Interference.com hosting Vegas Vertigo Party...

Interference.com will be hosting a Vegas Vertigo party prior to the Las Vegas Vertigo shows. All proceeds from the party will benefit the African Wellness Fund. Save the date and sign up today! It's only 5 bucks and it's for a good cause.

The Ethereal Connection re-launches website...

We know, we know.. you didn't know it was gone! But seriously, The Ethereal Connection is a fascinating site that takes a look at the parallels between U2 and the Beatles. We happened to stumble across the site and thought that you might find it interesting as well. The Ethereal Connection dissects the histories of both bands and compares them album by album. Was the cover of 'Pop' deliberately setup similarly to 'Let it Be'? The similarities (if you want to see them) are uncanny. We all know that the Beatles have inspired many bands. But have U2 consciously or subconsciously imitated the Fab Four's 'formula'? We'll let you decide.

A couple of excerpts from the site:

The Ethereal Connection is a synthesis of U2 and The Beatles. It derives from an experience that took place in 1994 when my friend Juan Raydan and myself, sat down to relate to each other the histories of both our favorite bands, his The Beatles, mine U2. Juan was born in the early fifties and I was born in the early seventies, so both of us became die-hard teenager fans during the blooming years of The Beatles and U2. We had a heartfelt meeting with the intention of transmitting to each other the experience of our two different generations. We did it by chronologically arranging the album covers of both bands passing one by one while the stories of each album were told; first Juan with The Beatles, and second me with U2. As it soon turned out, it seemed that the generations were not so different after all. When he started talking about Sergeant Pepper I was impressed. He was describing the same experience I had with Achtung Baby. The ironic characters, the color explosion, the sonic surprise.

----

The element that links How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb with Let It Be is the fact that both are "returning home" albums. Writer Devin McKinney comments in his book Magic Circles: "They spent all of January rehearsing and recording songs for their next album, an album advertised with the tagline -The Beatles as Nature Intended- Get Back was its symbolic title: the songs would be rock n' roll primitive, free of overdubs and post psychedelic fairy dust…And basic meant basic. Even the White Album songs hadn't gotten far enough" . In the same manner, with All That You Can't Leave Behind U2 went back to basics, but with How To Dismantle an Atomic Bomb they went even further into their origins.
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And the connection between these two albums goes deeper having to do with the Atomic Bomb and all that its creation implies. In 1992, U2 joined Greenpeace in the known assault on The Sellafield Nuclear Plant, to denounce radioactive contamination and plans for the construction of a new nuclear facility. To ask for "HELP" concerning this matter they emulated The Beatles HELP cover. This strengthens the connection between these two albums because of the fact that "The Unforgettable Fire" is strongly linked with the nuclear theme: "The Unforgettable Fire" was the title of a drawings exhibition by survivors of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki Atomic Bombings. After attending it U2 was greatly affected and decided to use that title to name the new album (and song).

Intrigued? We thought so. Take a few minutes by yourself and take a journey through The Ethereal Connection (cue Twilight Zone music)...

The Rolling Stone Interview: Bono

A shot of the new Rolling Stones magazine featuring, well, errr... you get the picture...

thanks to Lila64 for the link!

U2 Vertigo Tour Setlist 10.19.2005 // MCI Center, Washington, DC USA

"Did you come here to play Jesus?..."

Well, Gorman did! With fellow U2 fan, Ramblin' Rose, at tonight's DC show with a cell phone handy, Gorman was able to provide a live feed of the show to a capacity crowd of 64 lucky people over at Interference.com. Ahhh... the miracles of technology!

If you didn't catch the feed, here's tonight's setlist, as reported by fellow Interferencer... Lila64...

Main Set:

City Of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
Elevation
I Will Follow
Electric Co. / Send In The Clowns Snippet / See Me Feel Me...(Snippet)
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For / In A Little While (Snippet)
Beautiful Day / Many Rivers To Cross (Snippet)
Miracle Drug
Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own / Torna A Surriento (Snippet)
Love & Peace Or Else
Sunday Bloody Sunday / Father Abraham (Snippet)
Bullet The Blue Sky / Hands That Built America (Snippet) / When Johnny Comes Marching Home (Snippet)
Miss Sarajevo
HUMAN RIGHTS VIDEO
Pride (In The Name Of )
Where The Streets Have No Name
One / Old Man River (Snippet)

Encore(s):

First Time
Stuck In A Moment You Can't Get Out Of
With Or Without You
All Because Of You
Yahweh
40

Bono and GWB have lunch at the White House Ellipse Oval Office...

WASHINGTON - In town for a concert, U2 rock star Bono was invited to lunch Wednesday with the president. White House president secretary Scott McClellan said the meeting at the executive residence would be a follow-up on talks he had with President Bush in July at the G-8 summit in Scotland.
"They had a very good discussion about some of our common priorities," McClellan said. "Both share a deep commitment to combating AIDS, preventing malaria and expanding trade to lift people out of poverty."McClellan said Bono also planned to meet with National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley later in the day, before U2's concert at the MCI Center.
The spokesman laughingly told reporters that Bush was not planning to attend the concert.

U2 Vertigo Tour Setlist 10.17.2005 // Wachovia Center, Philadelphia, PA

Main Set:

City Of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
Elevation
I Will Follow
The Electric Co. / Bullet With Butterfly Wings (snippet)
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Beautiful Day / Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (snippet) / Blackbird (snippet)
Miracle Drug
Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own
Love And Peace Or Else
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Bullet The Blue Sky / The Hands That Built America (snippet) / When Johnny Comes Marching Home (snippet)
Miss Sarajevo
Pride (In The Name Of Love)
Where The Streets Have No Name
One

Encore(s):

Walk On
Fast Cars
People Get Ready (with Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa)
With Or Without You

All Because Of You
40

Image of DVD cover hits the net...

