Vertigo Tour

Vertigo Tour
World tour by U2
Locations	North America, Europe, South America, Oceania, Japan
Supporting album	How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb
Start date	March 28, 2005
End date	December 9, 2006
Legs	5
Shows	131
U2 tour chronology
Elevation Tour (2001)	Vertigo Tour (2005-2006)	U2 360° Tour (2009-2010)

The Vertigo Tour was a worldwide concert tour by the Irish rock band U2. Launched in support of the group's 2004 album How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, the visited arenas and stadiums from 2005 through 2006. The Vertigo Tour consisted of five legs that alternated between indoor arena shows in North America and outdoor stadium shows internationally.^[1] Much like the previous Elevation Tour, the indoor portion of the Vertigo Tour featured a stripped-down, intimate stage design. Protruding from the main stage was an ellipse-shaped "B stage" that encapsulated a small number of fans.

The tour grossed $260 million in 110 sold-out concerts in 2005, making it the top-grossing tour of the year.^[2] In North America alone, the tour grossed $138.9 million with around 1.4 million tickets sold.^[3]

The Vertigo Tour won the 2005 Billboard Roadwork Touring Awards for Top Tour, Top Draw, and Top Single Event, and U2's management company Principle Management won for Top Manager.^[4]

By the time it finished, the Vertigo Tour had sold 4,619,021 tickets — with 131 shows — for a total gross of $389 million; the gross was the third-highest such figure ever.^[5] The tour was depicted in the three concert films, Vertigo 2005: Live from Chicago, Vertigo: Live from Milan, and U2 3D.

Itinerary

The band performs in Anaheim on April 1, 2005.

After rehearsing for several months in Vancouver, the tour's opening night was on March 28, 2005 at the iPayOne Center in San Diego, California. The first leg through North America consisted of 28 sold-out indoor arena shows and finished May 28 in Boston, Massachusetts.

The second leg was a European stadium tour, commencing on June 10 in Brussels, and finished on August 14 in Lisbon. They played in a number of venues including Amsterdam, London, Dublin, Madrid, Milan and Oslo. U2 broke Irish box office marks with ticket sales for three Croke Park concerts in Dublin, after more than 240,000 tickets were sold in record time. In The Netherlands, Belgium, France and Austria, the tickets were all sold within 60 minutes.

U2 performs in Mexico City in 2006. The symbols of Islam, Judaism and Christianity form the word "Coexista" (or "Coexist").

The band then returned to North America for the third leg in the autumn, playing 50 sold-out shows in indoor arenas, starting on September 12 in Toronto and finishing up on December 19 in Portland, Oregon.

A fourth leg of outdoor stadium shows began in February 12, 2006 in Monterrey, Mexico, and ran through March 2, visiting Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, and Chile; many of these locales had not seen a live U2 performance in nearly a decade and proved to be a hugely successful leg, with massive audiences attending these shows.

On March 9, 2006, it was announced the final 10 shows in New Zealand, Australia, Japan and Hawaii were postponed due to a serious illness to guitarist The Edge's daughter Sian. (The initial start of the tour had been postponed slightly for the same reason, although this time prior to any tickets being sold.) On July 20, 2006 it was announced that those dates were now on for November and December, with some adjustments and additions of dates. The fifth leg started on November 7 in Brisbane, Australia and after 13 shows in stadiums it finished on December 9, 2006 at Aloha Stadium in Honolulu, Hawaii.

Stage design

The LED curtain and the stage, from the rear; Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, May 22, 2005.

The Vertigo Tour's production was designed by architect Mark Fisher and stage and lighting designer Willie Williams. Key elements were an ellipse-shaped ramp on the floor connected to the stage, with some fans inside it and some outside it (similar to the heart-shaped ramp used on the previous Elevation Tour). The inside area of the ellipse came to be known as the "bomb shelter", in reference to the supporting album.^[6]

In the North American shows, a set of seven retractable, see-through LED-based lighted bead curtains hung behind and to the side of the stage, showing abstract patterns, maps, moving figures, and occasionally text. The roll-drop LED screens were designed by Fisher using 360deg golf-ball pixels developed with Frederic Opsomer of innovative Designs in Belgium. The spherical LED product joined the BARCO product line as the Mi-Sphere. Dynamic, "moving" lights were also embedded in the stage and the B-stage ramp, as well. Four screens suspended above the stage showed close-ups of each member of the band, another element reused from the Elevation Tour.

