It was 20 Years ago Today.....

Well not quite today (9th March 1987 to be precise), that U2 released their 5th albumn - The Joshua Tree, which is still probably the best albumn they have written to date. It is also 20 years ago that I first managed to get tickets to see them play live, (after several years of trying), at the old Wembley Stadium, with the Pogues and Lou Reed in support.

After the trauma of our coach breaking down on the way (and fear of missing the gig altogether), it turned out to be a rather excellent day, and out of the hundreds of concerts I have seen, it still probably remains the best I have been to. It was that good I can remember the set list (see below), and recall that they included Help by The Beatles within their performance. This leads me to ponder that if The Beatles had managed to keep going for as long as U2 have (nearly 30 years now) without falling apart due to the excesses of a rock and roll lifetsyle, then perhaps they also could have ended up being as good!


Saturday, June 13th 1987 - U2 Live at Wembley Stadium, The Joshua Tree Tour
1. Stand By Me
2. Pride (In The Name Of Love)
3. I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For
4. MLK
5. The Unforgettable Fire
6. Sunday Bloody Sunday
7. Exit / Riders On The Storm (snippet) / Van Morrison's Gloria (snippet)
8. In God's Country
9. C'mon Everybody
10. Help
11. Bad / Walk On The Wild Side (snippet)
12. October
13. New Year's Day
14. I Will Follow
15. Gloria

encore(s):
16. Where The Streets Have No Name
17. Bullet The Blue Sky / The Battle Hymn Of The Republic (snippet)
18. Running To Stand Still
19. With Or Without You / Shine Like Stars (snippet) / Love Will Tear Us Apart (snippet)
20. Party Girl
21. 40

Linkin Park - In The End

New Blog Features

You may or may not have noticed that I have made some changes to my blog over the past few days, including making the photos section easier to navigate to, as well as adding a 'featured video', which plays at the top of the main page after clicking the link. I'll change this fairly regularly, or when I get bored with whith the current selection. Currently showing Linkin Park - What I've Done (not the best track they have written, however not bad either).
Usually around now I post an update on how the day's dragon boat practice session has gone, however as I have written on this quite a lot recently I will spare you the full vesrion of the events. I will highlight though that the Police have now split from our training session as the HKADBA are a bit too extreme for their liking. Today's paddling included the advance technique of switching up on to one knee at full speed (which takes some doing - trust me), and finished off with some 'speed' trials, the last of which saw us hitting 97 strokes in 1 minute from a standing start. To put that into perspective, that is hitting 2 strokes a second as you speed up. Try sitting in your chair and paddling through the air at 2 a second, never mind through water, and see how hard it is (although I suggest chosing a moment when no one is likely to see what you are doing). The morning ended with us being advised by our drill seargant that as from next week the training will start to become hard (!), focusing on anaerobic exercise. No alcohol is allowed from now on (you would spill it otherwise), and you must advise the leader if you are taking any medicines or if you are feeling under the weather as apparently this increases your chances of collapsing during the session (read previous post 'A Whole World of Pain' - no wonder nobody paid too much attention at the time!).

Black Holes, Revelations and Hysteria - Muse live in Hong Kong

Well, excellent performance from Muse last night in Hong Kong.

Fantastic set, starting with Take a Bow and finishing off with Nights of Cydonia (my favourite of the night), only dissapointment was that they did not play Absolution.

The crowd was the liveliest I have seen in over 9 years of going to concerts in Hong Kong and even had us jumping around a bit (not like me at all...). The Pics posted were taken with my new Dopod PDA phone, so please excuse the poor quality. As you can see this appears all the rage at gigs nowadays, with people photographing or recording almost the entire set on their mobiles or cameras (check out the link to You Tube below).

As for my mobile I have now figured out how to lock the keypad as during the excitement of last night I managed (without knowing it at the time), to connect to the internet, reject 2 calls and phone Reedy Boy back in the UK treating him to 3 mins of the concert (sorry fella!).

Well worth seeing if you get the chance and certainly worthy of the accolades they are currently enjoying (best live band - Brit Awards, best British Band - NME Awards etc).

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=muse+%26+hong+kong

U2 at Saitama

Hello, Hello, we're at a place called Tokyo!
I have uploaded some photos taken last year during the U2 Vertigo 06 tour at Saitama Arena. Great tickets with access to the restricted area at the front. Great show, from Arcade Fire's Wake Up to the last bars of Vertigo during the encore. Also fantastic to hear Out of Control, the first time I have seen them play it live.

Below is a link to videos posted on You Tube from the Japan leg of the Vertigo 06 Tour. We went on 4th December 2006.

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=u2+%26+saitama