Today, U2 performed in St Louis. They were meant to play here in September last year, but that show was cancelled when protests broke out in St Louis and there were insufficient security personnel available for the concert.

The band performed at least two songs during today's soundcheck. One of them, Vertigo, was in Tulsa's setlist two nights ago. The other, New Year's Day, is more of a surprise: no fan had previously heard it in rehearsals. It was, of course, performed at every show last year.

The early part of the main set had the order slightly rearranged from Tulsa, which allowed New Year's Day to slot in for its tour debut. During its intro, and also at the start of I Will Follow, Bono apologised to the crowd for the cancellation of last year's show.

All Because of You was performed again tonight after making its live return in Tulsa. City of Blinding Lights and Vertigo have been live standards since their release, but no other song from How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb has been played at consecutive gigs since 2006. Miracle Drug is the only other HTDAAB song played during the intervening years, and its two performances on Innocence + Experience in 2015 were not at consecutive gigs.

The sequence at the end of the first set dropped two songs that have previously been standard here: Song for Someone and Raised By Wolves. This is the first show on the IE and EI Tours to not feature either song. The samples and explosions that were previously used as the intro for Raised By Wolves were kept, but this time used to introduce Until the End of the World.

A third song in the Tulsa setlist did not show up tonight: Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses. This meant that the encore began with One. The removal of 3 songs with only the addition of New Year's Day means that this show clocked in at a total of 25 songs.

Bono snippeted a couple of lines of The Showman as an intro to The Best Thing. This is that song's first live outing of any form, though it was rehearsed extensively in full during last month's rehearsals in Laval.

Although Bono made multiple references to the last-minute cancellation of the 2017 St Louis show, the band did not insert any Joshua Tree songs as a nod to what local fans did not get to experience. It might be fair enough for the band to say that they did the Joshua Tree Tour last year and that this tour should focus on other songs (and dropping Streets proves that nothing is sacred and U2 can play a great show without dependence on any particular track). But multiple tunes from other albums that were played every night last year are still in the setlist, and for Tulsa and St Louis the absence of Joshua Tree songs is more glaring than for other cities: Tulsa because literally no Joshua Tree song has ever been performed in that city, and St Louis because of the cancellation.

The full setlist was:

1. Love Is All We Have Left
2. The Blackout
3. Lights Of Home
4. Beautiful Day / Many Rivers To Cross (snippet)
5. I Will Follow / Mother (snippet)
6. New Year's Day
7. All Because Of You
8. The Ocean
9. Iris (Hold Me Close)
10. Cedarwood Road
11. Sunday Bloody Sunday
12. Psalm 23 (snippet) / Until the End of the World / Love, Reign O'er Me (snippet)
(Intermission - Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me)
13. Elevation
14. Vertigo
15. Desire Hollywood Mix / Burning Love (snippet)
16. Acrobat
17. The Showman (Little More Better) (snippet) / You're The Best Thing About Me Full band acoustic
18. Staring at the Sun Bono and Edge acoustic
19. Pride (In the Name of Love)
20. Get Out Of Your Own Way
21. American Soul
22. City of Blinding Lights

encore(s):

23. One
24. Love Is Bigger Than Anything in Its Way
25. 13 (There Is A Light)

All details for this show including reviews, videos and photos can be found here.

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Posted on May 05, 2018 by Axver