by Louis (People Get Ready guy)

Here’s my really long story of playing People Get Ready with U2 in Chicago on Monday. If ANYONE has any pic of me on stage, please email me at louischoi@hotmail.com. I will happily pay you for costs of reprints, shipping, etc. Links to pics are awesome too!:

To start things off, right before Garbage came on, my girlfriend and I came up with an idea to maybe get up on stage. We were going to make a sign that said: PICK ME – PEOPLE GET READY. Then, just as she was about to start that, I said, hey why not just put the chords of the song. So that’s what we did. On a 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper, she wrote: C Am F – PEOPLE GET READY. Then Garbage came on, and I folded the paper and put it in my pocket.

Then during New year’s day, Bono was standing right in front of us (inside the heart near the tip on stage left), and I put up the sign. He glanced at it, and read it, but didn’t acknowledge it any more than that, but we KNEW he had read it.

Then during Angel of Harlem, Bono and the Edge were at the tip, and Bono walked over to where I was, and read the sign again. This time, he made a face that said, “No way, I don’t think so.” It was a really amusing face. So I put away my sign, but I knew at that point that I was going up on stage, because U2’s security guy came over and asked me if I could really play the guitar. I swore that I could, and he said something like ok, good luck. Anyways, near the end of the song, Bono came by again, and I just said, “Please.” Again, he went away to the tip to finish the song. Then bono came over again, and beckoned to me to be pulled up. The security guy pulled me up. Now I was walking to the tip, with Bono’s hand around my shoulder.

When we got to the tip, Bono asked me if i could really play. I said, yup. I tried to prove it by showing him the picks that I carry around in my wallet, but the picks would fall out. Bono said, “I don’t need your cash, you already gave me enough.” That’s when Dallas Schoo came by with Edge’s acoustic. He also handed me this really cool U2 pick. I strapped on the guitar, and showed Bono the chords to prove I could play it. All this time, angle of harlem was still on its outro, so that’s the rhythm I had in my head. Right after it ended, Bono told me to start. I accidentally started playing PGR to the rhythm of AOH! Bono and Edge looked at each other with a look of “Oh no, Not again . . .” in a funny way. So I stopped, got the correct rhythm in my head, and started.

Once I got started, and Bono started singing, they motioned for me to follow them to the main stage. Bono was ahead, and I was walking next to the Edge, who was smiling and winked once. We all strutted to the stage left raised portion of the main stage. Bono was adlibbing the lyrics. The noise level from the main stage was really low. It almost sounded like i was playing in a small room.

The view from the stage was amazing. Everyone was standing and cheering, smiling, etc. I took it all in, and thought, so this is what it feels like to play in front of 20,000 people. . .

For the last verse, Bono sang: “People get ready, Haven’t I seen you before, aren’t you the guitarist from the Smashing Pumpkins?” This got many people confused as to whether I really was James Iha or not!

Finally, to end the song, Larry came in with the drums. I picked up the head of the guitar towards the sky, and hit the strings hard to finish the song. Bono came and gave me a hug, I gave back the guitar, unfortunately, and he said thank you, to which i said, no thank YOU! I turned around to go back down the heart, and the applause was tremendous. I got back to the point of the heart where I was before, and the security guy helped me back over. He shook my hand, and said he was very impressed. (It is only three chords, though, nothing special.) The people around the tip of the heart all came by and shook my hand and stuff. They were yelping and going crazy! It was awesome.

P.S. Thanks to the ladies who let me and my girlfriend store our stuff in their car. We had locked the keys in the car earlier in the day! THANK YOU!

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