U2 Announces ‘Greatest Show on Earth’ Global Stadium Tour for 2027, Kicking Off in Latin America

U2 will be playing in stadiums around the globe next year, the group announced Thursday, with a tour dubbed “Carnaval De Luz presents: The Greatest Show On Earth” kicking off Feb. 23 in Mexico City and set to continue through 2027 “and beyond.”

Only the first six dates of the Live Nation-produced tour were unveiled as part of the announcement, all of them in Latin America, with the promise that North American and European shows will be revealed in the next few weeks.

The first dates are at Mexico City’s Estadio GNP Seguros Feb. 23 and 26, 2027; Sao Paulo, Brazil’s Estádio MorumBIS on March 10 and 12, and Buenos Aires, Argentina’s Estadio River Plate on March 23 and 25.

Beck will be the opening act, at least for these initial shows.

Concurrent with the announcement Thursday was the release of the group’s latest single, “The Greatest Show on Earth,” from the group’s upcoming album, “Carnaval De Luz,” which comes out Nov. 13. The Anton Corbijn-directed video and song are described as “a story of lovers fighting to keep faith in each other – and faith itself,” with the video “satirizing the band as a religious cult where women do all the heavy lifting.”

The new track is on the moodier side for U2, in comparison to some of their more outrightly anthemic releaess, with lyrics that take a more ironic approach to the “greatest show on earth” concept than it use as the name for the tour might suggest: “Is this a church of love or fear? Have we made God feel like a stranger here? …/ The light scatters things can get worse / These dark matters of the universe / Could not compete with us / We were once the greatest show on earth.”

Said Bono in a statement, “‘The Greatest Show on Earth? Now that’s a throwdown. It’s a dare, to ourselves as much as anyone, to try and have the best night of anybody’s life. A bit of showman, a bit of shaman, a riot of color, unreasonable guitar, bass and drums, and tunes you can hold onto. Because if people are gonna show up, we certainly are.”

Tickets for the tour will first be made available via U2.com. A subscriber presale for the six dates will begin Monday at 10 a.m. local time, with the remaining tickets available Oct. 22nd at U2.com.