U2 - Vertigo Tour 11/5
3rd leg of Vertigo Tour brings U2 back to North America, namely Vegas and Oakland.
Videos are stored over on my other site: Vegas and Oakland. Commentary about the show itself is shared on both sites! Scroll down below the pictures for commentary originally posted on the video site...
Vegas itself...
Slept for 3 hours, picked up Annie, over to k-town to pick up Bill and then Sophia. Drove... stopped in Baker to spend an hour or two hiking up a 400' rock pile that was a few miles off the main road and a half mile over dirt. Fun. The exercise was good, although the rock pile was a bit too crumbly for easy hiking. =)
Into Vegas. Parked. Had lunch at one of the cafes at Paris-- the salads were quite yummy, and the cobb salads were huge! Showered (dusty from hiking... well except Sophia, who slept instead!), then a few drinks, the some gambling as we waited for Pearl and Jer.
Bill gave some poker lessons, then Pearl and Jer showed up. We got them settled in, gambled a bit, then ran off to Rio for the seafood buffet. On the way we caught glimpses of the horrible, horrible slaughter.
Then the show, which is described well below (scroll past the pics, or click over to the video site)...
After the show, met up with Jenn and her boyfriend at MGM. We wandered to Bellagio for a bit before we split up. Sophia eventually went to bed, while Bill found some Hold'Em. Annie and I plunked around at video poker and were looking for a cheap blackjack table when Bill called-- he'd finished his game pretty quickly. Cheap blackjack was hard to find at Bellagio, we ended up at Barbary Coast, which is ghetto enough to have many $5 tables.
Annie played for a few hours while Bill and I ended up playing til 4am. Crazy. At least I recouped most of my losses...
Lunch the next morning was at Aladdin. We thought about a buffet, but the thought of another $20-25 for a champange brunch was too expensive and too much food for our tastes. A cafe at Aladdin proved right, with hot dogs, pancakes, and other goodies. Jer seemed to particularly enjoy his Pink's Hot Dog, while I had an omelet and toast... mmm...
Pearl and Jer left for home afterwards; Annie, Bill, Sophia, and I headed back to Bellagio to visit the art gallery. It's got an impressionist exhibit on display, but the small size and somewhat elementary audio tour leave us unimpressed. The audio tour wands are thin and about 15" long, which encouraged mock swordfighting and poking. Not a good idea in an art gallery!!! (Annie and Sophia didn't poke us too much... and we didn't damage any paintings, so I consider our escape successful!)
A gelato eatery is next to the gallery. Sophia and I thought about splitting one; then Annie and then Bill each proceeded to order their own. We looked on in amazement. We ordered our single... which turned out to be packed full with two or three scoops. Annie and Bill had maybe five bites of theirs each... I ate half of ours (berry, yum!), sampled liberally from the pistachio and the other one (was it mocha? I forget)... then Sophia turned into a Gelato Monster (GM) and ate the rest-- which was probably 1.5 order's worth. Maybe a little more! o_O
The drive home was uneventful, save missing the first freeway entrance and then stopping at Lee's Sandwiches in Alhambara for food. Yum!
Setlist per u2.com and u2.com article on the show: ‘An Operatic Kinda Place’.
City of Blinding Lights - being in the back, we miss the dazzling effect of the lights. The effect on the crowd is amazing nonetheless; it's as though a switch has been thrown and we're now fully energized. Annie's understanding of the magnificence that is U2 begins the instant the concert starts!
Vertigo - From the back, the graphics aren't nearly as annoying. The crowd knows this one well, but the difference doesn't seem as loud in Vegas. Other shows, it felt like all these newbies only knew Vertigo... seemed like less newbies this time!
Elevation - the introduction sequence to Elevation just drives everyone nuts. Bono singing just a few snippets of the lyrics one, two, three, four times as the crowd cheers on the words before going into full song is a great way to keep us excited. As though we need to be anymore excited!! =D
Mysterious Ways - no belly dancer this time-- looks like that was pretty unique to just a few shows on the first leg. Hearing "it's alright, it's alright, she moves in mysterious ways..." is so dramatic live...
