For Sale: One Used Stage
U2 are to sell off the 29,000-square-foot steel ‘claws’ they used to create the stage on their ‘360 Tour’.
Tour director Craig Evans tells Billboard.com, “It’s certainly our intention to see these things recycled into permanent and usable ventures. It represents too great an engineering feat to just… put it away in a warehouse somewhere.
“We are in discussions to send them (parts) into different places around the world and have them installed as permanent venues. Some major events have shown interest in these, from four different continents.”
Reports suggest The Claw could be used as part of the London Olympics opening ceremony next year.
“We’re now in discussions to send them into different places around the world and have them installed as permanent venues. Some major events have shown interest in these, from four different continents and we haven’t even really put the word out yet.”
U2’s ‘360 Tour’ is the highest-grossing concert tour of all time, with ticket sales totalling over $700 million and it requires 120 lorries to transport its 50-metre tall sound system, stage and lighting rig making it the most expensive tour to hold.
Guitarist The Edge - who played the Glastonbury Festival with his bandmates Bono, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen last weekend - previously admitted the rockers will never be able to go on a bigger tour.
He said: “We’re actually at the limit, the absolute limit, when you consider the economics and the practicality of transportation. We’re really as big as we could ever get.”