Anyone who set foot in a bank in Austria during the first half of 1997 should recognize this image. There were stacks and stacks of these fliers for several months. It's an advertisement for the U2 concert which took place on August 16, 1997, in Wiener Neustadt, Austria. Let me back up a moment to explain why this is important to me.
I was a huge U2 fan in high school (still am but they're not really doing it for me lately) and looked forward to the day when I could see them live. I was too young when they went on their Zoo tour and the closest place to Orem, Utah that they played was Las Vegas. There was a rumor circulating in Utah that they refused to play in Salt Lake because of some incident that happened to them there in the early 1980s. I'm sure other people out there know more about this than I do but I've also heard that this story is a bunch of hogwash. So I never had a chance to see U2 live because they never came to Utah on their tours, whatever the reason was. That changed with their Pop tour in 1997. I was getting ready to go on my mission when they announced their tour dates and this time they were finally coming to Salt Lake. Our long, state-wide nightmare was over. A lot of good it did me though because I was going to be in the MTC. But as I looked at their tour schedule I saw a silver lining -- they had also scheduled a date in Austria (where I just so happened to be going on my mission).
The U2 mania in Austria was palpable. Posters and fliers plastered every city and articles in the Krone Zeitung with headlines of Bono declaring "Ich bin Monster und Poet" abounded. Women and girls wept openly at the sight of the charismatic front-man in the media (I'm actually not sure if that's because they were so happy he was coming or if they were sad about his bad haircut). And then the fateful day: Meh, it turns out that I was nowhere near Wiener Neustadt, which is about 40 kilometers south of Vienna (don't ask me what that is in miles). I was in a city in southern Austria called Klagenfurt looking at the world's largest statute of a dragon. It's called the Lindwurm. You should check it out if you ever get the chance. (I should also point out that missionaries aren't allowed to go to concerts so I wouldn't have seen them anyway.)
10 comments:
At the same time, I'm both excited for you and I'm sad for you, Dave. I remember the show in Salt Lake in '97... it was a good one and I still think it's some evil twist of fate that you were in the MTC when they finally went to UT. I think it was a sacrifice you were required to make to show how serious about your mission you were...
Remember when I got to Italy and sent you flyers for their Best Of 80's album? I think you sent me one of theses little flyers, cause this looks really familiar even though I wasn't in Austria in the first half of '97.
(1) We went up and hung outside of Rice-Eccles and heard the concert. Good times.
(2) "Aren't Allowed"? Two words my friend: Creative Finding
You could hear it from the apartment. :)
Pete - That's a great point about it being a sacrifice for me. I wish I had thought about it at the time. "Do you have any idea what I had to give up to be here?" I could have said to people.
Marc - Creative Finding -- I like it. Creative finding for us usually meant knocking on doors 6 hours a day instead of 5.
Anonymous - I'm sure it could be heard from the apartment but the question is is that where they heard it from? Perhaps they were somewhere else. We might never know.
If I remember right, it could be heard from all over town.
Dave,
At their concert in November of 2001 I called you on my cell and let you hear a snippet of the concert. You said you couldn't hear it and besides you were puking in the bathroom. I went with Dave who would be my husband two years later. And to this day, he still is my husband, if only by the legal laws of this country. Just kidding. We are happily married. Do you know that band Muse? I like them. You might not, but you might.
I totally remember that Annie.
I do like Muse. I'm not their hugest fan or anything but I've heard their album a few times and liked it.
Can we turn this into a Muse blog? I love Muse. Especially their two latest albums, Absolution and Black Holes & Revelations. First albums didn't do it for me as much. But those two latest are really quality albums start-to-finish... no skips on the entire albums.
See, I didn't even know Muse had more than one album. I will now defer all Muse-related questions to smoothep.
You could hear it all over town and it's not like we had tickets or anything.
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