Concert review: U2 makes it a night to remember for 60,000 fans in Norman
By George Lang
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84
Published: October 19, 2009
U2 fans will be talking about "the claw" for years, and how the Irish band brought a gigantic stage set to Norman that almost made Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium feel like an intimate venue -- well, maybe a basketball arena. But even with that imposing, "in the round"
superstructure towering over Owen Field, the emphasis Sunday night was on U2's performance -- all the visual flash was in service to the band, which performed a lengthy set spanning 26 years -- or, as Bono said early in the set, the length of time since the group's last stop in Norman.
U2 plays Sunday at Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium in Norman. Photo by Sarah Phipps
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"It took us 26 years to travel one mile," Bono said, referring to the band's performance at
Lloyd Noble Center in 1983. And throughout the concert, Bono,
guitarist The Edge, bassist
Adam Clayton and drummer
Larry Mullen Jr. took huge leaps through U2's musical history, opening with three songs from this year's "No Line on the Horizon" -- "Breathe," "Get On Your Boots" and "Magnificent," before hurdling backward to 1991's "Mysterious Ways." While the group was highlighting its new songs whenever possible, U2 kept the crowd of 60,000 fans happy to the point of mass, ecstatic dancing when the group deployed its acknowledged classics such as "Beautiful Day" and "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For."
This was an audience ready to play along: toward the end of "Still Haven't Found," Bono sang two lines of
Ben E. King's "Stand By Me,"
and the stadium finished the first verse and chorus for him. Perhaps because the mood was right and the crowd was primed, U2 added two songs it had not played in previous shows on the tour, 2000's "In a LIttle While" and the new "Unknown Caller," a dramatic, half-chanted song partially constructed from computer commands. But after that deep plunge into the new disc, the band came roaring back to familiar territory with two of its most haunting songs, the Biblical melodrama "Until the End of the World" and a mesmerizing version of "The Unforgettable Fire."
Spotlighting new material can be challenging to a band with a three-decade history, but the new songs from "No Line" intensified in the live setting, particularly a discofied "I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight" and the show's closer, "Moment of Surrender." But U2 also brought an uncommon intensity to some older material, especially during a fiery version of "Sunday Bloody Sunday" that was performed against images from this year's election protests in
Iran. The Edge's guitar work on "Bloody Sunday" was possibly his most energized of the evening, with Clayton and Mullen barreling through the song's martial rhythm. And the band closed out the main set by devoting "MLK" and "Walk On" to jailed
Myanmar opposition leader
Aung San Suu Kyi, with
Amnesty International volunteers walking the massive circular runway carrying masks bearing the imprisoned politician's face.
While the
Black Eyed Peas performed an energetic set of recent hits including "Boom Boom Pow," "I Gotta Feeling" and "Meet Me Halfway,"
the opener was the equivalent to a slick, Auto-Tuned pep rally for U2
-- this is a group that has dominated the singles charts for most of 2009, but while the Peas had much of the crowd moving throughout their 45-minute segment, even a seemingly unstoppable dance-pop machine was merely a prologue for the stars of the evening. All in all, U2 played a long main set -- 19 songs -- and came back to play some of the most popular songs of its career, including "One," "Where the Streets Have No Name" and "With or Without You," with Bono singing into and swinging from a glowing circular microphone that dangled from the center of "the claw." Sure, it looked like an alien landing, but U2 cleverly used the dimensions of its enormous stage to bring a human focus to the band and its performances.
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One is a preening cleric who cannot be persuaded to look at the horrors quite close afield on his own continent than apartheid ever proved to be - the good Bishop still seems much more outraged by the orderly government that was the old South Africa than the genocide that has been going in, say, Rwanda, or Darfur. Dead old white guys are always a lot more fun to rant and rave about, rather than indigenous savages with machetes still running around carving up victims on the Veldt.
The other, Mandela, is a former terrorist and stout supporter of such benighted regimes as Fidel Castro's Cuba - imagine Timothy McVeigh being feted and celebrated by everyone from Queen Elizabeth to the Congress of the United States, and you have the measure of the insanity of the human mind when it comes to such matters: Mandela and McVeigh are moral equivalents, period.
