Hozier "cheap" seats vs. U2 cheap seats - Tuesday, July 15, 2025 - Freedom Mortgage Pavilion - Camden, NJ - Unreal Unearth Tour

U2 broke my heart 3 big times.

1) I went to see them play a stadium in NJ during their 360 tour in 2011. I was 16 at the time. U2 and Pink Floyd were the first 2 bands that I really got into, when I started listening and practicing music obsessively at age 11. I had been scheming for 5 years to get a ticket. Finally the day came when miraculously my aunt's credit card gave her access to pre-sale tickets, and my parents reimbursed her for 4 nosebleed seats at about $59 a pop, as opposed to the astronomical resale rates that were always so wildly out of reach.

The day arrived, and my parents, one of my siblings , and I drove to East Rutherford. We made it to our seats, and Interpol was playing. They sounded terrible, on account of the audio being out of time. We were optimistic that the live sound engineers had calibrated U2 to sound on-point, yet for whatever reason did not get around to dialing in Interpol's sound. The Jersey crowd ended up booing Interpol as they continued to play.

U2 came on, and the sound was just as bad. 2nd song, not improvement. My heart sank, and I was overwhelmed with panic and despair. My 3 family members accepted their fate. I told them I was going to walk around in hopes of getting better sound. I did not yet own a cell phone.

By the time I had been in the nosebleeds and then frantically searched for places with better sound ( (while trying to look like I was not frantic and belonged in the more expensive zones) at least two-thirds of U2's set was over. I ended up standing at the far end of this hallway that seemed to let out into an expensive seating area. It was heavily guarded. I had tried and been escorted out of similar areas moments before. I stood and listened for quite some time just at the far end of the hallway, where the bathrooms and hotdogs are. The sound was still bad, yet was exponentially better than the nosebleeds. It was still so bad I figured I'd rather try again and risk getting kicked out, rather than accept my fate. Some rich party left early, and in the shuffle I managed to go unnoticed into this half-empty road, where many of the people were staring at their phones. The sound was incredible. I just started dancing. At first I tried to blend in with the subdued demeanor of the zone, yet it sounded soooooo good and the band was playing beautifully. They were ramping up into the greatest hits, and oh my gawd, the guitar. I adore The Edge's playing. It was hitting my entire body so loud and so incredibly clear. I started bawling. I spent the last 30-50 minutes of their set barely able to see through tears of joy and release and frustration and fear and salvation and healing and inspiration and connection and full feeling. The set ended and I was still crying, my shirt was soaked with sweat and snot and tears. I stayed for as long as the ushers let me before asking me to leave. I have no recollection of leaving the venue. The next thing I can recall is being back at the car with my family members, feeling fundamentally changed. I recall looking at them as they approached the car after me, and they walked out as if we had just finished up an Olive Garden dinner. If anything, angry from being up late on Wednesday July 20, 2011. I asked how they liked the rest of the concert, and they said it was nice to be there. They asked me, and I said it was amazing. I felt unsafe giving more emotion, more detail than that. I couldn't bear the risk of having what just happened shot down. Sitting in the backseat as we were still in the parking lot on our way out, I recall feeling “that was real. I can't believe it. It's as good as I imagined it is. I need to do that.

My conviction remains , yet so does my frustration and heartbreak that U2 would sell tickets to fans who wait years for the opportunity to see them, only to be left with an awful-sounding experience. Devastatingly cruel. You're a fucking band.

Given the opportunity, will I ever play a stadium? Only if the sound is at least fantastic for all paying customers in their seating / standing area. If that's not possible, then forgettaboutit. I lead a fucking band.

2) When they put that god-awful album on everyone's iPhone without their consent. What type of Orwellian fascist move is that? You're the band that inspired myself and so many others through the rebellious spirit of your first album, “Sunday Bloody Sunday”, etc. No excuse for that one- you're multi-millionaires, at least- you could have taken a week off to read 1984.

3) Continually, as Bono (and possibly other band members) for years now has been putting more effort into being a capitalist than a musician. Aren't you from the Republic of Ireland? The Imperial Military is no friend of the people and the causes you sang about to kick off your career.

In other news, I just got home from seeing Hozier in Camden. Here are 3 awesome things he and the band and crew did tonight.

1) He put his balls on the line with concrete political criticisms and calls to action.

2) They did not sign a deal with a tech company to unconsensually spam my cell phone with their catalog.

3) The sound was fantastic in the cheap seats.

I have yet to do a deep-dive on Hozier and his team. I do not know if they have any shady investments or not. I'd like at least 1 night's sleep without knowing, and then I'll probably look into it on Sunday briefly, as Hozier has not personally assaulted my autonomy. I don't anticipate him or anyone else to ever be a saint, and when I hear that someone is regarded as a saint I take Orwell's advice that “Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent." Nonetheless, I commend him and his team for doing right by his 25,000 fans tonight.

Not that he or anybody else on the planet is asking me- yet perhaps a growth edge to explore moving forward is the sound latency? It seemed a bit extreme. Run an analog rig, or an upgraded / more optimized digital rig? A $100 Mackie mixer is all you'd need to at least run an experiment to see if there's any room for growth there. If not, perhaps consider adding a delay to the video screens so they seem more in-time with the sound. I realize Sound moves slower than Light. I also realize I don't know anything.

I took a shit in the Men's room and the door didn't have a lock, so no one else had yet used it, yet I realized I could put a crumpled piece of TP in the gap between the door to the stall and the stall structure, and it “locked", and I took a great one.