In the wake of their postponement last week, the 10 final shows of U2’s Vertigo tour will be rescheduled for November, singer Bono told an Australian TV show today (March 13). An official announcement could be made as early as tomorrow, he hinted.
Bono, who has been holidaying in Sydney with his family since last week, would not comment on press reports that the shows were postponed because guitarist the Edge’s daughter has leukemia. “I can’t really get into details why,” he told Andrew Denton, host of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation-televised program “Enough Rope.”
“There was a lot of distress and angst and [the] good news is … I can announce tonight we are coming back, looks like November and that’s a great relief for me.” He added, “I didn’t want to leave Australia without having that hammered down.”
The shows affected were at the Auckland Ericsson Stadium (March 17-18), Brisbane’s Queensland Sports & Athletics Centre (March 21), Melbourne’s Telstra Dome (March 24-25), Adelaide’s AAMI Stadium (March 28), Sydney’s Telstra Stadium (March 31, April 1), the Yokohama Nissan Stadium (April 4) and Honolulu’s Aloha Stadium (April 8).
Bono acknowledged that U2 have only canceled shows on one previous occasion — in Sydney in the late 1980s. He predicted that the rescheduled shows would be “extraordinary … it’ll be the only time we get a chance to play these songs for a long time.” The band member affected by the current tragedy, he added, would by then be “playing like he’s on fire.”
Michael Coppel, the promoter for the Australia and New Zealand shows, had successfully urged three leading airlines — Air New Zealand, Qantas and Virgin Blue — to offer passengers holding tickets for travel to a U2 show a reprieve from cancellation and change fees.
