Place Bell employees said the Irish rock group is in town to rehearse eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE show, scheduled to hit the Bell Centre on June 5-6

By Montreal Gazette/PRESSE CANADIENNE

Irish rock group U2 has chosen Quebec, and more specifically Laval, to rehearse for its next international tour, eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE, that kicks off on May 2 in Tulsa, Okla.

Employees at Place Bell in Laval confirmed to Presse Canadienne that the popular group is in town to rehearse the show, which will stop in Montreal for two nights in June.

Several staff members wearing badges with the name of the group were seen. Some were more talkative than others, and none wanted to be identified.

An artist's rendering of the claw at Loveland Living Planet Aquarium in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Photo courtesy of LLPA

Largest stage in history heads to Salt Lake City's Loveland Living Planet Aquarium

By Andy Greene, Rolling Stone

In June of 2009, Brent Andersen - the founder and CEO of the Loveland Living Planet Aquarium in Salt Lake City - headed over to Barcelona, Spain to see U2 kick off their 360° world tour. Long before he even got to his seat at Camp Nou stadium, he caught glimpse of the Claw, the single largest stage ever constructed. "I didn't even want to walk into the stadium," says Andersen. "I was kind of holding up the line because I just wanted to look at it and take it in. I didn't really view it as just simply a functional piece of architecture. For me, it was a dynamic sculpture. It was a work of art."

When the aquarium acquired nine new acres of nearby land for an expansion, Andersen's mind went back to the Claw and an article he read about how the group was selling it. Boston real estate firm Panther Management even launched a website to showcase how it could be used as a permanent concert stage, an exhibition hall, a theme park, a civic plaza or even a biodome. Andersen reached out and struck a deal to acquire the one used on the North American tour. (Another claw was used for the European dates and a third one appears to have been disassembled.) If all goes according to plan, it will be fully in place by June of 2019.

Opening Act(s): None

Setlist:

1. Sunday Bloody Sunday
2. Pride (In the Name of Love)
3. Gift - Get Out of Your Own Way
4. You're the Best Thing About Me
5. Beautiful Day - Starman
6. Elevation
7. Vertigo - Rebel Rebel
8. One - Invisible
9. Get Out of Your Own Way

Remarks:

U2 performed tonight in Trafalgar Square in front of 7,000 people in conjunction with their appearance on the 2017 MTV EMA Awards. New single "Get Out of Your Own Way" was performed for the very first time live as well as twice, the second time for a live music video shoot. Prior to the first version of "Get Out of Your Own Way", Bono read a piece of Czeslaw Milosz's poem "Gift" (this performance of the song ended up being aired live during the MTV EMA Awards on Sunday). For the second version of "Get Out of Your Own Way", protest signs were distributed to the audience members for the music video. Bono stated that the song was a "protest against yourself" but later joked that "if you want to protest us, that's cool." At the end of the song, Bono took a megaphone and shouted out Kendrick Lamar's rap lyrics from the studio version of the song.