Opening Act(s): Institute
Setlist:
City Of Blinding Lights, Vertigo, Elevation, I Will Follow, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For-In A Little While, Beautiful Day, Original Of The Species, Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own, Love And Peace Or Else, Sunday Bloody Sunday-Rock The Casbah, Bullet The Blue Sky, Miss Sarajevo, Pride (In The Name Of Love), Where The Streets Have No Name, One. Encore(s): Until The End Of The World, Mysterious Ways, With Or Without You, Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of, Yahweh, Bad-40, All Because Of You, Fast Cars.
Remarks:
Bono sings bits of 'Sgt. Pepper's' and 'Here Comes The Sun' during Beautiful Day, changing the lyrics ('there goes the sun') to reflect the cold, snowy weather outside. Bono thanks Ashley Judd, who's at the show, for her work with the ONE Campaign. During One, Bono brings about a dozen fans on stage with different national flags tied together and they stand behind Larry holding the flags up as a backdrop. U2 comes out for an unplanned 3rd encore, playing All Because Of You and Fast Cars to a shocked crowd made up of fans that haven't already left. Many fans, including some getting in the GA line for tomorrow's show, miss the end of the show.
Media Review:
Boston Globe
U2 dazzles with passionate, powerful show
By Jonathan Perry, Boston Globe Correspondent | December 5, 2005
When he's not busy stumping for human rights across the globe, meeting with world leaders and presidents, or being considered for peace prizes, Bono sings for a fair little rock and roll combo called U2. You might have heard of them: aside from some geezers called the Rolling Stones, they're just about the biggest band touring the world right now.
Last night's dazzlingly celebratory, pitch-perfect performance (the first of two sold-out shows in Boston, and one of seven this year in the city alone) illustrated why. Jubilant, poignant, impassioned, grateful, and always, always musically brilliant -- U2 was all of these things during a show in which one magnificent song from one era (an urgent, joyous ''I Will Follow") bled into another (''I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For") and fed into yet another (''Beautiful Day").
What U2 reminds us every time the four take the stage, some 25 years into their run as Ireland's most popular export this side of Guinness, is that they've never let up, looked down, or looked back. They've been the ambitious architects of monumental rock statements (''The Joshua Tree"), brazenly thrown themselves headlong into new sonic adventures (''Achtung Baby"), and effortlessly re-established their greatness by hitting new creative peaks (''How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb"). But they keep striding forward, a pop institution yet inimitable and still challenging themselves, and us.
Surrounded by a circular catwalk and flanked by a curtain of blinking lights that constantly shifted patterns and flashed like Las Vegas neon with a message, U2 had no trouble matching the electricity of the surroundings. At the center was Bono, of course, a bulky yet sensual presence in superb, soaring voice, preening and exhorting the crowd to exultation like a left-wing holy roller, as if he were leading a political rally inside the world's biggest pub. At his side, as always, was The Edge, peeling off those lovely shimmering guitar tones to match the easy majesty of the songs.
The evening started, appropriately enough, with ''City of Blinding Lights," dipped into the slippery dance-floor groove of ''Vertigo," and then the boisterous pomp and stomp of ''Elevation," with The Edge's bumblebee guitar buzz swirling Bono's cavorting romp around the lip of the stage.
Showmanship and sincerity collided beautifully on the evening's early showpiece, ''Sunday Bloody Sunday," an apocalyptic war-torn vision still timely to the world's events. ''America, this is your song now!" Bono called out. Someone from the audience then handed him an American flag, which he gingerly draped across an amplifier onstage, before shouting ''No More!" He immediately dedicated a howling, white-hot ''Bullet the Blue Sky" to the ''brave young men and women of the United States military." The sequence proved something of a paradox, but it was honest. And that's what U2 has always been about.
Copyright © 2005 Boston Globe. All rights reserved.
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I was at the show last night on the floor and I must say that this show ranks in my top 2 of all time. I have seen 26 shows over the years and number one is still St. Patricks Day in the old Boston Garden. Last night is now number two surpassing Madison Square Garden from the Elevation tour. The lads were in rare form last night. They were playful and Bono was in a talking mood (of course when is he not). The set list was incredible and they ended with Fast Cars to which Bono said "bet you didn't think we'd end with a song you didn't know" All and all a superb effort. I wish I was going tonight.
best show ever
The song selection and timing on the first 2 encores of the night was among the best sets of music I've ever heard at a concert, then they came back for a 3rd encore! It never ceases to amaze me how their shows get better and better as time goes on.
The greatest concert ever.
wow .... december 5th .... i was lost and my family found me.... pure magic may the spirit we shared as one.... be one we can take ....okay i mean bring.....with them....us... sharing is caring... heavenly ... and then like a switch we walk out ....and then..... and then.... can rock 'n roll ....really change the world? .......it already has......godess bless... violet
It was the best of the best, because it was real.