Kine and Jeff gets a little closer to Bono

Bono on the catwalk circle.

How do you judge a U2 concert? You can’t.

This was the kind of show where you have to take the next day off and stay in bed. It’s a dance-and-scream type of concert that will take all your voice and hearing out of yourself and send you to an unreal place that is not human. You cannot wear a fancy/cool outfit and jewellery to this type of concert. I had to take my earrings off because I was whacking my face off. My clothes took a good beating from all the dancing and the sweating, I could barely keep my glasses on and I think I lost some hair. People, it was not pretty.

The stage consisted of an oblong circle with the VIP crowd in the middle of it. We were standing just outside of the circle, so when the band played on the donut-like catwalk, we could stretch our arms to reach the band members, but not quite. It was quite surreal to have these four legends play three meters from your head.

You know when a rock concert kicks-off people tend to visually scan the whole stadium in case the lead singer makes a bizarre and spectacular entry? Well, Bono was born in the concert by sneaking on the catwalk with a bouncer (see below) and then adopted the child’s pose, right next to us. Nobody saw him. I was looking around frantically, and then Jeff gave me a “hey look, he’s right there!” look, and there he was. For chrissakes, Bono was right next to us. Bono stood up, I looked up to him, and I let out a high pitch scream.

Bono being discreetely escorted to the circle catwalk. This was seconds before the first song was played. If you look closely you can see Mylène’s hand on Bono at the right. Note how the audience has no idea he is there.

Throughout the concert, we bounced cheerily through:

1. City of Blinding Lights: great kick-off song. "Oh…you…look…so beautiful tonight."
2. Vertigo: The countdown to this song was done with Arcade Fire’s Wake Up. Brilliant.
3. Elevation: Wooo, ooh-hoo, Elevation! Wooo, ooh-hoo, Elevation!
4. I Will Follow.
5. Still Haven’t Found What I'm Looking For.
6. Beautiful Day: an awesome piece of feel good music.
7. Original of the Species.
8. Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own: this song is about Bono’s dad. He took his sunglasses off for this one, perhaps to show us how personal this song is.
9. Love and Peace or Else.
10. Sunday Bloody Sunday: U2 dropped some Rock the Casbah in this song before pulling some fine vocal assistance for the ‘No More’s’ from a little boy who climbed on stage. "For the sake of this man, for the sake of this boy" adds Bono, as he leads a new star off the stage, "May you learn to co exist"..."Things do not have to be the way they are," explained Bono. "If any of you have got cell phones you can take them out now. Let's turn this place into a Christmas tree! Yes I do believe in Santa Claus. But I believe in Canada. And I believe in what makes Canada strong. Looking out for the weak. Big idea, Canadian idea."
11. Bullet the Blue Sky.
12. Miss Sarajevo: Bono sang Pavarotti’s solo and did very good.

First encore:
13. (Pride) In the Name of Love.
14. Where The Streets Have No Name: Oh, the thrill or hearing The Edge’s guitar riffs on these two songs! This is the original and unique U2 sound.
15. One: Before starting this song, Bono spoke directly: "Prime Minister Martin, I write songs, You write history, Write us a chapter we can be proud of." Very unlikely: today the government was destituted.

Second encore:
16. Until the End of the World.
17. Mysterious Ways.
18. With or Without You.

Third encore:
19. The First Time.
20. Stuck in a Moment.
21. Yahweh: Our heads were right at their feet during this song. I heard Bono’s real voice making its way to my ears, sans microphone. That's how close they were to us.
22. "40": "...How long to sing this song...how long to sing this song?..how long, how long, to sing this song...", brought a beautiful close to a beautiful night.

The show ran for over two hours.

All my life I’ve suffered bad tickets, bad sound in arenas, pearl jam next-day sickness, and generally crappy performances. Last Friday the only thing I had to suffer was mild hearing loss, a sore throat, a (very) sore bank account, and regret for not bringing a camera. I can't tell you how much I enjoyed that night but I can tell you that last friday, I crawled very contentedly into bed after a much needed hot bath.

(merci Mylène pour les photos)