Until the End of the World - live. Good.
I Still Haven’t Found what I'm Looking For - we're in full nice-and-happy-and-peaceful mode now!! Wonderful...
Beautiful Day - then BAM!! The crowd is from mellow and happy to screaming excited. Woohoo!!!!!!!! Jump up and down!!! And we did...
Miracle Drug - quiet again. If only this song was the opening song to How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb, the flavor of the album would be very different.
Sometimes You Can’t Make it On Your Own - arms linked as the four of us sway as one... sooo good.
Love and Peace or Else - from the new album; it's not bad, but it's not great either.
Sunday Bloody Sunday - classic. It's great on the album, it's awesome live with all of the personal touches thrown in every time it's played: it's always different. And it's always good!
Bullet The Blue Sky - the airplane graphic is still cool. From the back we have a nice view, actually. This song is much better live!
Miss Sarajevo - Pavoritti, Bono is not, but hearing this song regularly on 3rd leg... it's one of those special feelings. Hearing it live at all emphasizes the wide-ranging abilities of U2...
Pride in the Name of Love - another classic. It's just overshadowed-- as well know as it is, the next song gets the crowd more excited.
Where the Streets Have No Name - U2 fans may know many songs, but this one always stands out for crowd excitement. The Africa flags never get old, either.
One - beautiful and mellow, then Mary J. Blige is announced. The roar from the crowd is awesome.
Zoo Station - very odd to hear it live-- it sounds great, but it's really not played all that often. Makes me happy!
The Fly - this is another song that's ridiculously good live, better than the album. The words flashing all over the light string displays and video screens really emphasize the impact of the song.
With or Without You - back into slow music. Purposeful and beautiful.
All Because of You - like most songs on the current album, it's better live. Seems a little weak leading the second encore compared to hearing it previously on first leg.
In a Little While - Bono says something about losing a little bit of his falsetto last night, so to compensate he's going to bring on The Killers's Brandon Flowers. Yes, it's awesome.
Bad - ooooommmmmggggg. Great way to end the show. Keeps the energy level so much higher than How Long/40, we leave still excited and jumpy instead of mellow and merely thinking we want more...
Original commentary from the video link..
Shot from section 201's (front view) by Pearl, or 223L's (rear view) by Annie and myself.
The show was AMAZING. Jer has been a U2 fan since forever and this was the best one he's seen.
MGM Grand Arena is actually quite large, seating 19,000, but it is setup for boxing, which means it is a very compact arena for 19,000: a tight square with minimal space and a relatively small floor compared to basketball arenas such as Oakland Arena or Staples Center. The result was that even in the "upper" 200 sections, we still felt like we were very close to the stage. Seated in the rear 223L's we were just a bit off-center from the rear view, which meant we still had an excellent view of all of the graphics that U2 was using, just in reverse. =)
Freakin' crazy. Left for Vegas at 6am on Saturday morning, stopped in the little town of Baker for a quick hike on the way up, checked in to Bally's, showered, gambled for 45 minutes until my friend Pearl and her husband Jerimy showed up and checked in, then gambled some more til we wandered over to Rio for their seafood buffet. Mostly dorked around with video poker, 'cause we were teaching my friend Annie some more details on the basics of poker...
As we wandered over to Rio Seafood Buffet, we saw the score for the ugly nasty disgusting diaster that was UCLA vs. Arizona that was still in progress. :( Got into the buffet. My goodness. Raw oysters, lobster tails, crab legs, shrimp, sushi and sashimi (toro, ahi, whitefish, saba), plus the other usual buffet trappings such as prime rib, fried udon, and a large dessert selection. Jerimy's a skinny guy about my height who somehow eats like a monster-- he had 7 plates of food. We were amazed.
Off to MGM Grand for the show. Pearl and Jerimy are up in front, hence the amazing pictures. The four of us are in the back, but MGM Grand is such a small place, we're less than 200' from the stage, maybe even closer. It's freakin' amazing. The arena actually holds 19,000+ as it's configured for U2, but it felt much smaller than Staples Center which is similar in capacity.