Here is an image of the cover of the Live from Chicago DVD to be released on Nov. 15.

U2 Vertigo Tour Setlist 10.10.2005 // Madison Square Garden, New York City

Main Set:

City of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
Elevation
I Will Follow
The Electric Co. // In A Little While (snippet)
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Beautiful Day
Miracle Drug
Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own
Love and Peace or Else
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Bullet the Blue Sky
Happy Birthday to Luciano Pavaratti
Miss Sarajevo
Pride
Where the Streets Have No Name
One - Ol' Man River

Encore(s):

Zoo Station
The Fly
With or Without You
All Because of You
Yahweh
Bad
40

The Vertiblog goes stealth at MSG today...

Today we took a tour of MSG and thought you might be interested in some of the pictures we took. This is a view from one of the luxury suites...

The highlight of the tour was getting to go backstage and into the locker room areas. As we entered the hallway we immediately knew we might see some interesting things...

About halfway down the hallway there was a hallway blocked by a black curtain, but the signs gave away what was behind it...

This is what was behind the black curtain. We didn't know that U2 had a 'quiet room'.. must be a place for pre-show relaxation. We also didn't see a menu for the Band Dining Area that you can see in the foreground.

This was on the wall on the opposite side of the black curtain, detailing the security passes and where you could go with each pass (we blurred out the details for, well, security purposes...)

Opposite the black curtain (walking away from band dining area) there was a hallway with more U2 personnel. Paul McGuinness, band manager, and Arthur Fogel, president of Clear Channel Touring both had dressing rooms and offices down this hallway.

Here is Paul McGuinness' dressing room.

And this is the hallway leading out to the Garden floor.

And this is the hallway leading out to the Garden floor and to the ellipse! These are the only pictures we could get away with taking without being too obvious... hope you enjoyed them!

MSG TShirt

MSG T Shirt

MSG TShirt - Front

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In the year two thousand.... in the year two thousAAAAND...

Edge donned the stage props for Conan O'Brien's infamous 'In the Year 2000' skit...

Testing Uno, Dos, Tres, Catorce...

Vertiblog will be Audioblogging from MSG on 10/7 and 10/8...

We're all set up and should be able to post some sounds from MSG as it happens. Stay tuned!

I'll be making a test post just to make sure everything's operational...

U2 Vertigo Tour Setlist 10.4.2005 // TD Banknorth Garden, Boston, MA

Main Set:

City of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
Elevation
Electric Co. // Send in the Clowns (snippet)
The Ocean
Crumbs from Your Table
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Beautiful Day
Miracle Drug
Sometimes You Can't Make it On Your Own // Black Hills of Dakota (snippet)
Love and Peace or Else
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Bullet the Blue Sky // Please (snippet) // Hands that Built America (snippet) // When Johnny Comes Marching Home (snippet)
Miss Sarajevo
Human Rights Thingy
Pride (in the name of love)
Where the Streets Have No Name
One

Encore:

The First Time
Stuck In a Moment You Can't Get Out Of
With Or Without You
All Because of You
'40'

U2 Advertised as Special Guest on Conan O'Brien...

U2 has been seen in television advertisements as being a special guest on this Thursday's (10/6) Conan O'Brien Show.

UPDATE:

NEW YORK (AP) - In his 12 years in charge of booking musical guests on Conan O'Brien's "Late Night," Jim Pitt always listed U2 and Johnny Cash as the dream artists he'd tried but never succeeded in getting.He lost his chance with the late Cash, but the U2 dream is coming true Thursday in a major way.O'Brien will turn over his entire show to the band, which is in New York for seven sold-out engagements at Madison Square Garden."We were able to offer them something to feel enough like an event for them to do the show," Pitt said. "It's basically 'Late Night with Conan O'Brien,' the U2 edition."The NBC show has never before devoted itself entirely to a musical guest, although it gave major time a few years back to a holiday appearance by bandleader Max Weinberg's other employer, Bruce Springsteen.O'Brien's a big U2 fan, and made a personal connection by talking at length with Bono during breaks in rehearsals for the band's "Saturday Night Live" appearance last season, Pitt said.It may be a nervous time for Bono, who is nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for his work in trying to ease Third World poverty. People who watch the Nobel closely list the lead singer as one of the favorites. The winner is expected to be named Friday.The band is expected to perform three songs and be interviewed by O'Brien.Pitt is not pushing for any material in particular."When U2 decides they want to come on the show for an hour, you don't get too picky about what they play," he said.

U2 Vertigo Tour Setlist 10.3.2005 // TD Banknorth Garden, Boston, MA

Main Set:

City of Blinding Lights
Vertigo
Elevation // Bullet with Butterfly Wings (snippet)
Electric Co.
The Ocean
Beautiful Day // So Many Rivers to Cross (snippet)
I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
Miracle Drug
Sometimes You Can't Make it On Your Own // Black Hills of Dakota (snippet)
Love and Peace or Else
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Bullet the Blue Sky // Hands That Built America (snippet) // When Johnny Comes Marching Home (snippet)
Miss Sarajevo
(Human Rights Thingy)
Pride (in the name of Love)
Where the Streets Have No Name
One // MLK (snippet)

Encore:

The First Time
Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses
With or Without You

All Because of You
Yahweh
'40'