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  2. Love when this topic comes up just so I can call out the stupid fucking heart-sitters on that dvd

    Same people that left the I&E shows at intermission to line up for the next night.

    Enjoy yer starbucks checkins, hosers
  3. Originally posted by MattG:Love when this topic comes up just so I can call out the stupid fucking heart-sitters on that dvd

    Same people that left the I&E shows at intermission to line up for the next night.

    Enjoy yer starbucks checkins, hosers
    At the intermission!? Must be a joke right? I always thought they left around the encore (it's criminal either way)
  4. Originally posted by MattG:Love when this topic comes up just so I can call out the stupid fucking heart-sitters on that dvd

    Same people that left the I&E shows at intermission to line up for the next night.

    Enjoy yer starbucks checkins, hosers
    Eh...

    U2 staff pulling people ahead in the line for arbitrary reasons is a shitty thing.

    U2 fans skipping out on part of a show because they want to start the next line and feel like they need to be in the front all the time is a stupid thing.

    U2 fans creating scam line check-ins as a shitty thing.

    I guess I'd recommend against conflating shitty vs stupid things. Stupid things affect yourself negatively, shitty things affect others.
  5. The reason for pulling fans wasn't because they were "more attractive" as they like to spout, its because they are exactly the type of people I'm referencing who were constantly, night-after-night, in the front row.

    The band wanted spontaneous energy at the edge of the stage when they were spending a shit-ton of money, riding on a couple of shows, to film a document of their tour. They're performers and if its better for their performance to "rig" the crowd so some unexpecting folks will see it from the front row, that's fine with me. I work with artists that hold seats in their front row for this exact reason on every night of their tour. U2 did not have that luxury with a GA crowd and made a choice. From my understanding, nobody in that group was shut out of the heart (the most coveted spot in the entire arena) and hardly any - if any at all - had not already seen the show from the rail. No one was truly robbed of the experience as they claim; they're intent on doing whatever it takes to not share the experience whatsoever, and then whine when someone forces them to.

    U2 were so conscious and aware of this issue that they took direct action to mitigate it on the next tour with their ticket scanning system.

    I think the group that collectively complains about what happened that night, and that actively tried to ruin the filming of a U2 DVD (talk about shitty things!) is so far out of line and has no maturity or perspective on the matter at all.
  6. If it was such an issue then they should have done it for the whole tour. It screwed over both the problematic fans you mentioned... and also any regular fan doing their time in line.

    I was a new 15 year old fan in 2001. Saw a few shows, and did the all night all day GA line experience for 2 shows. I was a bouncy exuberant fan (once upon a time). Under the model they implemented, some random fan showing up much later fan have been bumped up way before me, that's a shitty move.

    I hate that I'm defending the crazy GA fans, because many of them are assholes. So don't take it as me defending them. But I do think U2 staff screwed the pooch in Boston 2001.
  7. The Boston shows were like the second time in...15 years? that they played somewhere four shows in a row, over the course of like a week - the only other one being Chicago like a month beforehand. There's no way they could have known it was going to be that big of an issue when they booked the shoot that they'd be seeing literally the same faces every night. It also wasn't really a model they implemented...it was reactionary for a specific purpose of filming a tour document and making an attempt to increase the band's spontaneity.

    Having read the actual people involved's personal accounts on Interference and wherever else, it does not seem like many people like yourself were cheated out of a front-row experience. They seem mostly hurt by being targeted, and, to be blunt about it...they were. It was specifically to give other people a chance they wouldn't have had because of the crazy fans. If a bunch of random people got shoved out of line so a bunch of model-looking types could be the faces in the front row for the shoot, I would be on your side - but that's not what happened.

    I just don't see the situation as one where U2's staff really screwed anyone as badly as they claim.

    You can argue that any other artist that holds the seats and never gives you the opportunity to buy them is also screwing you because you don't get a fair chance to buy the seat. They may have made the decision at what's perceived as "the wrong time" (what's the right time? the issue is happening, its either solve it or dont?) but it got blown entirely out of proportion and the heart-sitting is a blatant example of how stubborn and immature they took it.

    Not coming at you with a pitchfork, hoserama, this is a good topic to beat around every once in awhile.
  8. I sort of agree with both sides. Another thing to discuss would be: if the band wanted to feed off the energy of fresh, unknown fans (which is alright)... why not do it at every show? Why only in the gig(s) that were being recorded? Are some gigs more important than others?
  10. I'm not really going to defend the heart-sitting, because I suspect it was made of the crazy GA fans that I can't stand. But setting aside, I do understand their frustration that a new system, for one night only, was implemented without any sort of prior notification.

    With their line efforts on 6/6/2001, some "regular" fans must have gotten screwed over. They just don't complain as loudly as all of the rest on the message boards. But I can imagine it must have been frustrating.

    If it was such a big deal, they should have just completely randomized the line. Or kept it going throughout the tour. Or given the fans upfront a bunch of coffee laced with speed to keep them bouncing.

    It was a one-time call, under the stresses of wanting to deliver an enhanced product for the filming, that didn't work out. They've never done it again, so clearly it didn't work the way they wanted. I liked the randomness in 2005, but then they went back to regular GA in 2009...and then the stadium GA mess just got out of hand.
  11. De facto YES of course, but definitely not in the words of the band. "We try to offer all our fans the same experience", "we want all of our fans to get the maximum", bla bla.
  12. Originally posted by LikeASong:[..]
    De facto YES of course, but definitely not in the words of the band. "We try to offer all our fans the same experience", "we want all of our fans to get the maximum", bla bla.
    My favorite use of that was their excuse for not having an A/B setlist in 2015. They booked all their shows in pairs (initially), talked about having two setlists....but then "Oh we wouldn't want to spoil fans going to only one"

    Meaning--too much work to work up another setlist in rehearsals.