The ten final shows of U2’s “Vertigo” tour will be rescheduled for November, singer Bono told an Australian TV show tonight (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 however 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,” Bono 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 Aloha Stadium (April 8).
Bono acknowledged that U2 have only canceled their 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.”
The Australian and New Zealand tour promoter, Melbourne-based Michael Coppel, could not be reached for comment.
Coppel had successfully urged three leading airlines — Air New Zealand, Qantas, and Virgin Blue — to offer passengers holding U2 tickets a reprieve from cancelation and change fees.
The full cost of the tour’s postponement is not yet known. The band’s production has already arrived in Australia. Airline company OzJet, which is renting a Boeing 737 to the band for their use Down Under, had spent an estimated A$80,000 ($58,000) painting the U2 logo on it.
