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U2 review: Unforgettable fire in Sheffield - SLIDESHOW
NOT since the vast furnaces of Brown Bayley's roared had the heart of Attercliffe witnessed energy consumption on such a scale.
Then rarely does South Yorkshire host rock stars of the global calibre of U2.
Click on the green play button to watch our slideshow - featuring fans and then the band on stage.
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READ MORE: U2 Bono's Sheffield dash to celebrity wedding.
Some 25 years after steel production ceased on the site of Don Valley Stadium, Sheffield's S9 district once again shook, this time with the product of heavy music industry.
Long-time U2 show director Willie Williams will remember the night Bono's boys returned to his hometown.
Having again worked his magic alongside one of music's most innovative set designers, he looked on as the frontman led the 50,000-plus crowd in singing happy birthday to him.
There were other public messages too, not least from South African activist Desmond Tutu ahead of an encore of rousing hit One.
Strip away the politics and worthy causes, though, and most spectators were here to witness a rock colossus that refuses to diminish.
The vastness of the 360 Tour stage – a cross between the oceanic Bond-baddies' base in The Spy Who Loved Me and a garish octopus – gave everyone a view, but robbed some of the immediacy and impact of an act with anthems to burn.
Having established a Sheffield theme via support band The Hours – featuring locally-born singer Ant Genn, whose elderly aunt Margaret earned a name check from Bono – and piped tunes from the Arctic Monkeys and Human League, U2 emerged amid smoke that wafted into a clear night.
A subdued start, drawing on latest album No Line On The Horizon, was brushed aside by the euphoria of Beautiful Day and Elevation before Bono touched on the subject of the day's A level results.
"Take courage because you will have done better than any of us on this stage!" he told teenagers in the audience.
Further proof that exam results don't necessarily rock gods make followed with I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For and an Edge/Bono-only acoustic Stuck In A Moment, stirring the masses further.
Then The Unforgettable Fire and City Of Blinding Lights had the bizarre arched stage on the move, its centre elongating like the core of some alien craft.
Never let it be said there isn't still one-upmanship in music.
Did you go to the show? Got a view? Add your comment below.
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">Subscribe to The Star Even in the midst of the worst recession since the 1920s U2 went one better than The Rolling Stones, eclipsing their Sheffield Arena show of two years ago.
This time the Arena provided parking for the 120 trucks that shifted 390 tons of stage, rigging, lights and screens to form the 164ft-high U2 super structure.
With no sides to it, the earlier intermittent showers looked set to give the Irishmen more than just greater exposure to their fans, as those diehards who camped day and night would testify.
As it happened the army of roadies dried out having completed the stage – only to begin deconstructing it within an hour of the band issuing their departing decibel.
The show had put Sheffield on the U2 tour map alongside Barcelona, Milan, Amsterdam, Paris, Nice and Berlin.
And, some 31 years after drummer Larry Mullen pinned a ‘Musicians wanted’ ad to the notice board at Dublin’s Temple Mount School, even he must have paused for breath as he gazed upon the human sea that turned Don Valley Stadium into a Milky Way of mobile phones while singing In The Name Of Love.
n Log on to www.thestar.co.uk/pictures for more U2 photos.
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Weather for Sheffield
Saturday 26 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 9 C to 21 C
Wind Speed: 17 mph
Wind direction: East
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Sunny
Temperature: 11 C to 21 C
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Wind direction: East
