U2 new album "Songs of Experience" coming December 1st, plus 2018 tour.*

Sorted now for Dublin 1 and 2 ( both GA) plus Belfast 1 ( seated). Looking for Belfast 2 on Friday.

 

Suit yourself. I like hearing new stuff more than old stuff. God knows I've heard the staples more than enough!

 

I heard they are playing every gig as the Dalton Brothers.

 

Same. Though I'd love to hear old stuff they play very rarely or never at all (11 O'Clock Tick Tock, Acrobat!).

 

Agree. And I don't whine when they play the staples - obviously they're a given - but it's nice to hear variety of old and new, especially since the last tour focused almost exclusively on the old!

 

Also agree and it's not like this is any shock that they're likely to play a number of new songs. I can't think of any instance where they've toured on an album and didn't play a number of songs from said album.

 

They have always played 6-8 songs from each album on each tour for that album I think, especially in the beginning of the tour. They may drop a few as the tour goes on if they don't work live.

 

Yeah. I just don't like this new stuff of theirs. Would prefer deeper cuts from their back catalog. All good.

 

U2 has never been known for playing deeper cuts from their past on any tour with any regularity.

 

Zooropa on the 360 tour was a pretty deep cut

 

Yeah but that is rare which is my point. They do it occasionally but are not a band like a Pearl Jam or Bruce Springsteen who will dust off deep cuts regularly over the years.

Even when they brought out A Sort of Homecoming last tour it was dropped after a few shows.

 

And even then, they still only played about 2/3rds of the song. (Having said that, it was my favorite part of the show)

Them dropping "Homecoming" after a couple weeks was a major letdown to me. I still enjoyed the show last year, but after reading opening week reports, it was the bit I was most looking forward to aside from "One Tree Hill." I guess when you're in stadiums, you can't take many risks, but it was still a bummer.

 

Very true and it's still alright to absolutely lose it when we here the opening chords of one of their tent pole songs. I just think quite a few folks only want to hear the tent poles, while a very vocal group of us would like to here both tent poles and some of the new material.

 

They cater to the frat boys\girls now.... I'm actually surprised that they play anything more than the singles off of a new album

 

Frat boys? Maybe the parents of frat boys....

 

Although I wasn't a fan of the weird electro-intro for the 2017 version of ASOH, I really wanted to hear it regardless and was disappointed when they dropped it from the set by the time I caught a show.

Also, they played the full version of Zooropa on the last legs of the 360 tour. Only during the 1993 ZooTV/Zooropa tour did they play the abbreviated version and the even shorter, almost ambient version on the 2nd leg of the 2015 IE tour.

 

Not quite. The intro was shorter and they skipped the 2nd verse. That said, I still loved seeing it, and the live version I have from that tour is now my go-to version of that song (the original is good, but a bit too slow and plodding).

 

Ok, I'll bite:

Electric Co, The Fly, Zoo Station - Cardiff 2006
Scarlet, In A Little While, Miss Sarajevo*, One Tree Hill, Until The End of The World*, Light My Way... Auckland 2011
A Sort of Homecoming, all the rarely played songs off The Joshua Tree, the full version of New Years Day (i.e. with the final verse) - Paris 2017

 

With the exception of Scarlet literally none of those are deeper cuts. Those have all been tour staples in the past and you cannot count playing the songs from Joshua Tree since playing the whole album was the whole reason for the tour. I have pretty much every single non hoarded and publicly traded live recording of u2 so I know they do occasionally play an older or rare tune but it isn't a regular thing and almost never is it a truly deep cut. I am talking songs that were not regular songs played on a previous tour. Going to a u2 show hoping to hear a rare deep cut is like playing the lottery. It MAY happen but you shouldn't count on it and certainly is no reason to buy tickets and expecting it.