For the European, Latin American and Australian stadium shows, the bead curtains were replaced by an LED screen behind the band. The screen was assembled from BARCO O-Lite modules. The assembly of the screen was similar to the rigging used for the LED screen on the PopMart. The ellipse was also replaced with two catwalks leading to two B-stages in the style of the 'Vertigo target'.

Concert setlist

The show's set list varied, with notable differences between each leg of the tour.

Main set

U2 perform in their home town of Dublin in June 2005

The arena shows of the first and third legs usually began with the same trio of songs: "City of Blinding Lights" , "Vertigo", "Elevation". On the first leg, "City of Blinding Lights" would alternate with "Love and Peace or Else", and sometimes "Beautiful Day" appeared in the opening trio. In contrast, the stadium concerts of the second leg opened with "Vertigo", "I Will Follow", and "The Electric Co.", though "I Will Follow's" position was occasionally occupied by other songs. By the fourth leg, "City of Blinding Lights", "Vertigo" and "Elevation" were the standard opening trio, that was only altered once - early on in the fourth leg. After the opening trio, songs from U2's early days were played at the arena shows, while the stadium shows featured more anthemic rock songs. "New Year's Day", "Until the End of the World", "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For", and "Miracle Drug" were examples of songs that oftened appeared in the main set. Beyond this point in the setlist, the stadium and indoor sets became roughly similar. "Sometimes You Can't Make it on Your Own" was played at every show as a tribute to Bono's father. Then there was then a sequence of politically-based songs (usually "Love and Peace or Else," "Sunday Bloody Sunday," and "Bullet the Blue Sky"), based around the theme of "Coexist" (written to show a Muslim Crescent, Jewish Star of David, and Christian Cross). Later, with flags of African nations displayed on the screens, "Where the Streets Have No Name" followed "Pride (In the Name of Love)." This led to a plea from Bono to participate in the ONE Campaign, while the opening of "One" played. On November 13, 2006 while performing in Sydney, Bono paid tribute to his late friend Michael Hutchence by saying to the Sydney crowd "Blow a kiss to Heaven to Michael Hutchence" before playing "With or Without You".

The encores

U2 performing "The Fly" in Brussels at King Baudouin Stadium on European leg's opening night, June 10, 2005.

The encores varied from leg to leg, and night to night. The first encore was frequently a musical and visual look back to U2's famed Zoo TV Tour, usually featuring "Zoo Station", "The Fly", and "Mysterious Ways". However, for many shows on the third leg, this was discarded in favor of an acoustic encore. The second encore often showcased recent material, and almost all second leg shows as well as rare first and third leg shows ended with a repeat of "Vertigo", in homage to U2's early concert days when they would run out of songs to play. The usual concert finisher in the first leg was "40" where Adam and Edge would switch instruments, but over the course of the tour, many other closing songs would be used as well.

At the start of the much-delayed fifth leg in Australia, the usual first Zoo TV-style encore was used initially, but several shows into the leg "Zoo Station" was dropped in favour of "Mysterious Ways" with "The Fly" opening the encore, making the first encore "The Fly", "Mysterious Ways" and "With Or Without You". The second encore, however, showcased three songs that had not been played until this point on the entire tour. "The Saints Are Coming" was played, following U2 and Green Day's using it to reopen the Louisiana Superdome. Up next was a full electric performance of "Angel of Harlem". Making its Vertigo Tour debut and closing a show for the first time ever was "Kite", which hadn't been played since the end of the Elevation Tour five years prior. Kite was accompanied by a didgeridoo and the show ended with Bono releasing a kite from one of the B-Stages. During the band's second show in Auckland, "One Tree Hill" replaced Kite as the show closer. The encore of the final concert of the tour in Honolulu included "The Saints Are Coming" featuring Billie Joe Armstrong, Window in the Skies and Neil Young's "Rockin' in the Free World" featuring Eddie Vedder and Mike McCready. The tour ended with the song "All I Want Is You".

Diversity of material played

The Edge playing "Electric Co." in Pittsburgh in October 2005; the song had been a staple from the band's live act in the early 1980s, but had not been played in 17 years.

