was only the crowd singing along on favorites such as “Where the Streets Have No Name” and “With or Without You.”
Dozens of Jackson Hole residents — ever eager to find fun within a 300- to 500-mile radius — traveled to Salt Lake for the show. Many gathered before and after at Bayou, a downtown bar boasting the biggest selection of beers in the state.
Everyone in attendance seemed to embrace U2’s message, but they left pondering the refrain of the final encore, “40.” If Bono can join with the likes of Orrin Hatch and Jesse Helms, one had to wonder, why hasn’t poverty been eliminated, in America if not in Africa?
“How long … to sing this song?”
JS is this your first use of the Orphan Works act, ie. tried to find the photographer, but couldn’t, so it is free for the public. This is a perfect example of how that will work.
If you are a creative professional, write your congressman and stop the Orphan Works Act.