U2 at Glastonbury 2011

Before I start I want to say that I’m going to steer clear of the tax avoidance issue. This Blog post is about the band, its music and the performance from last night.

I think this year’s choice of headliners is a bit poor. Coldplay will put a good show on but are a very conservative, risk free and, dare I say, slightly boring choice. Beyonce at Glastonbury just seems like an incredibly strange choice and doesn’t fit with my idea of what a Glastonbury headliner should be (it’s cruel but I would love to see her pelted with mud). The first headliner of the weekend though was the musical money making machine that is U2.

After last years no show U2 finally headlined a rain soaked Glastonbury. I’m not at Glastonbury this year so I can only give my opinion on their performance from the point of view of watching it on the television. I’m not in the U2 hater’s brigade but I’m not a big fan of them either so I’m exactly the sort of person they needed to win over.

My initial impression was that Bono looked nervous during the first couple of songs. Once he realised the crowd weren’t booing and throwing mud at him he seemed to settle down a bit and enjoy himself. The opening salvo was actually quite strong with hits taken mainly from the Achtung Baby era played against a backdrop of Zoo TV type video screen graphics. Things then settled down but only ‘One’, ‘Streets Have No Name’ and ‘I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For’ got the crowd singing. One of the strongest U2 songs is ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’ and it should have been a highlight but it just felt a bit flat and lifeless. I did enjoy ‘Elevation’ but ‘Vertigo’ felt a bit forced.

The encore was a huge disappointment as they had used up all the most well know hits that are needed for a memorable finale. ‘With or Without You’ worked but ‘Moment of Surrender’ was lost on the crowd. ‘Out of Control’ couldn’t save them by this point and the set ended on a bit of a dour note.

Bono tried his best not to be a pretentious twat but he is one and he can’t hide it for long. His Jerusalem made me cringe with embarrassment. The Edge gave his all but couldn’t hide the fact that it’s all sound effect peddles and computer programmes. Andy Clayton and Larry Mullen were as tight and professional as we have come to expect and managed to hold the sound together.

U2 were never going to stir the emotions of a Glastonbury crowd in the same way as say Blur did a couple of years earlier. The hits are popular but the fact of the matter is that U2 rely on the big stage sets and video screens to mask much that is mediocre.

There were some good points last night but not enough to make it a triumph for U2. Perhaps if the weather had been better the crowd might have been a bit more up for it but I doubt the music would have lifted them to any great degree. I give U2 at Glastonbury a score of 6/10. Not bad but not great either.