The Vertigo Tour was notable not only for its diversity of material — it was the first tour since the Lovetown Tour to feature at least one song from each of their currently released albums — but for the rarity of some songs played. Most notably, "The Ocean", which debuted on tour on 6 April 2005, previously had not been performed since December 1982. Tracks from their debut album Boy were chosen ahead of tracks from their biggest-selling album, The Joshua Tree. A number of other songs returned to the setlist after absences of more than fifteen years, including material from October, while "The First Time", from 1993's Zooropa album, was played in full live for the first time. "Miss Sarajevo", a song from U2's side project Original Soundtracks No. 1, became a concert regular despite previously only being played live twice since its release in 1995. Although Luciano Pavarotti sang the operatic vocals on the original, "Miss Sarajevo" featured Bono competently singing the operatic vocals. The Vertigo Tour has also featured Larry Mullen Jr. on vocals on "Elevation", "Miracle Drug" and "Love and Peace or Else". All but two songs ("A Man and a Woman" and "One Step Closer") from How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb were performed on the tour. "Fast Cars", a bonus track on some countries' editions of the album, was also performed. "Walk On", the Grammy Award-winning song from All That You Can't Leave Behind, was played only sparingly on the tour, and barring performances in Brisbane and Sydney, was played in stripped back acoustic form. Also "Bad", which was a regular on the Elevation Tour playlist, was played less frequently on this tour.

Concert filming

Two nights of the band's four-night engagement in Chicago, Illinois in May 2005 were filmed for the live DVD Vertigo 2005: Live From Chicago. During the European stadium leg of the Vertigo Tour in the summer of 2005, four more concerts were filmed: two in Dublin and two in Milan. Songs from the Milan shows were featured in a band profile on 60 Minutes and on U2.COMmunication. Ten songs performed at the Milan concert appeared as a special edition bonus DVD in U2's November 2006 compilation album U218 Singles. The February 20, 2006 show in São Paulo, Brazil was broadcast live by Rede Globo. Additionally, 700 hours of footage from seven Latin American concerts were filmed in 3D HD for the film U2 3D, released in 2008 in Real D Cinemas.^[7] On November 18 and 19, additional U2 3D filming was done at the Melbourne concerts at Telstra Dome, as they still needed shots of the stage's LED display and the concert audience.^[8]

Support acts

Support slots were taken up by Ash, Athlete, Feeder, Franz Ferdinand, Interpol, Kanye West, Keane, The Killers, Kings of Leon (U.S. leg only), Sissor Sisters, Snow Patrol, Starsailor (Cardiff only), Paddy Casey (Dublin only), Razorlight, Pearl Jam (Honolulu only) and The Zutons.

Ticket presale controversy

The band's website, U2.com, was involved in a ticket presale controversy that upset fans. Users who paid $40 for a subscription to U2.com were promised the opportunity to purchase tickets in a presale that preceded any general public ticket sales.^[9] However, many fans were unable to purchase tickets, as technical glitches plagued the presale.^[9] Additionally, many scalpers had taken advantage of the system by subscribing to U2.com and purchasing as many tickets as possible, with the intentions of selling them for profit.^[9] Larry Mullen, Jr. apologized on behalf of the band at the Grammy Awards.

Technical details

LED curtains

The LED based curtains behind the indoor stage setup were conceived by Mark Fisher and Willie Williams, custom made by Barco NV and Innovative Designs, and supplied by XL Video.^[10] The Vertigo Tour used 189 strings of these "MiSphere" LED balls suspended from custom truss, which allows the LED curtains to be rolled up.^[11] High above the center stage hung the MiSphere strings, each contained 64 spheres and totaling nine meters long; together the spheres formed seven 3-D curtains, which permitted concertgoers around the arena to have an excellent view of the curtains above the band and of the images displayed on them.^[11]

Lighting gear list

The following gear was used for the show's lighting:^[11]

• 54 Martin MAC 2000 Wash
• 15 Vari*Lite VL3000
• 37 Martin Atomic 3000 Strobe
• 66 2x2 DWE audience blinders
• 12 Lycian M2 Follow Spot
• 6 Strong 3K Gladiator Follow Spot
• 6 Saco Technologies LED Factory Light (custom)
• 24 ETC Source Four Leko
• 6 Lowell Tota light
• 6 1x4 DWE audience blinders
• 2 18K HMI Fresnel
• 1 Flying Pig Systems WholeHog 3 console (running beta version of the new 1.3.9 software)
• 189 MiSphere string
• 4 Barco G10 projector
• 5 Barco G5 projector
• 5 Folsom Encore image processor

A PlayStation controller is used to control High End Systems DL1 units for audience shots presented on the large video screens.^[11]