 

Since Elevation tour and skipping newest release/JT side B

Gone 52 times
Out of Control 73
Ground beneath 26
11 O'Clock 9
Sort of Homecoming 8
Electric Co 76
Zoo Station 71
Ultraviolet 105
U-Fire 47
Scarlet 45
October 42
MLK 71
The Ocean 28
Zooropa 68
The Cry 21
First Time 20
Gloria 32
Hold Me Thill Me 18
An Cat Dubh 17
Into the Heart 17
Ride Wild Horse 15
Fast Cars 16
Sort of Homecoming 9
Love Rescue Me 2
Two Hearts 3
Electrical Storm 3

 

Are these the final Euro dates? Still a bit of room before Dublin if they wanted to ad 2 shows in Glasgow(venue is open)

• 2018-08-31 - Berlin, Germany - Mercedes-Benz Arena Berlin (in 198 days)
• 2018-09-01 - Berlin, Germany - Mercedes-Benz Arena Berlin (in 199 days)
• 2018-09-04 - Cologne, Germany - Lanxess Arena (in 202 days)
• 2018-09-05 - Cologne, Germany - Lanxess Arena (in 203 days)
• 2018-09-08 - Paris, France - AccorHotels Arena (in 206 days)
• 2018-09-09 - Paris, France - AccorHotels Arena (in 207 days)
• 2018-09-12 - Paris, France - AccorHotels Arena (in 210 days)
• 2018-09-13 - Paris, France - AccorHotels Arena (in 211 days)
• 2018-09-16 - Lisbon, Portugal - Altice Arena (in 214 days)
• 2018-09-17 - Lisbon, Portugal - Altice Arena (in 215 days)
• 2018-09-20 - Madrid, Spain - WiZink Center (in 218 days)
• 2018-09-21 - Madrid, Spain - WiZink Center (in 219 days)
• 2018-09-29 - Copenhagen, Denmark - Royal Arena (in 227 days)
• 2018-09-30 - Copenhagen, Denmark - Royal Arena (in 228 days)
• 2018-10-03 - Hamburg, Germany - Barclaycard Arena (in 231 days)
• 2018-10-04 - Hamburg, Germany - Barclaycard Arena (in 232 days)
• 2018-10-07 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Ziggo Dome (in 235 days)
• 2018-10-08 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Ziggo Dome (in 236 days)
• 2018-10-11 - Milan, Italy - Mediolanum Forum (in 239 days)
• 2018-10-12 - Milan, Italy - Mediolanum Forum (in 240 days)
• 2018-10-15 - Milan, Italy - Mediolanum Forum (in 243 days)
• 2018-10-16 - Milan, Italy - Mediolanum Forum (in 244 days)
• 2018-10-19 - Manchester, England - Manchester Arena (in 247 days)
• 2018-10-20 - Manchester, England - Manchester Arena (in 248 days)
• 2018-10-23 - London, England - The O2 (in 251 days)
• 2018-10-24 - London, England - The O2 (in 252 days)
• 2018-10-27 - Belfast, Northern Ireland - The SSE Arena (in 255 days)
• 2018-10-28 - Belfast, Northern Ireland - The SSE Arena (in 256 days)
• 2018-11-05 - Dublin, Ireland - 3Arena (in 264 days)
• 2018-11-06 - Dublin, Ireland - 3Arena (in 265 days)
• 2018-11-09 - Dublin, Ireland - 3Arena (in 268 days)
• 2018-11-10 - Dublin, Ireland - 3Arena (in 269 days)

 

.
GA for Belfast 2 secured last Friday.

 

I want to attend a gig with that setlist! And they repeat Sort of Homecoming like they did I Will Follow back in the day.

 

I think you're contradicting yourself a bit here. You're stating that U2 aren't playing many deeper cuts, as the songs mentioned were played (regularly) on a previous tour. But if they're not played then they're suddenly an occasional rarity and that's also not a valid situation.
Fact is that U2 still play songs that were not hits/singles, at times not played in a while and not always (well) known to the general fan. This next to a fair number of songs of their latest album. And no, they're not mixing it up like a Pearl Jam or Bruce Springsteen. But in general they do add some variety to their setlist. In that aspect was the last tour (The Joshua Tree 30) an exception.
In any case, I'm looking forward to the e+i tour!

 

What happened to Sweden? Did they forget about us?