While the wife is away…. I’ve been off to hear U2 play! I was offered a ticket by a friend at Church and was delighted to take the opportunity to hear my favourite band play live, in the Estadio Nacional Santiago! They were amazing! I was delighted to share the experience with over 80,000 chileans.
There were three stages to the evening… and three “stages” too, as follows:
First, those standing, or promenading in the centre of the stadium exchange insults with those sitting in the expensive seats! Their insults were, respectively, “mira las minas” (which I think translates as “you upper class posh gits”), to which those with bank accounts and credit cards replied “los huevones de la cancha” (translated: “you low-life, no-good ******s in the ring”! Nice to know Chileans can humour themselves!
Second, to the real stage- Franz Ferdinand were fronting U2 and they appeared in their usual bold attire just in time to remove it (the lead singer wanted to show his scottish chest hair). However, despite everyone in my vicinity telling me they love scottish bands, most chileans appeared to be bored to the point of buying coke at 700 pesos a shot (which is a con) and listening to their personal steros (yeah… at a concert. Clever).
Third, the show began. The music was fantastic. The singing of 80,000 chileans wasn’t quite so fantastic. Thankfully, the sound levels were absolutely incredible- I’m sure it could be heard in the mountains around Santiago! However, the entertainment didn’t stop for almost 3 hours- in any moment of quiet euphoria (there were few quiet ones, even when Bono was speaking), the crowd started chanting “chii chii chii, cha cha cha, viva Chile!” which made us laugh and shout even more. The show was made unique by the invitation of a number of lucky chileans to join them on stage to sing or shout. And the band played a local guitar/banjo as part of - the churanga- after former President Lagos challenged them to do so.
What a show it was. The stage set of U2 for their Vertigo Tour was incredible. Almost 30m high, and 50m wide, it included two walk-along arms and the creation of a “Golden Circle” in front of the stage, containing 450 sleepless U2 obsessives who had camped at the stadium for the previous night in the hope of getting a ticket! The back wall consisted of a web of giant LED RGB pixels which displayed album graphics and key messages to the stadium during each song.
These messages included, rather controversially, picturing the new President Michelle Bachelet with former President Pinochet, whose regime resulted in her Father’s death. More encouragingly, it proclaimed a message of “COEXIST” to those who feel Abrahamic faiths won’t or can’t tolerate each other. And the message of Amnesty International, including the 6 articles of the UN Bill of Human Rights were read in full as a song’s conclusion.
Songs from a range of albums were played, including 6 of my favourites. I’ve listed them below, for any U2 freaks out there, in the order they were played:
City of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
Elevation
Until the End of the World
New Year’s Day
Still Haven’t Found
Beautiful Day
The First Time
Sometimes You Can’t Make it on your Own
Love and Peace
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Bullet The Blue Sky
Miss Sarajevo
Pride in the Name of Love
Where the Streets have no Name
One
(1st encore)
Zoo Station
The Fly
Mysterious Ways
With or Without You
(2nd encore)
Mothers of the Disappeared
Yahweh
All I Want is You
For more information about their tour and pictures from the Santiago Concert, see U2.com.
I’ve got some mobile phone recordings and videos from the concert. I’ll post them soon.