Tour dates

Number	Date	City	Country	Venue	Opening Act(s)
First Leg
North America I
1	March 28, 2005	San Diego	United States	iPay One Center	Kings of Leon
2	March 30, 2005
3	April 1, 2005	Anaheim	United States	Arrowhead Pond	Kings of Leon
4	April 2, 2005
5	April 5, 2005	Los Angeles	United States	Staples Center	Kings of Leon
6	April 6, 2005
7	April 9, 2005	San Jose	United States	HP Pavilion at San Jose	Kings of Leon
8	April 10, 2005
9	April 14, 2005	Phoenix	United States	Glendale Arena	Kings of Leon
10	April 15, 2005
11	April 20, 2005	Denver	United States	Pepsi Center	Kings of Leon
12	April 21, 2005
13	April 24, 2005	Seattle	United States	Key Arena	Kings of Leon
14	April 25, 2005
15	April 28, 2005	Vancouver	Canada	GM Place	Kings of Leon
16	April 29, 2005
17	May 7, 2005	Chicago	United States	United Center	Kings of Leon
18	May 9, 2005
19	May 10, 2005
20	May 12, 2005
21	May 14, 2005	Philadelphia	United States	Wachovia Center	Kings of Leon
22	May 17, 2005	East Rutherford	United States	Continental Airlines Arena	Kings of Leon
23	May 18, 2005
24	May 21, 2005	New York	United States	Madison Square Garden	Kings of Leon
25	May 22, 2005	Philadelphia	United States	Wachovia Center	Kings of Leon
26	May 24, 2005	Boston	United States	FleetCenter	Kings of Leon
27	May 26, 2005
28	May 28, 2005
Second Leg
Europe
29	June 10, 2005	Brussels	Belgium	King Baudouin Stadium	The Thrills, Snow Patrol
30	June 12, 2004	Gelsenkirchen	Germany	Arena auf Schalke	The Thrills, Feeder
31	June 14, 2005	Manchester	England	City of Manchester Stadium	Snow Patrol, The Bravery
32	June 15, 2005				Athlete, Idlewild
33	June 18, 2005	London	England	Twickenham Stadium	Doves, Athlete
34	June 19, 2005				Idlewild, Ash
35	June 21, 2005	Glasgow	Scotland	Hampden Park	Idlewild, Ash
36	June 24, 2005	Dublin	Ireland	Croke Park	Radiators, Snow Patrol
37	June 25, 2005				The Thrills, Paddy Casey
38	June 27, 2005				Ash, The Bravery
39	June 29, 2005	Cardiff	Wales	Millenium Stadium	Starsailor, The Killers
40	July 2, 2005	Vienna	Austria	Ernst Happel Stadium	The Magic Numbers, The Thrills
41	July 5, 2005	Chorzow	Poland	Stadion Śląski	The Killers
42	July 7, 2005	Berlin	Germany	Berlin Olympic Stadium	Kaiser Chiefs, Snow Patrol
43	July 9, 2005	Paris	France	Stade de France	Starsailor, Snow Patrol
44	July 10, 2005				Snow Patrol, The Music
45	July 13, 2005	Amsterdam	Netherlands	Amsterdam Arena	Kaiser Chiefs, The Killers
46	July 15, 2005				Snow Patrol, The Music
47	July 16, 2005				Athlete, Snow Patrol
48	July 18, 2005	Zurich	Switzerland	Letzigrund Stadium	Feeder, Ash
49	July 20, 2005	Milan	Italy	San Siro Stadium	Feeder, Ash
50	July 21, 2005
51	July 23, 2005	Rome	Italy	Olympic Stadium
52	July 27, 2005	Oslo	Norway	Valle Hovin	Paddy Casey, Razorlight
53	July 29, 2005	Gothenburg	Sweden	Ullevi Stadium	The Soundtrack Of Our Lives, Razorlight
54	July 31, 2005	Copenhagen	Denmark	Parken Stadium
55	August 3, 2005	Munich	Germany	Olympiastadion	The Zutons, Keane
56	August 5, 2005	Nice	France	Stade Charles-Ehrmann
57	August 7, 2005	Barcelona	Spain	Camp Nou	Kaiser Chiefs, Keane
58	August 9, 2005	San Sebastian	Spain	Estadio Anoeta	Kaiser Chiefs, Franz Ferdinand
59	August 11, 2005	Madrid	Spain	Estadio Vicente Calderon
60	August 14, 2005	Lisbon	Portugal	Estadio Jose Alvalade	Kaiser Chiefs
Third Leg
North America II
61	September 12, 2005	Toronto	Canada	Air Canada Centre
62	September 14, 2005
63	September 16, 2005
64	September 17, 2005
65	September 20, 2005	Chicago	United States	United Center
66	September 21, 2005
