"Exactly 7,251 people were the ones who had the privilege of being the first to see a tour totally different from everything established. A show that broke schemes and that dictated what the future of concerts would be like from then on. Those people had the privilege of being at the first show of U2's ZooTV tour.
A show that, from the setlist, is impressive. Son 8, EIGHT!!! new songs followed by the album Achtung, Baby, which they clearly liked a lot and the public too, and since U2 was in the mood of discarding the old and trying new things, nothing better than playing practically the entire album from the beginning. And the 9th song was also "new" to the Americans, who didn't get a chance to see the 1989 Lovetown tour.
We're talking about live debuts from Zoo Station, The Fly, Even Better Than The Real Thing, Mysterious Ways, One, Until The End Of The World, Who's Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses, Tryin' to Throw Your Arms Around The World, Ultraviolet and Love Is Blindness.
It was also the first time that U2 had covered Satellite Of Love in its entirety, although Bono had sung it several times during Bad in the 1980s.
Speaking of Bad, that was the first "known" song of the concert... and it's just the ELEVENTH! After a whole section of the new album and the mini acoustic section, came the “emblematic” section, with 4 from The Joshua Tree and the aforementioned from The Unforgettable Fire. Bullet The Blue Sky is even rockier than on the Joshua Tree and Lovetown tours and features a longer solo. Running To Stand Still is totally different, no piano, more enigmatic.
And already in the Encore we find climax after climax. Desire (also a US first) has completely different guitar effects, and during the song, Bono plays the role of Mirrorball Man, a parody of American televangelists. That is the second character of the night, after the emblematic The Fly.
This audio was created (as usual) by our friend Dafy, who used 2 different sources to create a good quality Matrix. And to add insult to injury, there is also a VIDEO version of the show. Some hero of the early 90s played it with a video camera (and they were big at the time), so we have a visual version along with the audio one that U2Chile delivers.
This was the beginning of one of the most spectacular tours for both U2 and music in general. The first of 156 shows across 4 continents, from February 1992 to November 1993, with opening acts such as the Pixies, The Fatima Mansions, The Sugarcubes, Pearl Jam, PJ Harvey, and Big Audio Dynamite II".
We hope you enjoy it in this #AchtungBaby30 celebration!
PS: Beware Who's Gonna Ride…, the best version of the song by far!
Atte: www.u2chile.net