Watch U2 Rose Bowl concert live on YouTube
Monday, 26 October 2009
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Irish rockers U2 have become the first stars to stream a full live concert for free on YouTube. Fans were able watch the show from the Pasadena Rose Bowl in California as it happened on the video-sharing website today.
U2 manager Paul McGuinness said: "The band has wanted to do something like this for a long time.
"As we're filming the Los Angeles show, it's the perfect opportunity to extend the party beyond the stadium.
"Fans often travel long distances to come to see U2 - this time U2 can go to them, globally."
The Rose Bowl show is U2's penultimate show this year on the 360° Tour and sold out to the biggest crowd of over 96,000 fans.
The gig began this morning at 3.30am GMT in the UK. It was the first time a show of this size has been streamed live.
Fans also had access to instant messaging network Twitter while watching the show.
Michele Flannery, the website's music manager, said: "YouTube is thrilled to be able to provide our global audience with a live streaming performance from one of the world's greatest bands.
"We are always looking for new ways to connect fans around the world with their favourite artists, and this is the perfect opportunity to do just that."
It's not the first time U2 has allowed a live streaming of one of their concerts. In 1997 the Boston leg of their 'Popmart' tour was aired on Microsoft's MSN website.
Wearing his trademark sunglasses, lead singer Bono said: "Thank you Los Angeles.
"Thanks to everyone watching on YouTube all over the world - seven continents."
The band performed classic U2 hits including I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For to rapturous applause.
Bono dedicated the song 'The Unforgettable Fire' to Stephen Gately, describing the Boyzone star as "a beautiful spirit and a bright flame".
The live webcast has now ended. You can watch the rebroadcast above or at youtube.com/u2
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Great concert. Very much enjoyed watching it live. However I found the moaning and groaning noises that Bonob made before a couple of the songs to be really disturbing. No need. Only he would imply that his music is orgasmic. Eww.
Posted by I''ll not have what he had | 27.10.09, 02:02 GMT
@Andy & his carbon footprint ... Andy, think in these terms.. if the concert reached only 96k people and produced 1 ton of emissions ... that's a large amount of garbage ... BUT if you reach 400 to 500 thousand people, while still only making 1 ton of carbon wasting emissions ... you've reached 4 to 5 times the number of people with hardly more emissions than the concert alone, without the web rebroadcast. The only way for there to have been even less carbon waste, would have been to ONLY broadcast a web streaming concert....and that wasn't what this was about.
Posted by RCG | 26.10.09, 13:23 GMT
no the kiddies charts dont come on till the afternonn
Posted by u2 fan | 26.10.09, 08:54 GMT
Absolute hipocracy on the part of bono/u2... he likes nothing better than to be a global warrior and yet look at his concerts and what it takes to make them happen, care to measure your carbon footprint at all ?
Posted by Andy | 26.10.09, 06:11 GMT
I'll make sure to set my alarm clock for 3.30am then - not!
Posted by Wen Bam | 21.10.09, 09:02 GMT