U2 spectacle has fans in raptures
8:48am Friday 21st August 2009

By Ian Savage


U2 360 Tour Don Valley Stadium, Sheffield U2's longstanding tour designer Willie Williams celebrated his birthday yesterday.

In a nice gesture, Bono led 45,000 fans from all over the country (this was the closet the world's biggest band are getting to us on this tour) in a rendition of Happy Birthday for Mr Williams.

It's to be hoped that the four men from Dublin also chipped in a for a fantastic present for their pal, because the birthday boy's work on this show is nothing short of genius.

The set has to be seen to be believed; dubbed 'The Claw' it resembles a cross between a War of the World's martian and, indeed, a gigantic version of one of those mechanical claws in fairgrounds, used by eager youngsters, usually in vain, to try to pick up cuddly toys.

It is 160ft tall and squats over a circular stage, which is itself surrounded by an outer 'catwalk' style stage, connected to the main stage by two arched bridges. Which rotate throughout the show.

The Irish band's aim with this tour - their first since 2005 - is to make stadium rock a more intimate experience (and get an extra 10,000 or so in to each show to in effect play in the round).

Whether intimacy is enhanced is debatable. Bono and the boys have somehow always been able to effortlessly reach out to their audiences in massive spaces.

What is not open to question, however, is that the show was an astonishing spectacle.

At one point, as The Claw's legs changed colour, chameleon-like, the centrepiece glittered with white light and smoke poured from the stage. You could have been forgiven for expecting the whole contraption to take off and head out into space.

This Sheffield show - with superb support by Bury's Mercury Prize winning band Elbow - was the penultimate of the European leg of the tour, launched to showcase songs from U2's latest studio album, No Line on the Horizon. Incredibly, despite the 45,000-strong crowd, it was one of the smallest venues. The band had played to 88,000 at Wembley a week earlier.

Seven tracks from that featured in the 24 song setlist and, as ever with U2, the new songs just worked better live than on CD.

Show opener Breathe and Unknown Caller stood out for me, but the weakest song on the new record - Get on Your Boots - is much more impressive live.

So the rest of the songs were basically a Best Of complication. And what a catalogue.

I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For got fans to their feet, then there was Pride, Vertigo, Beautiful Day, With or Without You, City of Blinding Lights, Sunday Bloody Sunday, Elevation, The Unforgettable Fire, Mysterious Ways and One, which saw the stadium become, in Bono's words 'lit up like The Milky Way', as fans held up glowing mobile phones, a hi-tech replacement for the flickering lighters of yore.

As for U2's one-of-a-kind lead singer, Bono was in fine form and voice; the most impressive I have seen him live for many a year.

The only criticism is ironic, in that because the set is SO fantastic, I did find myself distracted from the band members themselves at times.

This didn't concern my 12-year-old son, who simply said his first experience of U2 live was 'amazing'.

Hard to argue with . . . and if U2 want to top this tour, they and Mr Williams are going to have their work cut out.

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source: theboltonnews