Tour FAQ: (pre-sale) tickets, dates, locations etc. (updated: 9/3)

1st leg: European dates

· 2009-06-30 - Barcelona, Spain - Camp Nou (25 March)
· 2009-07-07 - Milan, Italy - San Siro (13 March)
· 2009-07-11 - Paris, France - Stade de France (20 March)
· 2009-07-15 - Nice, France - Parc des Sports Charles Ehrmann (20 March)
· 2009-07-18 - Berlin, Germany - Olympiastadion (27 March)
· 2009-07-20 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Amsterdam ArenA (14 March)
· 2009-07-24 - Dublin, Ireland - Croke Park (20 March)
· 2009-07-31 - Gothenburg, Sweden - Ullevi Stadion (13 March)
· 2009-08-03 - Gelsenkirchen, Germany - Veltins-Arena (27 March)
· 2009-08-06 - Chorzow, Poland - Slaski Stadium (20 March)
· 2009-08-10 - Zagreb, Croatia - Stadium Maksimir (27 March)
· 2009-08-14 - London, England - Wembley Stadium (20 March)
· 2009-08-18 - Glasgow, Scotland - Hampden Park (20 March)
· 2009-08-20 - Sheffield, England - Don Valley Stadium (20 March)
· 2009-08-22 - Cardiff, Wales - Millennium Stadium (20 March)

2nd leg: North American dates

· 2009-09-12 - Chicago, Illinois, USA - Soldier Field (30 March)
· 2009-09-16 - Toronto, Ontario, Canada - Rogers Centre (30 March)
· 2009-09-20 - Boston, Massachusetts, USA - Gillette Stadium (30 March)
· 2009-09-24 - East Rutherford, New Jersey, USA - Giants Stadium (30 March)
· 2009-09-29 - Washington, District of Columbia, USA - FedEx Field (6 April)
· 2009-10-01 - Charlottesville, Virginia, USA - Scott Stadium (4 April)
· 2009-10-03 - Raleigh, North Carolina, USA - Carter-Finley Stadium (6 April)
· 2009-10-06 - Atlanta, Georgia, USA - Georgia Dome (6 April)
· 2009-10-09 - Tampa, Florida, USA - Raymond James Center (18 April)
· 2009-10-12 - Dallas, Texas, USA - New Cowboys Stadium (20 April)
· 2009-10-14 - Houston, Texas, USA - Reliant Stadium (20 April)
· 2009-10-19 - Norman, Oklahoma, USA - Oklahoma Memorial Stadium (4 April)
· 2009-10-20 - Phoenix, Arizona, USA - University of Phoenix Stadium (20 April)
· 2009-10-23 - Las Vegas, Nevada, USA - Sam Boyd Stadium (TBD)
· 2009-10-25 - Los Angeles, California, USA - Rose Bowl (6 April)
· 2009-10-28 - Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada - B.C. Place Stadium (6 April)

The first batch of dates will be announced on March 9

Live Nation’s Chairman of Global Touring, Arthur Fogel, has been talking about the upcoming U2 tour.

“I think fans will be very impressed,” he tells UK trade magazine Music Week. “U2 have always been on the cutting edge in terms of stage design and technology. Performing live is an art form in itself and there is no greater master of that than U2.”

As revealed in their current Hot Press cover story, the band will be playing ‘in the round’ with a 360-production. They’re eschewing indoor arenas, festivals and other ‘flat field’ events in favour of stadiums.

“Given the unique design of the production, it’s mandatory really,” Fogel resumes. “There is no front or back – we’re playing surrounded by the audience.”

As for ticket prices, “There will be an extreme tiering. I’ve always been a proponent of scaling. The notion of single price tickets is not something that I’ve ever embraced but I think that in this particular (economic) climate it’s important to really look at that tiering carefully.”

Music Week also quote Paul McGuinness as stating that details of the world tour will be announced on March 9, with approximately 25 shows in Europe and 25 in North America before Christmas. European ticket sales will commence on March 14 or 15 with the Irish leg expected to comprise of a three-night run in Croke Park on July 24, 25 and 27.

