Overall I'm going to talk about my thoughts on the setlist in general and each of the songs. I'll be putting in spoilery spoilers as I'll be describing a lot of neat/new things that you will WANT to experience yourself. I already knew that there would be Electric Co., 40, that at one point they played Gloria, etc due to various spoilage online, which I tryed to avoid, which merited some wonderful moments for me.
Main Set:Love and Peace or Else - What a way to start the show, given the song's long snythy intro it is a natural opener - the band walking the ellipse with flashlights skittering into the audience was pretty cool. The distorted “everyone†vocals coming into this with fighter jets screaming around- powerful stuff if a bit more obvious than the minimal ominous sounds the studio version had. I don't think it needs to have SBS/Bullet after it to stay strong (as in the middle of SD and intro to Anaheim 1). It is one of the songs from the album I was dying to hear live and also one I knew would be hard to pull off live as well. The middle 8 and the transition out of it seemed a bit off a bit off (but it seems to be getting better night by night). The solo itself rocked, with Bono taking over the mini drum kit Larry played near the tip of the ellipse and banging away. Lovely song.
Vertigo / Stories For Boys - It seemed faster than usual. Bono's timing was off on the verses as usual but it seemed more intense than on the TV recordings. At "and no one gets hurt" he really delays singing "hurt" and the music just stops a few seconds, similar to the 'slow down' in the video version I suppose. It makes more of an impact but also interrupts the pacing a bit. When the song ended and the cymbals kept on going then the bass came back in I thought "oh how cool, they've made a little coda for it" Then he starts singing SFB! Wow! The lyrics are sung over almost "vertigo-light" instrumental parts making it even cooler. When he reaches "Hello, hello" the song slams back into Vertigo. A wonderful parallel between the two eras. Thematically it works well as a follow up to LAPOE (confusion following discord, deliverance from chaos, etc) while setting a tone for the show as a whole copmared Anaheim 1 (though listening to that now it was a really strong first half of the set).
Elevation - The first two verses (+ first chorus) are sung over just Edge playing two chords over and over, and larry providing hi-hat hits. It WORKS. At this point I was like "damn, they're being pretty creative this time." I found it cool Edge emphasized "mole, hole, soul" like fans did during the last tour, melody is a bit different, at the end of the slow part Edge plays a silly little riff. Apparently it was supposed to go full band after the first chorus in an earlier show but Larry goofed, and it worked so well they kept it.
The Cry - Electric Co. - I knew it was coming but still great. Bono had some new lyrics for The Cry. It keeps up the energy/heaviness of the beginning of the set. The time period thing seques well into the next song...
An Cat Dubh / Into the Heart - This blew my mind. Never expected to hear this - I got goosebumps during the transition, powerful moment, Bono kind of laying on the ellipse/crawling around. Bono grabbed someone's girl and walked around with her a bit and then said "raise your arms and see what happens"....
City of Blinding Lights - Little sparkly confetti rained down among the lights (no doubt delighting the girl) the whole first verse or two fit well with that as well, thematically nice rolling off of ITH. The backdrop was *really* cool for this song, reminded me of some kind of abstract cyberpunkish backdrop (which was emphasized by some scrolling Japanese text near the end - Tokyo archetype city of the future). The "time, time" part didn't come out too well, my favorite part of the song.
Beautiful Day - Again, this song really works after COBL nice thematic tying in... the set really flowed. Nothing really new or exciting here until the end, when Bono motioned for Edge to keep playing the ending phrase while he sang Blackbird on top of it, that toning down of things segued really well (you must be getting tired of that by now!) into
Miracle Drug - Long Bono chat about the Pope over Edge playing the intro riff over and over (poor The Edge!). Beautiful work done using the stage lighting, very unique. Heavy backing synth/sfx compared to the early BBC broadcast, no MIDI backing from his guitar. Was peeved Bono sang along to Edge's verse (apparently the night before Edge’s mic cut out, so I’ll forgive him though).
Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own - Again dedicated to the pope... you know this song's gonna make it in, and it doesn't really fit anywhere better at this point. He added in an extra line from 'no regrets' at the end. The CG postman on the backdrop was a bit cheesy, arrangement of the song didn't seem as good as on TV appearances but it might have just been the sound where I was sitting.
New Year's Day - Yeah, the rebirth song (after UTEOTW, etc). Dunno, been there done that. Great song but compared to the stuff before it rather familiar live. Got the highest approval rating of any song up to this point judging by the cheers when it started.
Sunday Bloody Sunday - Well it fits after NYD due to them being on the same album. I swear this is faster than it was last tour. Bono had a world religions bandana on, said some lines about us knowing what was on his mind.Bono does the "no more" bit in the middle - REALLY resonated with the audience (and myself) I found myself really getting into the song after having NYD being the first real "passive listening". After the normal ending they did the lil drum pickup thing, I thought they're going into their little live version coda. Mid measure it slams into (wow!!!!)
Bullet the Blue Sky - Hands That Built America - I WASN'T expecing this to come in where it did. Edge's solo was pretty raw distortion, then went into BLUES!! I'm not talking about R&H "Edge play me the blues" either. There are some recognizable licks here and there, but it is pretty much a new solo. Amazing (after listening to previous three nights this was much more original). Ala Popmart there is a plane in the background, this time instead of a cartoony fighter it is a F-22 Raptor (or something like that, the new JSF plane?). Either way there aren’t all that many countries that have them. Bono puts the bandana over his eyes and sings this creeeeepy THTBA... then to a verse from this song
http://www.instantknowledgenews.com/johnny.htm then back to Hands. Shivers up and down my body. Perhaps to stave off belligerence from the crowd at the end of the song he said “this next one goes to the brave men and women of the armed forces.†Of course knowing the ZooTV/Vietnam connection I had a good idea what that song would be, and how ambivalent that statement might turn out to be... always looking at the humanistic side of things, taking an angle not always appreciated. [I didn't catch it but he did similar poses as in LA 2 - see that for description].
Running to Stand Still – Yup. Edge on piano, Bono contributing a handful of notes on an acoustic guitar – beautiful… got goosebumps around the third verse. There is an instrumental outro where the beginning of the UN Declaration of Human Rights is displayed.
http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html Articles 1-2 (and part of the preamble?) are shown text only, 3-6 are recited in somewhat broken English by a video-recorded girl. 3 naturally got a wonderful response from the crowd, 4 got an amazing amount of cheering (it seems a bit dated for such a large response) and 5 (which I think hits hard on the whole widespread use of “coercive interrogation techniques†leading in dozens of cases in death, administration legal workings to justify said actions, extracting prisoners for “interrogation†in countries that are known for torture, refusing the red cross access to certain detention areas, etc), 6 which would undermine the patriot acts holding people indefinitely with no legal counsel, etc. I doubt the armed forces are turning to Heroin etc as much as the forces in Vietnam (the inspiration for the zootv running order, the helicopter sounds deliverance into streets, at the end as Bono wrapped in opposing flare signals of yellow/red) , but another link would be how the war in some aspects seem to be ‘standing still’ despite massive money and effort exerted. It seems an odd piece, in context, to get across "supporting the troops is different than supporting the war", it seemed more sympathetic in ZooTV (the smoke remains, though uncolored in this version). Heavy song...
Zoo Station – I thought I heard the closing bars soundchecked but didn’t believe it’d be in the set. I was screaming my little head off when this came up… I associate it with the opening of ZooTV, never thought I’d see it in the middle of a set. The stage had some really cool lighting, Edge had a little headset so he could sing while playing/walking around the ellipse. Bono didn’t seem up to this one lyrically (he repeated some lines in BTBS, LAPOE’s middle, and a few other places too). At some point near the beginning he sang “it’s not alright, not alright†I kind of associated it with the violation of Geneva conventions (perhaps reading too much into it, but why else have this song after RTSS?). Great song, I was wondering “I hope this doesn’t mean I won’t get the fly.â€
The Fly – As close to a ZooTV concert as I’ll ever get… sigh. Had a cool intro where they looped Edge’s playing and Larry came in on top, a more traditional arrangement than last tour aside from that, with the chorus featuring both vocalists. Bono sang along with Edge’s part of the chorus before his part came in with a lower/distorted voice – it kind of diluted the impact but worked well at other times. Edge seemed to have his pitch bend effects off during the solo and it came off a little flat. The LCD drapes flashed ZooTV phrases over them – I was in heaven.  Nice kind of information overload can’t-take-it after Zoo Station and the preceding songs.