U2 opens with City of Blinding Lights and the whole crowd cranks it up a notch beyond anything we've had for our previous shows in Los Angeles. Sophia, Pearl, Jerimy, and I have U2 bleeding from our thoughts at times like this, while Annie's sort of a casual fan. Well, was. This show pushed her over the edge. Nice. :D We get Until The End Of The World, which hasn't been played in a while, then Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For, which is so incredibly beautiful live this time... *sigh* Bono dedicates Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own to his father, who always asked him to take his "fscking sunglasses" off. I think I've heard that line before at a previous concert, but it's a nice touch. All four of us have arms linked and are swaying as one-- we're completely absorbed by the show. Sunday Bloody Sunday goes through the usual political speech, but the audience is really, really into it for SBS.
I'm not the biggest fan of Bullet The Blue Sky as it's recorded, but live, just like everything else U2 (except maybe Vertigo-- bleh!) it's pretty damned good. Bono singing Miss Sarajevo without Pavoratti just isn't the same deep operatic rumble, but my friends loved it. We get the stick figure man walking on the light display, but sadly, no belly dancer or pumping heart this time around. The flags of the world for Where The Streets Have No Name are as pretty as ever, and the "COEXIST" lightwork is new-- it's spelled with the star of david replacing the X, a crescent replacing the C, a cross for the T, etc. Nice touch. (Annie's camera batteries die shortly thereafter. That's the one problem with the Canon SD-series cameras... battery life blows...)
Mary J. Blige for One is a huge surprise to us... then U2 goes off the stage and the stage lights stay on, so the crowd starts stomping our feet, clapping, and cheering for an encore. STOMP STOMP STOMP!! We're sitting on stands in the back rather than a structural part of the building, so we can FEEL the whole set of stands trembling and shaking. Sophia's got a sore throat and all this screaming can't possibly be helping, but we don't care! Zoo Station is superb, much better than it was at Oakland a few days later, while the graphics for The Fly seem to have been updated since 1st leg in April. I don't know what it is about The Fly, but that song always has us dancing and flying around. It's great!! They end the encore with With Or Without You, which is beautiful in that smooth harmony that U2 can so smoothly shift gears into. *sniff*
Wait... the overhead blue circular lights have descended from the ceiling now... the band's off the stage... they've designed 3rd leg for a two-encore setup but we don't know it yet... ohhhhhhhh myyyyyyyy goooddddnnnnneeeessss we're getting a 2nd encore. They celebrate the birthday of their tour manager on stage and he blows out a cake, which lends a very unique touch to this show. We're convinced this is one of the most awesome U2 shows ever at this point. So much personality...
All Because Of You is like most of the stuff on their new album-- the album itself is okay, but the style of the songs lends itself very well to live performances where the energy seems to translate a little better to the audience. Bono starts mentioning something about having lost a little bit of the falsetto at last night's performance in Vegas, so he brings on Brandon Flowers from The Killers to help with In A Little While. We've been bitching that all the US shows have been getting shafted with second-rate opening acts like Kings of Leon, Damian Marley, Institute, etc, while the European shows have been getting Snow Patrol, The Killers, Franz Ferdinand, Doves, the Bravery, etc. Well crap, we're here on the deprived West Coast, and we're getting Brandon Flowers from The Killers! SWEET!!!!! :D Can this get any better?!?
Instead of calming us down with How Long/'40' as U2 often ends with, we get a much better ending... Bad. I've heard '40' too many times at the end of a U2 concert and it winds the energy waaaay down, which may be a good thing, but it's pretty blah given how hyped up everyone is during the concert. Ending with Bad... just... kicked... *ss...!!!!!!!!!
Sophia, Annie, Bill, and I were in the back... four seats next to each other meant we could dance around and sway to the music like the lunatics we are. =D Pearl and Jer had the pair of seats in front, and they had an absolutely amazing view. If only floor tickets had been in reach... sigh...
