by Lovorko

Longtime U2 fan. First U2 concert. I wasn't disappointed, to say the least. What an experience.
The Vienna gig was special because it occured on the same day as the Live 8 festival, on which U2 participated. The band was late for an hour. An announcer came about 20 minutes before the gig had started, telling us it's going to be a «magical night».
He was right.
Great beginning featuring Vertigo, I Will Follow culminated in a fantastic performance of The Electric Co.(my favorite song from Boy), featuring energetic guitarplaying by The Edge and some great singing by Bono(snippets of Smashing Pumpkins' Bullet With Butterfly Wings and The Who's I Can See For Miles were heard). Bono's voice was tremendous during the whole gig. It was like he was 20 years younger. The sound was not so good at places – the guitar was too loud and sometimes you could hardly tell what Bono was saying, but most of the time it was great. It got better with time. Although the majority of the crowd wasn't familiar with Electric Co., the song lifted the gig to another level, just to see it go higher and higher with Elevation(don't like the song, but I have to admit this version is very amusing), New Year's Day(flawless), I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For(classic singalong) and All I Want Is You(Bono brought a girl on the stage; the place erupted).
New songs sounded fantastic. City of Blinding Lights had the same crowd reception as the classics, Miracle Drug sounded amazing(extended middle part), Sometimes was very emotional and then came the showstopper; Love and Peace or Else easily became one of the band's finest live songs(comparable to Until the End of the World, for example – great riff, explosive ending – seeing Bono on drums was genius).
Continuing the War trilogy with Sunday Bloody Sunday and Bullet the Blue Sky, one of the highlights of the evening came in the form of Running To Stand Still; a beautiful ballad about heroin addiction, dedicated to Aung San Suu Kyi, which also featured a Walk On snippet. Pride, Streets(fantastic, unforgettable) and One ended the main set.
I was going frantic with Zoo Station(first U2 song I ever heard) and The Fly(my favorite song...ever), but the crowd reception was incredibly weak. That was actually my major disappointment in the crowd – these fantastic songs deserved much better atmosphere (instead, people in front of me sat down for the first time). Unfortunantely – no Mysterious Ways, but With or Without You(it will never sound as good as it did until 1993, but at least Larry is drumming like he should drum on the song again). All Because of You was great, acoustic Yahweh was nice. It ended with the second version of Vertigo that was much better than the first(feautring extrordinary lightning), but I'd prefer another ending(a song that we didn't hear on the concert, for example).
Anyway, best concert I've ever been to. I could be bitching about my favorites that weren't played(ACROBAT! Why won't they play this gem?), but really...how could they do wrong at choosing songs? Fantastic gig, great tour, amazing band. Nothing more to it.

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