Mysterious Ways – Heh, keeping up the little ZooTV block. I love the song, but miss the Elevation intro, no piano parts either. An odd song to close the set with, but I always that solo they tagged onto the ending. Perhaps a kind of "well we might not understand it, but things will work out" kind of message - or just leaving things on a happy dancy note.
Africa Encore:Pride – A great song, but I never got much out of hearing it live. Bono had the audience do the little “oh oh†(My throat got tired… I was dry coming into the show but wasn’t gonna spend no $4 for bottled water once inside) stuff for a long time while he talked about Dr. King’s dream not just being for the US but for the world – equality in Europe, Asia, and Africa, Africa, Africa. Odd that he didn’t mention the M.E. If you support a modernistic spread of values “dream big enough to fit the whole world†it seems fair to assume that would somewhat support the neo-conservative “new American century†they’re trying to build up.
Where the Streets Have No Name – It ties into the song before it, odd spot in the concert for it. Instead of the traditional red dawn and then blinding sunrise you see a lot of African flags flowing down the backdrop. The lighting didn’t seem as dramatic as past tours. An amazing song live presented in any manner.
One – Didn’t recognize the synth riff repeated in the background at first, interesting inversions on the chords. Nice for Edge he didn’t have to play while Bono plugged the One Campaign. Bono had all the lights turned off, and had people hold up their cell phones, they did look like stars shining in the night.
God Encore:All Because Of You – This song is growing on me, it feels a lot more alive than it used to, when it wasn’t in the main set I figured it might be used to open up an encore. Bono tried playing tambourine… his technique was pretty jerky and it sounded off. The shaker in Stuck worked a lot better. He missed the little scream moment as he moved over to shake the tambourine near Edge’s head. Funny.
Yahweh – It started off as an acoustic number, with Adam adding some subtle bass and Larry playing keyboards (?!). I like it a lot better than the album mix, the feeling of the song really comes out a lot clearer. I’m not sure if Larry had the wrong sample loaded on his keyboard or if they wanted it to be clear he wasn’t playing a backing track as it sounded like a $50 radio shack string sample. This encore doesn’t seem to work as well, the songs fit well lyrically but not so much musically.
40 – Bono apparently forget the lyrics, melody, or both, as he had to run over to Edge and have him sing in his ear. I think Edge went over to Adam and told him the chords as well. Weird – it’s such a critical song. I tried to do the “how long to sing this song†for as long as I could, but my throat was shot from Pride and my voice kept cracking on the “how.†Still went on.
What I’d change:Keeping things realistic – no Like A Song, Acrobat, etc. Move Elevation between Fly and MW [possibly after, it would fit well near it with the new intro - perhaps it was just an abrupt transition that evening that makes me want to put something between those two...] leaving Vertigo – Electric Co with a much more energetic intro. Perhaps replace Yahweh with Gloria, or put Gloria before Yahweh to make ABOY not stick out so much. Take out NYD and replace with Crumbs, or Gone. There are no songs from Pop! Hell, toss in Discotheque/SATS after MW? And Xanax and Wine somewhere? (OK that last isn’t realistic).
Overall I thought it a great setlist, more balanced than Anaheim 1 thematically. Interesting to see them take out some staples – Bad, UTEOTW, WOWY (though I’d like any of these over Pride it is a pretty integral part of his campaign encore and don’t expect to see it go). I thought at times the prompting for audience singing was a bit overdone or detrimental, especially at the "oh oh whoa whoa" part of Miracle Drug where Bono wasn't even sure of what to sing and what to expect from the audience - perhaps that just keep that within the band, it's neat to see Larry singing back up in any case.
[Edited on 2005-4-9 by Carl]
