U2 are touring again next year – a huge world tour, playing many indoor arenas for the first time in many years, for Vancouverites that doesn’t mean much. The last few times they’ve come to Vancouver, they’ve played either BC Place or Rogers Arena, and the same will go this time around. The Irish megaband actually opens the tour in Vancouver, with two shows back to back, while may not seem unusual for an extremely popular band – this time it’s a little different.

The tour is called iNNOCENCE + eXPERIENCE, and focuses on those themes quite heavily, just like their latest album has, with a terrible metaphoric album cover, as a matter of fact, the official photo released with the tour statement is pretty poor too. It’s all very cliche, and comes off as tired, and odd. Back to the dates, the tour is hinted to be a very different experience depending on the day you’re attending. The rumour has it that one of the nights will be a stripped down, almost acoustic set, while the next night, will be much louder. Bono himself has said that they’re looking to strike a very clear contrast between the two nights. They could do it by set design and video screens, they could do it by dedicating one night to a setlist from the first half of their career, and the next from the latter half. I like the idea of mixing it up, it’s something that very few artists do these days – it’s one of the things that make Bruce Springsteen’s shows amazing. If they do go the route of an acoustic/plugged in show – I wouldn’t wager as to which will be which. There latest album I found to be quite mellow, even thought it seemed to be promoted to be quite loud.

There’s another item you’ll want to know – sites are showing that if you’re purchasing tickets with a credit card, you’ll need that credit card and some photo ID to enter the venue. It seems to be a technique to deter scalping, how reasonable it is to assume a venue will enforce it though, remains to be seen.

The tour kicks off in Vancouver on May 14, and 15. Tickets start at $42.