U2’s Joshua Tree 2017 tour tops 2.4m ticket sales

U2’s The Joshua Tree 2017 world tour – announced in January to commemorate 30 years of the album of the same name – has become the year’s most successful concert tour, selling more than 2.4 million tickets for dates in North America, Latin America and the UK and Europe, according to promoter Live Nation Global Touring.

The initial North American leg of the tour came to close on Saturday (1 July) at the FirstEnergy Stadium (67,431-cap.) in Cleveland, Ohio, after having played to more than one million people over the course of almost two months.

The European leg, with support from Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, kicks off this weekend with two dates (8–9 July) at Twickenham Stadium (110,000-cap.) and concludes on 1 August at Brussels’ King Baudouin Stadium (50,094-cap.).

The initial North American leg came to close on Saturday, after having played to more than one million people over two months

The tour then heads back to North America with support from Beck, before departing for South America on 7 October, again backed by Gallagher.

In addition to being commercially successful, the tour has drawn a largely positive critical reception. “I have left every U2 concert feeling like some measure of my humanity had been restored after being worn down by the blistering winds of the daily shitstorm we call living,” reads a typical review of the Lincoln Financial Field show by Phawker. “Last night was no exception.”

U2’s last world tour, 2015’s Innocence + Experience, was the fourth highest-grossing of the year.

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