U2’s Bono Previews Innovative “No Line on the Horizon” Tour

After selling out countless arenas this decade, U2 are heading outdoors this year with their first U.S. stadium tour since 1997’s PopMart Tour. The band members, who release No Line on the Horizon on March 3rd, haven’t yet announced dates for the tour or details about what they’ll play. But they hope to keep ticket prices unusually low, and they’re already planning an innovative setup that will allow for 360-degree seating around the stage, which will be moved closer to the center of the field than in any other stadium show. “It’s an engineering feat that creates this real physical proximity to the crowd,” Bono tells Rolling Stone, adding that the band wants to maximize space in the enormous venues to accommodate the many young fans it has made this decade with hits such as “Vertigo.” “We’re going outdoors to try to meet that audience.

“We want to play for each other as much as we want to play for the crowd this time,” Bono adds. “You just don’t know how long you will be going to be doing this. I just sat everyone down the other day, because some concerns about the tour had come up, and nobody wants to be away from their families. I just said,’This is an unbelievable and rare opportunity to be in this band and to play at this level. You don’t know what is around the corner, you don’t know if you will be up for it or the audience will be up for it. Right now, we are perfectly riding across those two thoughts and every single night should be the best night of your life. If not, then we are just the worst of those Seventies dinosaur bands that felt it was enough to just turn up and play and that people were lucky to be in their presence.’ ”

TOUR ANNOUNCEMENT COMING UP

On March 9th, the band will announce details of where and when they'll be hitting the road this year - but dates and venues are yet to be finalised and fans are advised to steer clear of groups claiming to have tickets available now.

Details of countries, cities, venues and dates will be revealed on U2.Com in nine days time and no-one has any tickets yet.

'The tour will be officially announced on March 9th and the schedule is subject to change of date and location till then,' said Paul McGuinness, manager of the band. 'It would be crazy to buy tickets before the announcement on U2.com.'

Arthur Fogel, CEO Global Touring and Chairman Global Music at Live Nation, underlined the advice to fans to steer clear of channels claiming to be selling tickets for the tour.

'The tour has not been announced and no tickets should be purchased at this time. ' he said. 'Fans should beware of unofficial and unscrupulous sellers.'

Bottom line ? Don't take a risk on any tickets until you've seen the real dates announced here, on March 9th.

Exclusive: Paul McGuinness on U2's World Tour

04 Mar 2009

Paul McGuinness has been talking to Hot Press about the imminent announcement of U2's world tour, which is likely to include three Croke Park stop-offs in July.


"This is going to be a very big tour, the biggest shows we've ever done," he reveals. "We're going to play stadiums only. Football stadiums. That excludes, for instance, baseball stadiums because the production that we've designed is 360º. It's a stage with the audience on all sides."

Will the stage be in the centre of the arena?

"Not quite in the centre, it will be towards one end of the field in a typical football stadium, so the places we're playing will be tiered football stadiums; no flat fields, no festivals, no baseball stadiums. Only big, tiered stadiums."

As with previous U2 productions, there's a heavy emphasis on new technology.

"Well, yeah. I mean the engineering to do this, obviously it has to be a freestanding structure that has to support sound, lighting and video. And that's never been done before. Some people have performed in the middle of a field or maybe in a stadium on a one-off basis, but this is a touring production designed by Mark Fischer and Willie Williams, as usual. We've been talking about it for years, and this is the time we're going to do it. It will be necessary to tell people a bit about the production before the tickets go on sale because otherwise they're going to say, 'hold on, that seat is behind the stage'. Now, it's not behind the stage. There is no behind. So we'll be playing to very large capacities and that gives us an opportunity, or we think it's an opportunity, to scale the house in quite a radical way. So I think, when the tour is announced, which will probably be on March 9th, certainly we are going to start in Europe, and basically do six weeks in Europe, take a logistical break and then six weeks in North America. The large capacities give us an opportunity to scale the house and have some seats at very low prices, and there will be higher prices as well. But the breadth of the scaling will be wider than anyone has ever done in our business. That's kinda news."

Asked about all the Croke Park speculation, McGuinness says: "It's always best to know when you are going to announce it, because there are so many things affected by this, like hotels and airlines, and there's speculation on those commodities which have nothing to do with us. So we try to be disciplined about it, otherwise there can be unforeseen circumstances. Also, sometimes with sports facilities that we are looking to use around the world, we have to wait for sports leagues to resolve. Sometimes if a team loses, such-and-such a stadium becomes available. And all those things are a part of the planning so it's better to build up to it."


It's Hot Press' understanding that U2 will initially announce two Croke Park shows on July 24 and 25, with the option of a third on July 27 if, as expected, those sell-out.

