By Gretel Sarmiento
For a country said to struggle with numbers, math and science, nobody is getting U2 360 degrees wrong.
At least in South Florida, everyone got what they came for.
The electrifying Irish band’s 360° Tour, with its supernatural stage, landed at Miami’s Sun Life stadium Wednesday night. One hour after the English indie rock band Florence and the Machine ended its magical opening performance, the knights from Dublin were still nowhere to be seen. The crowd grew impatient. When they finally came out, a little after 9 p.m., it was with Even Better Than the Real Thing that they decided to open the night.
It was one big happy crowd, despite the few rain drops that did materialize, and the sticky humid weather.
“Thank you, Miami. Muchas gracias. And thank for your patience,” Bono said between songs. “Some of you were two years younger when you bought tickets.”
He was referring to his back injury and surgery, which caused the Miami appearance the band had scheduled for last year to be delayed, and those who had bought tickets months before to wait even longer.
During the show Bono spoke to the people, engaging them and getting up close and personal with them. This is, after all, a band that once shared its long locks of hair and is not afraid to now show its wrinkles.
“We are not ready to retire,” said Bono, proudly, before breaking into I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For from The Joshua Tree album. Here the crowd joined in as well.
(Photo by Gretel Sarmiento)
The set list included: You Are the Real Thing, The Fly, Mysterious Ways, Sunday Bloody Sunday, Where the Streets Have No Name and plenty more. But the biggest surprise of the night was a little love song called North Star, which, Bono said, has never been played before in North America. It is also being featured in the Transformers: Dark of the Moon film coming out soon. As all good songs, it will take time for it to grow on us. The crowd loved it, but not as much as old favorites.
With each song people of all ages grew more hypnotized. Those who had seemed shy earlier, with daylight, loosened up as soon as it got dark. They bounced from their seats and against one another while singing along and holding up their palms wide open. Nobody seemed to mind their personal space or if a boundary had been crossed. There were no boundaries.
It helped that the stage, a mechanic sea star-like creature nicknamed The Claw, felt like another member of the band. The steel creature, which cost $25 million, was meant to deliver an intimate atmosphere. It did the job, and so far it keeps gathering attention everywhere its tentacles spread.
On this particular night, it appeared to be feeding off from the energy given by South Florida fans. The roof colors changed with each song, alternating between green, purple, red, orange and blue. Two bridges extending to the lucky mass at ground level allowed for some special moments, such as when Bono and The Edge reached out to each other from different sides while singing Until the End of the World.
The sophisticated giant TV screen delivered unimaginable surprises, including a personalized greeting from NASA Commander Mark E. Kelly (“Hello, Miami”) that shocked everyone, and another from Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese political prisoner. The sound emanating from the machine’s speakers was at times too powerful and drowned lyrics here and there. Even so, people followed the band, track by track, making up whatever lyrics they could not recall.
With all the amazing technicalities and special effects, The Claw still was no match for the thousands of passionate fans, who gave the band everything they had: their screams, voices, arms in the air, applauses. They even lent their cellphones, holding them up open to simulate a night sky full of stars when Bono asked them to. This was while a motivating Walk On played and Amnesty volunteers came out holding candles until the stage was all surrounded by them.
In the end, it wasn’t so much the brilliantly and expensively conceived stage that gave that intimate feeling, but the being there in the moment, as part of a sea of people who wanted the same thing: to be part of U2, in some way. That’s why they sang along and stood for most of the show, and why they went along with the commentary.
“Irish people are like Latin people who don’t know how to dance,” said Bono, making the crowd laugh. “Actually, there is an exception. The Edge can dance.” He refused to give a demonstration, even though Bono practically begged him.
(Photo by Gretel Sarmiento)
For this show, the singer wore a black leather jacket while The Edge wore his serious face and dark beanie. The rest of the band, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen, were dressed in white. It was not always that way, as an old footage played later on in the show, from the band’s Joshua Tree days, reminded us. In it, Bono lacks the cool glasses and The Edge wears a long brown coat and black hat.
Aside from the nostalgic film, the night carried other highlights such as when rays of light shot up from the top of the stage brightening the night sky. Another was when Bono decided to swing off the stage holding on to a red glowing microphone as if he were a kid riding an old car tire.
By the end of the show I really wanted to believe Lisa Hayes, a native of Missouri whose parents are Irish and who has seen the band at least 10 times. At the beginning of the show she and others had explained to me that a U2 concert is really a religious experience and how people walk out feeling overwhelmed with a collective feeling of love and positive energy.
“You feel their music is about helping each other, not just stumping over people to get to where you need,” Hayes said.
Surely this show, along with Bono’s screams for freedom, peace and love, had transformed us all and turned us, automatically, into better individuals. But one look at the traffic exiting the parking lot proved the whole theory wrong and had me wishing that The Claw had never lifted off – or at least, had swallowed us all.
(Photo by Gretel Sarmiento)
SET LIST
Even Better Than the Real Thing; The Fly; Mysterious Ways; Until the End of the World; I Will Follow; Get On Your Boots; I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For; The Promised Land; North Star; Beautiful Day (with fragments of Space Oddity); Elevation; Pride In The Name of Love; Miss Sarajevo; Zooropa; City of Blinding Lights; Vertigo; I’ll Go Crazy; Sunday Bloody Sunday; Scarlet; Walk On
ENCORES
One; Will You Love Me Tomorrow; Where the Streets Have No Name; Hold Me Thrill Me Kiss Me Kill Me; With or Without You; Moment of Surrender