05-21-2015, 11:03 AM
We just spent the weekend together so our verbal fencing has been back in action. But he resisted my invitation here, so kudos to him. I'll see him at lunch in a few minutes, where we shall surely discuss this show, so here's a more accurate review. In fact, this will be my IRE review. My wife is part Irish. Consequently, so is my daughter, only less so. And not only have I eaten countless potatoes (okay, they were french fries) with Greg, I have replaced my bloodstream with Guinness many times over. So I think I'm qualified.
S has been tepid about seeing U2. We recently put together a bucket list of major acts we wanted to see but had not yet seen, and I found her list to be sorely lacking with the absence of U2. I think I've seen U2 5 times now, but I haven't gone back to count. After our wonderful Joshua Tree journey, it seemed a perfect fit. But T's school changed schedule so she had finals the day after and we couldn't justify taking her, so we had two extras as mentioned earlier. So we took the father and brother of one of her classmates, who also happen to be Irish. In fact, the dad had torn his gastrocnemius doing some vigorous Celtic dancing in Dublin just a week or so earlier and was on crutches. None of them had seen U2. So there I was with three U2 nooBs.
The SAP ran out of Guinness early. They only had two cart stands that offered it - probably only a case all in all. I went to the first cart and the dude before me bought their last can, so I had to dash all the way around the arena to the other cart. There was a lot of Jameson. But I'll never forgive SAP for that lame oversight.
The show was amazing. It always is. U2 delivers. The new stage was one long glory ramp. Above it was the biggest TV screen ever and the bad could walk inside the screen and interact with what was projected. And the video was perfect. The sound system looked good with speakers hanging off the rigging for the lights and TV in every direction (so no front stage wall of speakers) but I felt it was compromised by the crappy acoustics of the SAP. The ceiling is all girders and metal, which gives that house a clangy, tinny sound. The intense volume, which is amplified even more when they play indoor shows, well, my head is still ringing (but then, it's been ringing for years now).
I found myself focusing on Clayton and Mullen for the first time. The Edge seemed a little subdued, perhaps after his fall off the 'edge' of the glory ramp at the first show in Vancouver last week. Bono, well, he's always front and center, and was very preachy this time, really plugging his One charity, and spitting a lot of water on the audience (doesn't he know about our drought?) I feel like his voice is losing its high end a little now. Mullen really led the charge with his almost military rudimentary drumming style - the marching orders come from him. And Clayton holds the other three together as a good bass player should. I wished they turned him up a little higher in the mix. Even though his lines are that complex, he can drop some bass bombs like any veteran rocker. It never ceases to amaze me that this four piece can put out such a sound. The staging was absolutely spectacular. They moved thematically, starting from their Irish roots (I thought our Irish guest on crutches was going to cry during a blistering Sunday Bloody Sunday but he just nodded at me, choking back the tears). Then they went to more global issues, with Stephen Hawking narration, and a kid with AIDS who got to walk the ramp as Bono sang to him. There was a really weird intermission with Johnny Cash song. I instagramed a lot of mini-vids, just because I'm getting into Instagram (there was a proposed Tiger Claw venture which has only succeed in addicting me to yet another social media
). My favorite moment was a video of Joshua Trees beaming rays into the universe - that really worked for both S and me. I'm sad that T and Greg couldn't join us, because that would have made it all super fun.
Now I'm really tired. After the weekend tournament and street fair, this, and then staying up for Letterman last night, I'm just running on caffeine. Tomorrow I leave for Cali Roots. I'll probably try to nap there a lot. :oops:
S has been tepid about seeing U2. We recently put together a bucket list of major acts we wanted to see but had not yet seen, and I found her list to be sorely lacking with the absence of U2. I think I've seen U2 5 times now, but I haven't gone back to count. After our wonderful Joshua Tree journey, it seemed a perfect fit. But T's school changed schedule so she had finals the day after and we couldn't justify taking her, so we had two extras as mentioned earlier. So we took the father and brother of one of her classmates, who also happen to be Irish. In fact, the dad had torn his gastrocnemius doing some vigorous Celtic dancing in Dublin just a week or so earlier and was on crutches. None of them had seen U2. So there I was with three U2 nooBs.
The SAP ran out of Guinness early. They only had two cart stands that offered it - probably only a case all in all. I went to the first cart and the dude before me bought their last can, so I had to dash all the way around the arena to the other cart. There was a lot of Jameson. But I'll never forgive SAP for that lame oversight.
The show was amazing. It always is. U2 delivers. The new stage was one long glory ramp. Above it was the biggest TV screen ever and the bad could walk inside the screen and interact with what was projected. And the video was perfect. The sound system looked good with speakers hanging off the rigging for the lights and TV in every direction (so no front stage wall of speakers) but I felt it was compromised by the crappy acoustics of the SAP. The ceiling is all girders and metal, which gives that house a clangy, tinny sound. The intense volume, which is amplified even more when they play indoor shows, well, my head is still ringing (but then, it's been ringing for years now).
I found myself focusing on Clayton and Mullen for the first time. The Edge seemed a little subdued, perhaps after his fall off the 'edge' of the glory ramp at the first show in Vancouver last week. Bono, well, he's always front and center, and was very preachy this time, really plugging his One charity, and spitting a lot of water on the audience (doesn't he know about our drought?) I feel like his voice is losing its high end a little now. Mullen really led the charge with his almost military rudimentary drumming style - the marching orders come from him. And Clayton holds the other three together as a good bass player should. I wished they turned him up a little higher in the mix. Even though his lines are that complex, he can drop some bass bombs like any veteran rocker. It never ceases to amaze me that this four piece can put out such a sound. The staging was absolutely spectacular. They moved thematically, starting from their Irish roots (I thought our Irish guest on crutches was going to cry during a blistering Sunday Bloody Sunday but he just nodded at me, choking back the tears). Then they went to more global issues, with Stephen Hawking narration, and a kid with AIDS who got to walk the ramp as Bono sang to him. There was a really weird intermission with Johnny Cash song. I instagramed a lot of mini-vids, just because I'm getting into Instagram (there was a proposed Tiger Claw venture which has only succeed in addicting me to yet another social media
). My favorite moment was a video of Joshua Trees beaming rays into the universe - that really worked for both S and me. I'm sad that T and Greg couldn't join us, because that would have made it all super fun. Now I'm really tired. After the weekend tournament and street fair, this, and then staying up for Letterman last night, I'm just running on caffeine. Tomorrow I leave for Cali Roots. I'll probably try to nap there a lot. :oops:
Shadow boxing the apocalypse