I’ve heard from countless U2 fans this morning about the quote on U2.com about last night’s show in Brussels: “Until The End of the World made its tour debut tonight…” - and with all of the resources at the fingertips of the staff writers for the official site, it pains me to let them know that actually, that song made its tour debut on May 12 in Chicago, and then it was played again a few more times before the end of the first leg.

Now, you could techincally argue the point that ALL songs performed made their tour debut last night for the 2nd leg of the tour…but it’s a leg - not a new tour.

Is asking for accuracy from the band’s official website too much to ask for?

Thanks to Steve Morse and Bruce Mohl of the Boston Globe for putting a special highlight on official musician fanclubs, and how they’re servicing their fans by offering ticket presales, and the concerns faced because of them.

The Business and Money section of the Boston Globe focused on a guide to tickets - whether it’s sports tickets, concert tickets, or anything in the city and how scalping is a force in the free market. This was a section I couldn’t put down today, especially given the Chicago Sun-Times’ interview with Larry Mullen, Jr., which was published today (5/1).

Some highlights from Morse’s story:
Sebastian Clayton, Adam’s brother who runs U2.com, said “We weren’t expecting the amount of members who joined,” and that the system was overwhelmed when tickets became available in January. Sebastian says, “We were left in the lerch and weren’t able to fill everyone’s order.” The story also states that Sebastian said “the problem was fixed after U2 tacked on another leg to it’s tour.”

Full story

It’s interesting that now as U2 hits the major cities within the next 4 weeks - Chicago, Boston and New York City - that both Chicago and Boston newspapers are still reporting about U2’s tour ticketing woes.

I don’t know why the media are still beating this story into the ground. Especially given the fact that U2 are playing a total of 7-8 times in each of these major market cities when it’s all said-and-done.

Now - instead of focusing on the fanclubs, let’s focus on stopping scalpers charging an ivy-league college tuition for tickets. Surely, there must be something we can do to put them out of business!

Got this in my email today. What a novel concept — get tickets to your fanclub directly, without having to deal with the Ticketmaster mess.

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Our New Presale Method Explained:

This is not a first come first served service, you have until March 2nd 4pm (GMT) to submit your presale ticket request.
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Here’s hoping U2 takes a similar route for the 3rd leg. Just do it like we used to with Propaganda, but put the form on the web instead of doing it via mail.

It appears we’ll find out next week if that’s the plan. 3rd leg should be announced Sunday or Monday.