U2, Live at the Brooklyn Bridge

U2, Live at the Brooklyn Bridge

Just got home. Will update shortly. I posted gobs of pictures at Buzznet during the show.

I have to run out to Manhattan right away, so here's a quickie rundown.
They played a lot of songs from the new album -- several ballads -- plus a few old ones. They opened and closed with Vertigo -- possibly because the sound wasn't quite right for the first time around? The show will air Dec. 8.

set list:
Vertigo, All because of You, Miracle Drug, ?? (a song Bono rote for his dad,) City of Lights, The Original of the Species, She's a Mystery Girl, It's a Beautiful Day, I Will Follow. Encore: Out of Control, Vertigo.

Check out the links in the comments section of this post (and this one,) at Gothamist for people's pictures of the band as they took a flatbed truck thru Manhattan playing on their way to Brooklyn.

Update: OK, I'm back. This is how it went down for me. I read last night on Gothamist that U2 would be doing this surprise show. I logged onto that silly web site in hopes of getting a ticket. Lots of weird rules, but ultimately one of the cops at the show said something along the lines of "I don't know why some of you think you have tickets, because no one needs tickets, everyone can get in."

So I played the online ticket game and didn't get any, but decided to walk down there anyhow.

Last night I dug out my 1987 Joshua Tree T-shirt -- one of the first U2 shows I slept on a dirty sidewalk over night in order to obtain tickets to the show. It was my freshman year in college.

So I get down to the Fulton Ferry spot between the Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges. The cops and crew seem relaxed, the fans are mostly my age -- I'd say 25 to 40. Lots of salt-and-pepper hair. Huge lines snaking between the DUMBO buildings. No one's really saying which lines are for ticket-holders or party crashers like me. Sometime around 4 p.m., a helicopter starts flying way too close to the Manhattan bridge and then it becomes clear this is the entrance. U2 is on the flatbed truck, heading to Brooklyn. About 2/3 of the way toward us, Bono starts saying something and then everybody turns into teenagers again -- all giddy waving and clapping and shrieking. The truck keeps driving and then disappears. I got in a couple different lines, all with no success. At one point a cop sounds all fire marshall like and says "this venue has reached capacity. Please don't bother the neighbors on your way home." Then 10 minutes later, they're letting everyone in.

I find a spot a few feet in front of the media risers. Not close to the stage, but considering every other time I've seen the band has been in a giant stadium, these indeed is pretty close. Plus, the backdrop is the Brooklyn Bridge and lower Manhattan. And every few minutes a boat passes by along the East River. Sometimes just little commuter boats, other times they're giant ships.

A few minutes after 4:30 the band come sout onto stage and start into Vertigo. The crowd roars and hands go up - not kidding I bet half of them had cameras and camera phones. Vertigo was fun and rocking, but like most of the rest of the show, the sound was a bit uneven and Bono's voice shows it's not at peak.

Next is a new song, called something like "All Because of You," and I think Bono introduced it as "a love song to The Who."

After that song, Bono starts chatting. "Wow. Vertigo. Why does this feel like a hometown show?" (I was taking notes as best I could onto my Treo.) "We come from the north side of Dublin," he names the school and then talks about a paralyzed boy who may have attended the school after the U2 boys left. The boy couldn't speak, but his mom saw a light in his eye and never gave up hope. At age 13, there's a new drug that allows him to move his head slightly, and thus type. As it turns out, all those years he was composing poetry in his head. I believe his name is Christopher Noland, his poetry book is Damburst of Dreams, and I think the song they did, "Miracle Drug," is actually his poem.

The next song is another slow one, Bono says he wrote it for his father who dies about two years ago. He says something like: he gave me a gift when he died. "I have my voice back after many years" ?? Anyhow, the song didn't do much for me.

Next Bono starts talking about how with this new album, the band wanted to recapture the sense of innocence the band had early on. Like arriving nnew York the first time, coming across the bridge. And how they listened to a lot of music from bands they liked -- for inspiration? He introduces the next song, "it's about innocence, and naivete." It's about Manhattan. "City of Lights"-like. I' missing a word in there, I think. I have a note in here that it has a guitar line like in I Will Follow.

Next song, Bono says "This is called The Original of the Species" and someone it the audience yells "woo!" like they know it. And Bono says "How do you know this shit?" Few minutes spent getting Edge set up at the keyboards and Bono strapped into his guitar. "There's a reason I don't play a lotta guitar." My brilliant rock star critique: This is a good groovin' ballad with pretty lyrics.

Another ballad. "She's a Mystery Girl." Crowd gets a bit restless near me. Not a great song. And maybe not quite two minutes into it, Bono says "I'm not quite sure how to end this," and then a few beats later it suddenly raps with a ba-da-dump. Like it wasn't planned. Reminded me of when my brother's band had their first gig in junior high and they hadn't yet learned how to "finish" a song, so those of us in the audience had to clap loud so we could pretend not to notice the rough end.

Bono says thanks for coming out. "Winter never felt so warm." They do "beautiful day" and the crowd is happy again, singing, bouncing around. Then they do I Will Follow, maybe just a tad slower than I remember from earlier concerts.

They leave and come back a few minutes later to do "Out of Control," which Bono points out was their first single. They close with another round of Vertigo.

So for my money, it wasn't the best U2 show I've seen but it was a great fun. Felt like cutting school and "borrowing" mom's car for a roadtrip to the show you knew all your friends would be talking about for months. Indeed, I've still got lines from U2 shows more than 15 years ago embedded in my head. When the band walks off the stage, I still hear "How long -- must we sing this song." Not that the crowd did that today, but they do in a bootleg of a show I have from April 20, 1987. And I've listened to it hundreds of times over the years. Just a great band, it even though the performance wasn't flawless this evening, that doesn't mean it was lacking in magic. Great band.
- posted by Amy @ 11/22/2004 06:21:00 PM