U2 will be back in stadiums next year in support of its upcoming album Carnaval De Luz, with six initial shows in South America announced today (Oct. 15) in tandem with the Nov. 13 Interscope LP’s third single, “The Greatest Show on Earth.”
Beck will open the first gigs, which start Feb. 23 in Mexico City. The tour, which is subtitled The Greatest Show on Earth, will expand to Europe, North America and Ireland, with details forthcoming. Tickets will first be available through the U2.com subscriber presale beginning Oct. 19 at 10 a.m. local time, with remaining tickets going on sale Oct. 22.
“The Greatest Show on Earth? Now that’s a throwdown,” the band says. “It’s a dare, to ourselves as much as anyone, to try and have the best night of anybody’s life. A bit of showman, a bit of shaman, a riot of color, unreasonable guitar, bass and drums and tunes you can hold onto. Because if people are gonna show up, we certainly are.”
As for “Greatest Show,” it was co-written with longtime collaborator Brian Eno and frames a relationship as an elaborate spectacle, with lyrics that find love, deception and performance tangled together. Anton Corbijn directed the accompanying video filmed in the California desert, which satirizes U2 as a religious cult in which women do all the heavy lifting.
U2 has been in promo mode for several months, which has included filming videos in Mexico City and celebrating its 50th anniversary with a surprise performance on Dublin’s Grafton Street on Sept. 25. Anticipation is building for the new album, which includes what’s said to be the final vocal recording made by Dolly Parton before her death. Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. will also be saluted as MusiCares’ Persons of the Year at a Feb. 5 Los Angeles ceremony the day before the Grammys.
Meanwhile, the stadium run will mark U2’s return to that scale of touring after its sold-out 40-show engagement at Las Vegas’ Sphere in 2023-24. The band last played stadium dates on The Joshua Tree Tour, which concluded in Mumbai in December 2019 after drawing nearly 3 million fans worldwide.
Here are U2’s tour dates:
Feb. 23, 26: Mexico City (Estadio GNP Seguros)
March 10, 12: Sao Paulo, Brazil (Estadio MorumBIS)
March 23, 25: Buenos Aires (Estadio River Plate)