67	September 23, 2005	Minneapolis	United States	Target Center
68	September 25, 2005	Milwaukee	United States	Bradley Center
69	October 3, 2005	Boston	United States	TD Banknorth Garden *
70	October 4, 2005
71	October 7, 2005	New York	United States	Madison Square Garden
72	October 8, 2005
73	October 10, 2005
74	October 11, 2005
75	October 14, 2005
76	October 16, 2005	Philadelphia	United States	Wachovia Center
77	October 17, 2005
78	October 19, 2005	Washington	United States	MCI Center
79	October 20, 2005
80	October 22, 2005	Pittsburgh	United States	Mellon Arena	Damian Marley
81	October 24, 2005	Detroit	United States	Palace of Auburn Hills
82	October 25, 2005
83	October 28, 2005	Houston	United States	Toyota Center
84	October 29, 2005	Dallas	United States	American Airlines Center
85	November 1, 2005	Los Angeles	United States	Staples Center
86	November 2, 2005
87	November 4, 2005	Las Vegas	United States	MGM Grand Garden Arena
88	November 5, 2005
89	November 8, 2005	Oakland	United States	Oakland Arena
90	November 9, 2005
91	November 13, 2005	Miami	United States	American Airlines Arena
92	November 14, 2005
93	November 16, 2005	Tampa	United States	St. Pete Times Forum
94	November 18, 2005	Atlanta	United States	Philips Arena
95	November 19, 2005
96	November 21, 2005	New York	United States	Madison Square Garden
97	November 22, 2005
98	November 25, 2005	Ottawa	Canada	Corel Centre
99	November 26, 2005	Montreal	Canada	Bell Centre
100	November 28, 2005
101	December 4, 2005	Boston	United States	TD Banknorth Garden
102	December 5, 2005
103	December 7, 2005	Hartford	United States	Civic Center
104	December 9, 2005	Buffalo	United States	HSBC Arena
105	December 10, 2005	Cleveland	United States	Quicken Loans Arena
106	December 12, 2005	Charlotte	United States	Charlotte Bobcats Arena
107	December 14, 2005	St. Louis	United States	Savvis Center	Kanye West
108	December 15, 2005	Omaha	United States	Qwest Center
109	December 17, 2005	Salt Lake City	United States	Delta Center
110	December 19, 2005	Portland	United States	Rose Garden
Fourth Leg
Latin America
111	February 12, 2006	Monterrey	Mexico	Estadio Tecnológico	The Secret Machines
112	February 15, 2006	Mexico City	Mexico	Estadio Azteca
113	February 16, 2006
114	February 20, 2006	São Paulo	Brazil	Estádio do Morumbi	Franz Ferdinand
115	February 21, 2006
116	February 26, 2006	Santiago	Chile	Estadio Nacional	Franz Ferdinand
117	March 1, 2006	Buenos Aires	Argentina	Estadio Monumental	Franz Ferdinand
118	March 2, 2006
Fifth Leg
Australasia
119	November 7, 2006	Brisbane	Australia	QSA Centre	Kanye West
120	November 10, 2006	Sydney	Australia	Telstra Stadium
121	November 11, 2006
122	November 13, 2006
123	November 16, 2006	Adelaide	Australia	AAMI Stadium
124	November 18, 2006	Melbourne	Australia	Telstra Dome
125	November 19, 2006
126	November 24, 2006	Auckland	New Zealand	Mt Smart Stadium ^
127	November 25, 2006
Japan
128	November 29, 2006	Tokyo	Japan	Saitama Super Arena
129	November 30, 2006
130	December 4, 2006
Hawaii
131	December 9, 2006	Honolulu	United States	Aloha Stadium	Rocco and the Devils, Pearl Jam

* = The FleetCenter had changed names to the TD Banknorth Garden between the first and third legs of the tour.

^ = Mt Smart Stadium was formerly known as Ericsson Stadium, but during the delay of the fifth tour leg the stadium was renamed.

Reference ^[1]

Box office score data

See also

• List of highest grossing concert tours

References

External links

• U2.com official site on Vertigo Tour