Dolby Atmos Fan Listening Sessions
Original Story by Aaron J. Sams (2024-11-20)
U2 have done a number of listening parties for the new “shadow album” How to Re-Assemble An Atomic Bomb in various locations around the world where Dolby Atmos enabled venues were available to show off the technology.
The first party was held on November 15, for a small group in London, England, and since that time there have been sessions in Dublin, Los Angeles, New York, Berlin, Toronto, and Mexico City. These sessions finish up with listening sessions in Sao Paulo and Tokyo on the eve of release of the new album, November 21, 2024. Due to time change differences all of these listening sessions are before the album is released in the local time zone, but the Sao Paulo session will be held after the album has been released in Australia and Asia.
To attend, one had to enter via U2.com. They posted on November 2, sharing the dates of the events and asking those who could attend to apply. One did not need to be a member of U2.com to apply. The invite shared, “Special listening parties presented in Dolby Atmos® coming up exclusively for U2.com with the chance to hear How to Re-Assemble an Atomic Bomb ahead of release day on November 22. With Dolby Atmos®, fans will hear every detail with unparalleled clarity and depth as if they are inside each song.”
These sessions are small, ranging from 30 people to approximately 200 people, as these venues hold only a small amount of people. Most of the sessions have been held in custom built Dolby listening facilities. Dublin is the largest venue, an actual theatre, and all of the other venues are considerably smaller, with most holding well under 100 people. Each invited person is allowed to bring one guest. Guests who were invited were automatically added to the guest list and did not have to confirm their attendance. This may have lead to some of the empty seats during some of the events.
Before each session, a greeting from The Edge is played discussing the album:
“Hi everyone. This is The Edge. We are so grateful for your support, and happy that you are able to make this playback, of the Dolby Atmos mixes of our new record How to Re-Assemble an Atomic Bomb, the shadow album to How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, which has just been remastered, and also mixed for Dolby Atmos. Something that I personally had to oversee. By the way, I don’t get paid extra, I just want to make that very clear. I’m doing it for you. Because I care about you fans. The others like you, but I actually really love you. So we hope you have a great listen back session. You are actually among the first U2 fans to hear these mixes in their purest form, so I hope you enjoy the playback, I hope you enjoy the new songs as much as we do, we think they are really good.”
In most cases the songs played have been the same at each session. The full 10-track How to Re-Assemble An Atomic Bomb album is played in full, and is then followed up by three tracks from How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, “City of Blinding Lights”, “Sometimes You Can’t Make it On Your Own” and “Vertigo”. In Mexico City, the session went a bit longer, and fans were able to request additional songs at the end, resulting in extra songs being played from the main album, including “Original of the Species” and a second play of “City of Blinding Lights”. The whole album is done in Dolby Atmos.
At some of the sessions, including London, New York and Berlin, an LED truck was present at or near the venue displaying a countdown clock with graphics from the album campaign. These have not been present at every event. A QR code on the back of the truck lead visitors to atomicbomb.u2.com for more information about the anniversary release of the album. In New York, the truck wasn’t at the venue when people exited the building, but a few blocks away.
At most of these events no swag was given out of any kind. In Berlin, however, at the end of the event, posters were given out to attendees. These posters have the red and black Vertigo target and read “20 Jahre”, the name of the album, and a list of formats, with a Universal records logo at the bottom. In Toronto, there was no swag given out, but in the phone pouches given out, one contained a card which awarded one copy of the Record Store Day Black Friday release. (300 copies will be available in Canada).
These sessions are all phone / smart-watch free listening sessions, and attendees are asked to put these devices into a pouch prior to the session starting.
A couple of special guests were present in the Dublin presentation. Long time friend, and supporter of U2, Dave Fanning was present. Dave did share that the whole How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb album had been mixed in Dolby Atmos. Alastair McMillan, the engineer who worked closely with The Edge on the Dolby Atmos mix was also present, and shared that work was done in Belfast. He shared that Bono was looking for a feeling of the recording surrounding you, where Edge preferred to keep more of a stereo feeling, and magnify certain areas of the recording. He said the work on the album had taken several months now. How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb is the first back catalog album done in Dolby Atmos since Achtung Baby was released back in January 2024.
Many of the early events had little for food or drink. Events in Dublin or New York didn’t have any options. A few of the later sessions have had some items provided. In Berlin, drinks and popcorn was made available. In Toronto, pizza and pop was available.
The small size of the Mexico City gathering saw an opportunity for fans in attendance to walk around the room and experience the mix from different angles and perspectives. Toronto got a playlist of U2 favourites ahead of the Atmos presentation and again after things ended. In Los Angeles there were reports of fans dancing in their seats, and there was an impromptu sing along to Vertigo in London. Fans of U2 always manage to find a way to create some joy when they manage to re-assemble.
Interested in hearing some fan feedback from these presentations? U2.com has a story up with comments from a number of fans across various events.
We will have a quick update after the final presentations in Tokyo and Sao Paulo. Many thanks to the fans who helped us put this one together. We’ll avoid a second assemble joke. Many thanks to Kelly, Allison, Adele, Irma, Joseph, Harry, Tony, Jon, Paul, Pawel, Max, Jason, Tim, Manuel and a few others who chose to remain nameless.
Full listing of Events:
- London – Nov 15 6PM
- Los Angeles – Nov 16 3PM (Started at 4PM)
- Dublin – Nov 16 12PM
- New York – Nov 16 3PM
- Berlin – Nov 19 5PM
- Toronto – Nov 19 7PM
- Mexico City – Nov 19 6:30PM
- Tokyo – Nov 21 7PM
- Sao Paulo – Nov 21 8PM
An additional listening event by Universal Australia was held on Monday, November 18, and was not associated with these events organized through U2.com. In that case entry was via a contest held by Universal.
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