Like I said, SA is just a dandy jewel of a place to live now - unless you count the rolling brownouts, the complete breakdown of law and order in vast swaths of the country, and trash piling up in the streets of all the major cities. And, oh yeah, the fact that one out every four male savants you run into on the streets *admits* (!) to being a rapist - that's not even counting the ones who are rapists yet deny it. I'm shocked the you have decided to not make your home in such a glittering paradise, Lee: what's keeping you here?
(...*rolls-eyes*...)
It really bothers me when reporters who know nothing about the band are sent out to write about them.
Do a little history of background before you put your pen to work.
Who told you that they haven't played Unknown Caller and In a little While??
Look up the tour.. They have played both of those songs numerous times on this tour.
Politics was not on the agenda except that "We're one, But were not the same, We get to carry each other," and a call to stand up for injustice, which is not a bad sentiment.
I was not in the mood for a concert Sunday night, which bodes ominously for the attitude to come...generally. I have seen U2 three times previously, twice in 2001 in Dallas' Reunion Arena and once in 2005 in the American Airlines Center. Both of those indoor venues' shows made me skeptical that an outdoor show could be better due to the inherent limitations. "Bad mood. Wrong venue," went through my mind. But "Wow!" I loved it. I am amazed that the four folks in U2 can put out so much sound. Guitarist The Edge's playing was amazing, and the background vocals that he emits do not get sufficient credit until you see U2 live and recognize who is putting out that sound. U2 lifts the roof, even when there is not one like on Sunday night at Memorial Stadium in Norman.
Undoubtedly one of the best rock shows I've ever seen, & I've seen U2 on a handful of occasions in the last 15 years. Maybe it was our lucky day, but we drove straight to the Noble center with no delays, caught the shuttle to the stadium, and basically walked straight into the inner circle next to the stage. It was awesome. The Peas impressed much more than I had expected, and U2 continues to amaze. The stage was (obviously) unlike anything I'd ever seen, and the sound was great from our vantage point. And from the field to the shuttle to I-35 south took maybe 20 minutes. So -- a big Texas thank you to OU, U2, & all the friendly folks in Norman!
Lou from Oklahoma City's rant a few posts back.
"behind the Hee Haw iron curtain" - Always with the juvenile ridicule, our scumbag Leftists/"progressives" are. Yes, folks, our Tribunes of "tolerance" and "multiculturalism" and "civility" embrace all those things with their rhetoric right up until they run into someone who doesn't share their views, have the same political/social culture, and won't just shut up. Then the savants start bray insults, in lieu of actual argument.
"a clip of Nelson Mandela speaking about human rights" - Mandela was a terrorist with no more credibility to be speaking about "human rights" than Osama bin Laden, at least in the eyes of thinking people.
And how, by the bye, has South Africa fared since it was "liberated" from those eviiiiiiiillll Anglo-colonialists and their Afrikaner second cousins?
Well, besides the rolling brownouts, the complete breakdown of law and order in vast swaths of the country, and trash piling up in the streets of all the major cities, I guess you'd say swell. Oh, yeah, and besides things like *this*:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jun/17/south-africa-rape-survey
"The show was a few hours of the hope I never see written about in this "news" paper nor hear people talking about."
Then you need to wake up and take a look around: I see it every day in people who get up, take their kids to school, and then go to work and hit it hard for eight hours or whatever it takes. They are members of the Productive Community who are proud of their country, go to Church, give to charity, and don't ask for handouts or freebies. They think they're doing the right thing when they take responsibility for their actions, instead of blaming everyone else in society for their troubles. Perhaps you should check it out sometime.
U2 was awesome, nuff said.
The politics at the show were the sort of things anyone should care about. Despite not liking the dismal set list which was almost reluctantly sprinkled here and there with a hit, the awful sound, the crazy dude in the small airplane sort of listing overhead during "Beautiful Day", and some questionable crowd control decisions, the show was OK but not great.
