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On this day, 18 August 1993, Irish rock giants U2 played Cardiff’s Arms Park as part of their Zoo TV Tour. Support for the day was provided by Utah Saints and Stereo MCs.
Staged in support of their 1991 album Achtung Baby, the tour visited arenas and stadiums from 1992 to 1993. It was intended to mirror the group's new musical direction on Achtung Baby.
In contrast to U2's austere stage setups from previous tours, the Zoo TV Tour was an elaborately staged multimedia spectacle, satirising television and media oversaturation by attempting to instill "sensory overload" in its audience.
To escape their reputation for being earnest and overly serious, U2 embraced a more lighthearted and self-deprecating image on tour. Zoo TV and Achtung Baby were central to the group's 1990s reinvention.
The tour's concept was inspired by disparate television programming, coverage of the Gulf War, the desensitising effect of mass media, and "morning zoo" radio shows.
The stages featured dozens of large video screens that showed visual effects, video clips, and flashing text phrases, along with a lighting system partially made of Trabant automobiles.
The shows incorporated channel surfing, prank calls, video confessionals, a belly dancer, and live satellite transmissions with war-torn Sarajevo.
On stage, Bono portrayed several characters he conceived, including the leather-clad egomaniac "The Fly", the greedy televangelist "Mirror Ball Man", and the devilish "MacPhisto".
In contrast to other U2 tours, each of the Zoo TV shows opened with six to eight consecutive new songs before older material was played.
Setlist:
Zoo Station
The Fly
Even Better Than The Real Thing
Mysterious Ways
One / Hear Us Coming (snippet) / Unchained Melody (snippet)
Until the End of the World
New Year's Day
Numb
Babyface
Angel of Harlem
Dancing Queen
Stay (Faraway, So Close!)
Satellite Of Love
Bad / Irish Heartbeat (snippet) / The First Time (snippet)
Bullet the Blue Sky
Running To Stand Still
Where the Streets Have No Name
Pride (In the Name of Love)
Encore(s):
Desire / You Make Me Feel So Young (snippet) / Green Green Grass Of Home (snippet)
I Just Called To Say I Love You (snippet) / Ultraviolet (Light My Way) / My Way (snippet)
With or Without You / Shine Like Stars (snippet)
Love Is Blindness
Can't Help Falling In Love
ARCHIVE REVIEW
by Steve Duffy, South Wales Echo
The band too have moved on, as they must. CNN and NBC were the perfect backing for the PVC of Bono as band started with a huge chunk from their previous album Achtung Baby - techno-rock gloss of Even Better Than The Real Thing, The Fly (and with exotic dancer) Mysterious Ways, three tracks which stand with Us2 best.
Normal service was quickly resumed with New Year’s Day, who struck the crowd dumb with his new solo, effort, Numb.
On Babyface, Bono invites a girl up - these days she gets a camcorder rather than a kiss, and promptly zooms in on his crotch.
the band at last leave the technology behind to take to a small stage for semi-acoustic segment - a memorable Angel Of Harlem, an improbably good version of Abba’s Dancing Queen, the excellent Stay (Faraway So Close) from Zooropa and Satellite of Love (with fuzzy image of Lou Reed bearing down).
The crowd are predictably welcoming for the U2 - the anthems’ segment.
The old stadium rock atmosphere is recreated for Bad, although Bullet The Blue Sky is, with out irony, turned into a horrid Nuremberg style rally, to a backdrop of burning crosses turning into swastikas, Bono ending with clenched salute declaring, "We must not let this happen again." Please don’t.
They finish with Where The Streets Have No Name and Pride, and we’re left with a relaxation video of tropical fish.
Bono returns for the encore as MacPhisto - dressed in gold glitter suit, platform shoes, red devil horns and lip gloss for Desire.
Then it’s on the mobile phone to Lady Thatcher.
the band may have matured musically, but not politically - a naive call to the Commons in the summer recess to sing I Just Called To Say I Love You to The Lady (wrong number too), to be told by a telephonist to write in.
We should all write "Capitalism Suck" 100 times on our £10 tour programmes and send them to the band.
It ends wonderfully quietly - Love Is Blindness and a quick impression of Elvis before a simple sign off with I Can’t Help Falling In Love With You.
"Elvis Is Still In The Stadium," were his last words.
Somehow Bono himself never really was.
