Watch U2 Perform ‘Sweetest Thing’ With Bono Impersonator
“You’re looking really good, man,” Bono told the singer of a U2 tribute band that he’d pulled onstage at the band’s L.A. Forum gig Tuesday night. It helped that the man in question, Joe Hier – who sings for an outfit called Hollywood U2 – was in full Bono gear with rose-tinted glasses and slicked-back hair (which unfortunately was not the U2 frontman’s current blond hue). “Don’t want to mess with the day job?” Bono joked about the hair color. But nevertheless, the real U2 frontman kept him onstage.
For most of the band’s performance of the group’s 1998 single “Sweetest Thing,” Hier held another fan’s iPhone and filmed the performance. Midway through, the pair locked sunglasses and Bono let Hier have a go at the chorus before giving him the mic. The impersonator then handled lead vocals while Bono played piano. “You’ve got a great voice,” the real Bono told Hier after a big hug. Then later, in a faux-southern accent, Bono said, “only in America.”
U2 are a few cities into the North American leg of their Innocence + Experience World Tour. The trek finds them playing multiple dates in every city of the tour, with long stretches in Los Angeles, Montreal, Chicago, Boston and New York City. The group welcomed a fan onstage in Phoenix to play the Joshua Tree track “In God’s Country.”