It was a bright California Saturday morning. The stadium was relatively peaceful, with only a few people milling about, cleaning and prepping for the next show. A mere 12 hours earlier the world’s biggest band performed an incredible set in front of 40,000 admiring fans. I was in the audience, enjoying every moment and singing along to every song.
Amnesty Volunteers during 'Walk On'
Now we were back in the stadium for the second day of our shoot, and the moment I had been waiting for – the chance to actually walk on U2’s stage. Rocco, U2’s stage manager, called to me from across the field. The time was now. We were technically working, and so I had to keep my game face on and stay focused on the task at hand of shooting the claw – the iconic staging structure designed and created to support the largest touring shoe in history. Inside however the fan in me was doing cartwheels.
The Claw during soundcheck
I had been a U2 fan since the tender age of 14 when at a winter youth group retreat a kid in a khaki army jacket put a poorly dubbed cassette of “War” into my walkman and sent me off for a cold evening walk across a frozen lake in Northern Ontario. Seems he thought my musical horizons needed a little broadening. Walking alone on that cold winter night, those songs were a liminal moment for me, one that changed my perceptions of music and the world around me forever.
Checking out the setlist
Now some 27 some years later here I was walking up the stairs and onto the stage as a boyhood dream comes full circle.
In June 2011, we spent two days in Anaheim shooting for a marketing program we produced for Panther Management, Live Nation and U2 aimed at selling these iconic structures once the tour was complete in July 2011.