Today, as rumoured, U2 officially announced an all-stadium tour to celebrate the 30th anniversary of The Joshua Tree. There will be two legs across May–August 2017: one of sixteen North American cities followed by another of eight European cities. The North American leg includes a headline appearance at the Bonnaroo festival, U2's first performance at a North American festival since the US Festival on 30 May 1983.

The announcement confirms that U2 will perform the entire album every night. This means that Red Hill Mining Town will make its live debut; U2 attempted to perform it in 1987, and even considered it as the album's second single, but it was in the end shelved. This also means that Exit and Trip Through Your Wires will be performed for the first time since the 1980s. Edge is quoted as emphasising The Joshua Tree's renewed timeliness: "with global upheaval, extreme right wing politics and some fundamental human rights at risk ... these songs seem so relevant and prescient of these times".

Tickets

The general sale begins next week. European tickets will be available from Monday, 16 January, then North American tickets from Tuesday, 17 January. The fanclub presale begins THIS WEDNESDAY, 11 January at 9am. Fans can purchase up to 4 tickets via the presale and up to 6 tickets via the general sale. There will be a general admission floor and reserved seating in the stands. Presale codes will be emailed to subscribers, so keep an eye on your inbox.

For regular tickets, prices in North America will range from $35 to $280, with slight variation between cities. On continental Europe, there will be similar minor variation between cities with prices around €40 to €180, with GA €75. In the UK, prices - which in this instance are inclusive of fees - range from £40.30 to £187, with GA £78.25.

There are also VIP packages. These too will vary slightly in price between shows, so I will use the Dublin prices. Like other recent tours, this one features a Red Zone, €315, with a portion of the costs going to the Red charity; ticketholders will have entry to their own zone close to the stage and the chance to be selected for a backstage tour. There will also be a Gold Hot Ticket, €314.50, with premium reserved seats in the stands, an exclusive item of merchandise, and a commemorative lanyard; a Silver Hot Ticket, €220.65, with similar benefits but seats slightly further from the front; and VIP Travel Experience Packages, €995-1,990, which include a reserved seat within the first 15 rows, 4-star hotel accommodation, shuttle to the show, a private catered pre-show reception, and the chance to be selected for a backstage tour.

Dates

Leg 1: North America

• 2017-05-12 - Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada - BC Place Stadium
• 2017-05-14 - Seattle, Washington, USA - CenturyLink Field
• 2017-05-17 - San Francisco, California, USA - Levi's Stadium
• 2017-05-20 - Los Angeles, California, USA - Rose Bowl
• 2017-05-24 - Houston, Texas, USA - NRG Stadium
• 2017-05-26 - Dallas, Texas, USA - AT&T Stadium
• 2017-06-03 - Chicago, Illinois, USA - Soldier Field
• 2017-06-07 - Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA - Heinz Field
• 2017-06-11 - Miami, Florida, USA - Hard Rock Stadium
• 2017-06-14 - Tampa, Florida, USA - Raymond James Stadium
• 2017-06-18 - Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA - Lincoln Financial Field
• 2017-06-20 - Washington, DC, USA - FedEx Field
• 2017-06-23 - Toronto, Ontario, Canada - Rogers Centre
• 2017-06-25 - Boston, Massachusetts, USA - Gillette Stadium
• 2017-06-28 - East Rutherford, New Jersey, USA - MetLife Stadium
• 2017-07-01 - Cleveland, Ohio, USA - FirstEnergy Stadium

This leg will also feature a headline set at the Bonnaroo festival, held in Manchester, Tennessee between 8–11 June. The date of U2's appearance is not yet confirmed.

Leg 2: Europe

• 2017-07-08 - London, England - Twickenham Stadium
• 2017-07-12 - Berlin, Germany - Olympiastadion
• 2017-07-15 - Rome, Italy - Stadio Olimpico
• 2017-07-18 - Barcelona, Spain - Estadi Olimpic Lluis Companys
• 2017-07-22 - Dublin, Ireland - Croke Park
• 2017-07-25 - Paris, France - Stade de France
• 2017-07-29 - Amsterdam, Netherlands - Amsterdam ArenA
• 2017-08-01 - Brussels, Belgium - King Baudouin Stadium

No concerts have been announced for any other part of the world, nor have they been rumoured. Some of the large markets listed above, however, may get a second gig if tickets sell fast, e.g. Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, London, Dublin, etc.

Support acts

Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds will support U2 at all the European dates. Mumford & Sons will support U2 in Vancouver, Seattle, and San Francisco; OneRepublic will in Miami, Tampa, and Cleveland; and The Lumineers will at all the other North American dates.

Fun facts and stats

Although this tour is basically a celebratory run rather than a standard comprehensive tour, the North American leg is actually rather substantial. It features sixteen different cities (plus Bonnaroo), which is more than the ten visited on that continent's leg of Innocence + Experience, and equal with the first North American leg of 360. It also features more shows in west coast states than either of those legs.

The concert in Cleveland is U2's first show anywhere in Ohio since 10 December 2005, a gap of over eleven and a half years. Texas's shows will be the first in almost eight years, having last been visited in October 2009. U2 will play two different cities in Florida on the same leg of a tour for the first time since the third leg of Vertigo.

On the European leg, U2 return to one of their most celebrated hometown venues, Croke Park. They played two shows there on the original Joshua Tree Tour, 27 and 28 June 1987. The last time they performed there was on the first leg of the 360 tour in July 2009.

Database listing

All dates are contained in our Joshua Tree Tour 2017 page. If you want to take a trip down memory lane, check out all the shows on the original Joshua Tree Tour in 1987 and the closely-related Lovetown Tour of 1989–90.