Different artists are coming up with different ways to encourage fans to take in the live concert experience directly rather than through the tiny screens of their mobile devices. At Bruno Mars’ July 27 show at the Park Theater in Las Vegas, John Katsilometes of the Las Vegas Review Journal noted how ushers put attendee smart phones into locking “phone cozies” from Yondr at start of the performance. For U2’s 2018 tour, by contrast, fans were asked to download the U2 AR eXPERIENCE app. Then, for the first song, Bono and company would be dimly lit, and the crowd was encouraged to view the performance through their phone screen. The phone added imagery to the scene, and the audience was treated to an intimate moment with Bono. The digital image of the singer appeared as an avatar, looking over the audience. And while the giant, ghostly image of Bono that it produced on your phone was pretty neat, what is even cooler was that it would drain your battery with stunning speed, encouraging the fans to put their phones away for the rest of the night. After the first song, the concert was all about the live performance.
-Nook Schoenfeld, from “U2’s 2018 eXPERIENCE + iNNOCENCE Tour,” PLSN, July 2018, page 54.