If any democrat can ever convince me to turn back to DP then they must justify the election fraud, murder for hire, money laundering, wire fraud, human trafficking, state auction rigging, land sale fraud, loan sharking, extortion, embezzlement, arson, and all the other things the Stipe family has done in the past 60 years under the full support and leadership of Carl Albert, Dale Covington, Mike Mass, William Brewster, George Nigh, David Boren, David Walters, Francis Stipe, and a dozen lawyers and bankers of this state.
Bono never met the Stipe family, did he!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xhyxlik4o9o
(4th thing you should know)
U2 was one of those "bigger than life" events that Oklahoma got lucky to have. The review lacked a few points about the show: The Message and the meanings behind the music. Bono had a loud Stand by Me serenade from the crowd that gave me goosebumps and gave him a huge smile. Also him using Sunday Blood Sunday, applying it to the Iranian protestors plight after their rigged elections was most appropriate.
Bono is what you'd call an "internationalist", something not seen often behind the Hee Haw iron curtain here. He brought attention to Aung San Suu Kyi who has been under house arrest since 1990 for promoting democracy, a clip of Nelson Mandela speaking about human rights that led into the song "One", Bono also asked a good question, "Why in the 21st Century are there still children starving?", and that Red/Blue should unite for a common goal of peace....the only downer was leaving the stadium knowing I am re-entering a land where people vote for the likes of Inhofe, Coburn, Kern...implying this state wants to remain "left behind".
The show was a few hours of the hope I never see written about in this "news" paper nor hear people talking about.
Wake up Oklahoma!
"Become an internationalist and learn to respect all life. Make war on machines. And in particular the sterile machines of corporate death and the robots that guard them."
Cletus, it's a rock concert...what do you need a seat for?
One complaint that I heard from MANY people was not about U2, but of the disorganization of trying to get to your seats in the stadium. I've been to countless OU football games, and I've never had to wait 15+ minutes in line to get into the stands and up to my seat. Trying to get down to the consessions was just as terrible. I stood waiting on the stairs through and entire Black Eyed Peas song when all I wanted to do was get down to use the bathroom! I ended up spending the entire intermission between the BEP and U2 trying to get down to the consession area and back to my seat again, which is inexcusable.
About 7:00 Pm last night I was sitting at the house wishing I would have got off my tired/partyied out butt and went. Glad everyone had a good time.
BTW, I thought it would have been great to start with "vertigo". But I always liked Bono's rock more than his crooning.....Oh well, if they wait another 26 years to come back, I will be 80 friggin years old!!!! AAAAhggggg......
The only thing that creeped me out was the small plane that circled the stadium for the first 10 minutes of U2's set. Sometimes it looked like it was going so slow I just knew it was going to fall out of the sky. I thought since 9/11 they wouldn't allow that kind of thing.
As for the show, INCREDIBLE sums it up. no... MAGNIFICENT!!! BEP'S were a fantastic warmup... as far as BEP'S blowing U2 off the stage... No... sorry... that didn't happen... Please bring U2 back again.. and not another 26 years from now!!!
Breathe
Get On Your Boots
Magnificent
Mysterious Ways
Beautiful Day
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of
No Line On The Horizon
Elevation
In A Little While
Unknown Caller
Until The End Of The World
The Unforgettable Fire
City Of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight
Sunday Bloody Sunday
MLK
Walk On
encore
One
Where The Streets Have No Name
Ultra Violet
With Or Without You
Moment of Surrender
Breathe, Get On Your Boots, Magnificent, Mysterious Ways, Beautiful Day / God Only Knows (snippet), I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For / Stand By Me (snippet), Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of, No Line On The Horizon, Elevation, In A Little While, Unknown Caller, Until The End Of The World, The Unforgettable Fire, City Of Blinding Lights, Vertigo, I'll Go Crazy If I Don't Go Crazy Tonight / Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) (snippet), Sunday Bloody Sunday, MLK, Walk On / You'll Never Walk Alone (snippet)
encores: One / Amazing Grace (snippet), Where The Streets Have No Name / All You Need Is Love (snippet), Ultra Violet (Light My Way), With Or Without You, Moment of Surrender
3-3 ...boomer
FALSE! I have already seen "In A Little While" performed in person once this year and "Unknown Caller" 3 times, including the last show I attended in New York City.
Might be good to get the facts straight.