Fans hoping for something a little more intimate will be heartened by McGuiness' observation that: "The new O² in Dublin is not what I would call an arena, it's an amphitheatre in layout, but it has the same capacity as an arena, and it's an amazing facility. And this tour is exclusively outdoors, there will be no indoor shows, but I look forward to a tour when we will be indoors again."

The Hot Press Newsdesk

Exclusive: U2 To 'Kiss The Future' On Global Stadium Tour

March 06, 2009 09:00 AM ET
Ray Waddell, Nashville

Kiss The Future, U2's world tour in support of the band's new album "No Line on the Horizon," will play stadiums around the world, beginning June 30 in Barcelona, Billboard can exclusively reveal. Details of the tour will be announced March 9.

It’s a groundbreaking tour with production that includes a 360-degree audience configuration, ambitious staging, and a cylindrical video screen. “We’re very excited about the idea to go on the road with this album,” the Edge says. “It’s an album that I think is going to translate so well to the live context. The songs we’ve tried in rehearsal are sounding fantastic, so that’s got everyone really fired up.”

U2 will be playing in a setting unique among all previous tours, by any artist. The tour will be global and lengthy. U2 will stay in Europe through Aug. 22, then hit American shores on Sept. 12 with a show at Soldier Field in Chicago; they’ll play in North America until Oct. 28 and plan on working the globe until the fall of 2010. In addition to its production firsts, the tour is destined to become one of the highest-grossing tours ever; at $389 million, the band’s 2005-2007 Vertigo tour is second only to the Rolling Stones’ A Bigger Bang trek.

After playing arenas in North America and stadiums elsewhere on their last few tours, U2 will play stadiums everywhere this time out. “This is going to be completely different, and that’s what makes it exciting, finding something new to bring to the touring culture,” says the Edge. “It’s hard to come up with something that’s fundamentally different, but we have, I think, on this tour. Where we’re taking our production will never have been seen before by anybody, and that’s an amazing thing to be able to say. For a band like U2 that really thrive on breaking new ground it’s a real thrill.”

As they have for well over a decade, LiveNation global music chairman Arthur Fogel and his team will produce and promote U2 worldwide. Committing to a global stadium tour is “obviously a major undertaking on a bunch of different levels,” says Fogel. “On the last tour it basically broke down indoors in America and stadiums outside of America. Both shows were pretty different and they were both incredible, but I think the general feeling, and certainly mine, was the experience of U2 in a stadium is special and unique, and it would be great for North America to experience that the way the rest of the world did the last time around.”

Playing in a 360 configuration will increase the capacity by about 15%-20%, depending on the stadium. The configuration opens up myriad opportunities for scaling ticket prices, an important consideration for Fogel and the band. The top ticket price will be slightly higher than last time and the bottom price will be lower, with the floor seats — the closest to the stage — the lowest priced. In fact, playing larger capacity venues allows for more conservative pricing overall. Field level is going to be $55, and there will be 10,000 tickets a show, every show, at $30, Fogel says. The price points are $250, $90-$95, depending on the market; $55, and $30.

On-sales will begin in Europe in mid-March, and North American on-sales will start in late March/early April. U2 will also resurrect it's random upgrade program first seen on Elevation in 2001, where random fans purchasing GA tickets will be moved closest to the stage.

The basic layout of the tour is Euro July/Aug., America Sept.-Oct, a total of 40-45 shows this year; more stadiums in America in June/July next year, then Aug/Sept in Europe, then tentatively South America in the fall of 2010 for potentially as many as 90-100 shows over the next two years.

This will be the first tour under U2’s 12-year multi-rights deal with Live Nation, though the band’s relationship with Fogel dates back to a show at the El Mocambo in Toronto in 1979. “Arthur and I are great friends and I’ve been very interested in the Live Nation project for years now, and we’ve been very supportive of it,” says U2 manager Paul McGuinness. “We obviously intend to go on performing for a long time to come and that’s what the deal reflects. U2 always had parallel careers as recording artists and a touring act and it was always fundamental to our way of thinking that the two should be complimentary.”

http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/exclusive-u2-to-kiss-the-future-on-global-1003948418.story

06 March, 2009
Tour News
Dates for the U2360° Tour will be announced exclusively here on U2.com at 8am Dublin time, this Monday, March 9th.