2015-07-23

Madison Square Garden, New York, NY, USA

Set List of Show:

Act One:

"The Miracle (of Joey Ramone)"
"The Electric Co."
"Vertigo"
"I Will Follow"
"Iris (Hold Me Close)"
"Cedarwood Road"
"Song for Someone"
"Sunday Bloody Sunday"
"Raised by Wolves"
"Until the End of the World"

Act Two:

"Invisible"
"Even Better Than the Real Thing"
"Mysterious Ways"
"Lucifer's Hands"
"Sweetest Thing"
"Every Breaking Wave"
"All I Want is You"
"With or Without You"
"City Of Blinding Lights"
"Bullet the Blue Sky"
"Pride (In the Name of Love)"

Encore:

"Beautiful Day"
"Where the Streets Have No Name"
"I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For"

Additional Music

Pre-Recorded Intro Song: "People Have the Power" - Patti Smith
Pre-Recorded Exit Song: "Same Love" - Macklemore and Lewis ft. Mary Lambert
Pre-Recorded Intermission Song(s): "The Wanderer" - U2 with Johnny Cash

Snippets of Other Songs Performed by U2:

A Little Night Music

Show Details:

U2 do their biggest run of shows at one venue in North America with eight shows in New York City’s Madison Square Garden. The shows start on July 18, and run until July 31, and finish off the first leg of the Innocence + Experience tour, before the band moves to Europe. This is the fourth of eight shows. Tonight Bono jokes that the band have moved in because of the number of shows they have done. “That’s right, we live here! This is Madison Square Garden. Adam Clayton has brought his own antique door knobs. Yes, we’ve moved in”.

Ahead of the show tonight, the band are heard rehearsing “Sweetest Thing”, “Lucifer’s Hands” and “The Electric Co.” Although “The Electric Co.” is played often on this tour, “Sweetest Thing” hasn’t been heard in the last ten shows, and “Lucifer’s Hands” has only been played twice in total. All three are played in the show this evening. For “Lucifer’s Hands” though it is the third and the final time it is heard on this tour. The band also play “All I Want is You” tonight, by request of a fan from Brazil, who is brought on stage to play with the band.

A fan from Colombia is pulled up as well to dance during “Mysterious Ways” and to do the Meerkat filming that follows. They have a flag from their country which has text written on it asking U2 to play Colombia. U2 have never played that country, but they will in 2017 as part of The Joshua Tree Tour. Maybe that idea was born tonight at the Garden.

Among the guests tonight are Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin. There are several nods to him being there throughout the evening including riffs being played from Led Zeppelin songs as the techs set up, to “Black Dog” and “Good Times Bad Times” being snippeted during the show. He also gets a tour of the stage set up ahead of the show. Mike Peters of The Alarm is at the show as well, and Bono includes a snippet of their “Blaze of Glory” in the show as well. Others in the crowd tonight include Interscope founder Jimmy Iovine, musician Jay-Z, and Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi.

“Send in the Clowns” and “I Can See for Miles” start the snippets off during “The Electric Co.” and “God Save the Queen” appears in “Vertigo”. “When Johnny Comes Marching Home” appears in “Sunday Bloody Sunday” as does “Blaze Of Glory” by The Alarm. “Love and Peace or Else” is referenced during “Until the End of the World”. “Young Americans” by David Bowie makes an appearance in “Mysterious Ways” and “Into the Mystic” gets quoted in “All I Want is You”. “Black Dog” by Led Zeppelin is referenced during “Bullet the Blue Sky” as is “19”. “The Hands that Built America” fills the space between “Bullet” and “Pride (In the Name of Love)”. “Good Times Bad Times”, another Led Zeppelin song is referenced in “Beautiful Day”. “Mother and Child Reunion” is the introduction to “Where the Streets Have No Name” which also includes a reference to U2’s own “California (There is no End to Love)”. After “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” Bono sings a piece of “People Have the Power”.

Tonight’s show sees the band return to the Johnny Cash / “The Wanderer” intermission video after using the newer Gavin Friday / “The Fly” intermission since the fourth show in Boston.

For each show at the Garden, a unique T-shirt and poster is sold, dated with the date of the performance. The back lists all eight dates, and has U2 over top of the symbol for protection used on the album. The front has the U2 over the symbol, surrounded with stars and listing “Madison Square Garden * NYC” in a design reminiscent of some older Ramones logos. Tonight the shirt is olive green.

The first four New York shows were announced on December 3, 2014. Pre-sales for U2.com members started on December 4, and the general sale for these started on December 8, 2014. Unlike the other shows in North America which used credit cards for entry, this show used hard tickets.

Officially Released Tracks