Think U2 is ‘too political’? Stay home
They’re one of the biggest bands of all time, but some Australian fans seem to be forgetting what U2 is – and has always been – about, writes Cameron Adams.
It’s fair to say that Bono virtually invented the concept of the woke rock star.
But it’s been surprising to see people surprised that in 2019 U2 are still including political messages on their Australian tour.
Some online commenters have vented under reviews from the New Zealand and Brisbane legs of the band’s The Joshua Tree tour about the amount of social commentary in their show, as if it’s a new thing that they had no idea they’d have to endure.
The images of Greta Thunberg and Hannah Gadsby that the band display seem to be particularly triggering.
How is it that anyone in this day and age is expecting to go to a U2 concert and it be a politics free zone? Have you never listened to U2? I get the ‘shut up and sing’ thing, but this is U2, not Katy Perry.
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Bono’s career-long “wokeness” is the main reason they’re so polarising, the reason the Irish band have as many rabid, vocal haters as passionate, vocal fans. But if you have a problem with his politics, surely you tapped out a long time ago? Or maybe you just like trolling the online comments section about gigs you had no intention of attending?
The 2017 leg of The Joshua Tree tour made over $500 million from 2.7 million tickets sold to 51 shows. And while they’re only playing 15 shows this year, the wokeness hasn’t hurt them too much so far.
Tracking the trolls it seems there are a number of key issues people have had with the highly anticipated tour.
The sound was an issue in Brisbane, seemingly related to the venue. U2 have state of the art sound technicians, so let’s hope that is rectified before the tour continues on as that’s a legitimate complaint. Then again, it could muffle Bono banging on about Trump so could have been a win-win for some.
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The price of tickets was another popular issue. And sure, no one is denying concert tickets are expensive. But U2 supply an impressive bang for buck ratio in the scheme of things – looking at that screen (the size of four IMAX screens) and staging, it’s not difficult to see where a lot of ticket dollars go.
And, despite being called The Joshua Tree Tour – as if it could not be any more obvious what to expect – apparently, the band isn’t playing enough hits. They’re playing an album that sold 30 million copies from start to finish and even book-ending it with earlier hits (Sunday Bloody Sunday, Pride, New Year’s Day – all very political songs just quietly) and later hits (Vertigo, Beautiful Day, One), but apparently that’s not enough.
What’s even more confusing then, based off of that complaint, is that people are still very angry about that iTunes album. It was 2014, but apparently tracks from Songs of Innocence still pop up uninvited on peoples phones and pissed them off to the point that they’re willing to dive into the comments section of an online debate to sling them about it.
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At the end of the day, you might think that Bono is billionaire businessman preaching about environmentalism while flying around the world in his private jet emitting carbon and lugging the biggest stage in rock history across the globe. It’s not entirely wrong.
You may also think that this bloody pretentious, overrated virtue signaller (presumably this means his decades spent doing charity work to eradicate poverty) shouldn’t share any opinion on politics or Trump or Australian bushfires or link them to climate change and he should just stop with the feminist political evangelical ranting. That he should just pay his tax and sing because that’s what he’s paid for and U2 haven’t been good since 1983 anyway. But still, there are plenty of fans who wouldn’t change a thing.
Cameron Adams is a national music writer for News Corp.
Originally published as Think U2 is ‘too political’? Stay home
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