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Watch U2’s First Live Show in Four Years, a Surprise Benefit

U2, live, four years, suprise, Haiti, benefit, tour hopes

U2 have played their first live show in years, stoking hopes for a tour in support of the rock giants’ upcoming album. As Billboard reports, the Bono-led band gave a surprise performance on January 11 at Sean Penn’s Help Haiti benefit in Beverly Hills, California. Below, watch footage of the band performing “I Will Follow,” “Desire,” and “Vertigo” in the Montage Hotel ballroom, plus Bono and the Edge covering Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” with Haitian singer Anaelle Jean-Pierre. The charity event was timed to this weekend’s Golden Globes, where U2 won Best Song for Nelson Mandela tribute “Ordinary Love.” The song is also on the Oscars’ not-so-short Best Original Song list, and U2 have a new album expected to arrive in April. It’s worth noting that when a band like, say, Foo Fighters played a secret show, full-fledged concerts were soon to follow.

Check out SPIN’s 50 Albums You Gotta Hear in 2014.

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