I didn’t think I was going to come to the show tonight, but I am sure glad that I did. This was U2‘s opening show for their North American Innocence + Experience Tour and it was great. Rogers Arena is always a nice place to see a show…something about the crowd/ atmosphere in Canada that is just a little bit more mellow than most places.
I got to the venue a little before 6:30 thinking that I would walk right in…nope! There were lines all around the building. I didn’t know which line was which and where to stand and no one was moving. I am not sure why they waited so long to start letting folks in, but when they finally did, things moved along pretty well. I got in around 7:15, went to the merch booth, bought a tour shirt and then a beer and went to sit down and wait for the show.
When I got to my seat, I have to admit that I was little disappointed that it was just left of the stage and I thought that I would be looking at the side of the band all night long. They actually had a real nice stage set-up with an island from the main stage all the way to the other end of the floor where there was another smaller, round stage. There really didn’t seem to be a bad seat in the entire arena, and the guys made sure they played to all the sections. In between the two stages was a huge see-through video type screen that raised and lowered and had a cat walk in it so the band could walk through from one end to the other…they really put together a very entertaining stage performance. There was a bit of a intermission at the half way mark where they played a real neat punk rock and new wave, alternative retrospective on the big center screen.
They played for just over two hours with I think four encore songs. They sounded great, with Bono still being able to belt out the vocals and of course the screeching and scratching guitar work of The Edge (who took a little spill off the end of the stage at the end of the show…kind of scary as this was the first show of the tour). Rounding out the band was Adam Clayton on bass and of course Larry Mullen on drums. Some of my favorite songs of the night were “Beautiful Day“, “With or Without You“, “Vertigo” and of course “Sunday Bloody Sunday” and “Pride (In the Name of Love)“.
I can’t wait to see them in LA on a few weeks…
bryonsconcertblog 
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