If you had been outside Giants Stadium, Wednesday, July 20th, 2011, you might have seen me leaning against a lamp post throwing my guts out before being stuck on a stretcher and wheeled off to the bivouac, er, Medical Emergency Center, where I spent the next 45 minutes listening to victims of alcohol abuse, falling down stairs, heat exhaustion and dehydration, being wheeled in and out.
Was is it me who said U2 make him sick? Sure it was. But only in some ways.
Pros::
1. A coupla great albums
2. Bono is a perfect front man.
3. I've seen em live three times and they have blown me away always..
cons:
1. Their charitable works are obvious and hypocritical.
2. They haven't recorded a decent song since 2001.
3. Bono won't keep his mouth shut while everything he says is obvious, self-righteous and insufferably condescending.
So despite my misgivings, I bought a tix (sixty bucks for a nose bleed).
Now, I'll digress. In the Spring of 1993 I was going through yet another bad break up and decided to take myself to Disneyworld: I had never been there and had been a Disney fanatic as a kid. I was broke and went on a cheap Holiday Inn the sun. All in all a horrendous vacation. Perhaps it's enough to say my 36 year old self had little in common with my 6 year old self, though I would hope my six year old self would have found it somewhat loathsome as well.
Anyway, on the last day of my vacation, I went for a swim in my hotel's septic pool and got an ear infection. A plane trip made it worse. I ended up out of action for two weeks and ever since have had terrible motion sickness. It hits unexpectedly and it hit me after standing in line for an hour trying to get a bus to Giants Stadium and then getting stuck in traffic for another hour. Which explains why i was throwing up… not because of alcohol or drugs, as the doctor appeared convinced of.
Back at the bivouac. It is odd being behind the scenes at a concert of this stage. Not backstage. Backstage we've all done and it is still a part of the festivities; behind the scenes are security, cops, doctors, administrators, and if you turn your head is the Stadium itself. The claw, 80,000 people screaming for U2, lights, no action… It reminded me of "Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead" -the Tom Stoppard play about two minor characters in "Hamlet". All the "to be or not to being…' occurs off stage or to the side, and upfront are the minor characters. That's exactly what it felt like.
After 45 minutes I began to get back to normal and any way, it was either leave or go to the hospital and if you have ever been to emergency you know what that's like.
It was 945p and U2 still hadn''t gone on stage. Usually, that would give me permission to really let loose but tonight I'm backstage and I can hear the administrators discussing how the band have decided to go on late because the traffic has been so bad, not everybody has made it to Giants Stadium yet.
I walk across the parking lot to the 10pm , NJ Transit to Secaucus. And as I get on board I can hear U2 singing "Even Better Than The Real thing".
On the 2005 live in Milan "Miss Sarajevo" you can hear Bono tell the audience how he wants to change the (terrible) song into a prayer for those killed in London after a terrorist attack. I don't know where to hug him or punch him.
I kinda think a punch is due.