Is this the future of entertainment?

U2 at The Sphere, Las Vegas

Progress is not defined by what technology can do alone, but by what humans choose to do with it. Our boldest move is not to resist digital transformation, nor to surrender to it, but to collaborate with it deliberately. To use its precision without losing our unpredictability.

Last week I had the extraordinary opportunity to attend U2:UV Achtung Baby Live at The Sphere in Las Vegas, a production that doesn’t just showcase technology, but reveals what becomes possible when human creativity and AI-assisted modelling work together to entertain and to elevate the soul.

We had read the reviews of the 160,000-square-foot (15,000 m2) wraparound LED screen, but minutes before showtime, as we took our seats in the venue, we faced an enormous wall of what appeared to be grey concrete blocks. Down below (we were seated approximately halfway up), a neon-lit pre-show DJ playing an array of songs from a Trabant car, and a small stage with a very minimalist design shaped like a record player.

Looking up, what appeared to be a glass ceiling revealing a starry sky (significantly less cloudy than the Vegas sky had been when we’d entered the building. It felt crazy. More so because we had travelled a very long way to get there (and were still very much on UK time).

Showtime

When the band took the tiny stage it started small. 4 chords and the truth, which is the simple, undeniable grace U2 has been sharing with the world for what feels like a lifetime.

Then a panel of the wall clicked to life, then another, and we were reminded that, always at the forefront of creative innovation, behind every extraordinary U2 show is the creative brilliance of the band’s long-time production designer Peter ‘Willie Williams’.

Visions of the original 1992/93 ZOO TV stage, which have been ingrained in my brain since I was a teenager, filled the wall.

Visual sequences that were modular and responsive, able to stretch or contract with the tempo of the music. AI-supported systems helped synchronise motion graphics, lighting, and sound so that the environment could “breathe” with the band.

Elvis, well of course, he had to be there. And the real Elvis, too (not the fake-tanned, white bejewelled suited, Spaniard Elvis I’d met down by the Welcome to Vegas sign earlier in the day).

Magnificent and insane high-tech visuals, and we could have forgotten there are four men down below, except they were projected onto the screens for just the right amount of time for us to remember we’d travelled to see this band, along with a history of knowing how they always commit to ensure every single person in every seat, in every stadium, feels involved, engaged, and entertained.

Most remarkable, the vision of the nighttime skyline of the Las Vegas Strip, displayed on screen, giving the impression that the whole building had melted and we were watching it outdoors. Then, remarkably, the lights, the casinos, the fake Eiffel Tower and Empire State Building, all melted too, in a reverse time-lapse, until only the empty Nevada desert remained.

‘Where the Streets Have No Name’, the same desert imagery transitioning into a sunrise while a plume of water vapour forms a white flag on screen, the white flag representing Bono’s frequent stage antics in the early years (but I’m not old enough to have witnessed that in person).

I won't forget this experience. Of it all, the vision that will stay with me for the rest of my life, when surrounded by the creation, a sky of sepia-toned imagery of animals, in an instant, as Bono sings the Beautiful Day lyric “After the flood all the colours came out,” the animals progressively transitioned into full colour.

In the arts and media, these technologies are unlocking new forms of storytelling. Experiences are becoming spatial, immersive, and adaptive. Audiences are no longer passive observers but participants in dynamic environments. This is the essence of human–AI collaboration. The machine processes vast variables: geometry, perception, timing, while the human decides what feels right. One optimises; the other interprets.

Is this the future?

If this is the future of entertainment, I was incredibly interested to learn that at the heart of The Sphere production is the use of a digital twin: a fully simulated, virtual replica of the venue and an area of digital transformation that is already reshaping fields far beyond entertainment.

I have been working with them in climate change and environmental sustainability, complex, data-rich simulations that model weather patterns, river levels, flood risk, and environmental change. These AI-enhanced twins allow scientists and policy makers to run scenarios at a scale and speed previously unimaginable: predicting the impact of rising temperatures, testing interventions, and identifying risks before they materialise. Here, the societal benefit is profound. Governments and organisations can make better-informed decisions about infrastructure, disaster preparedness, and sustainability. Instead of reacting to crises, they can anticipate them.

The same underlying principle applies: AI processes immense datasets and simulations, while humans apply judgment, ethics, and strategic intent.

The Goal is Soul

For all this progress, the Sphere experience underscores a vital boundary. Technology can construct the stage, but it cannot supply the soul.

This show is a remarkable feat, and I am honoured to have had the opportunity to experience it. But once is enough, any long-term fan of this band knows that ‘The goal is soul’.

For me, the most memorable moments of the performance were not the sweeping digital landscapes, but the human ones: a laugh from Bono in expanded giant size, the sight of comfortable friendship among Bono, Edge, Adam, and support for guest drummer Bram van den Berg (wishing Larry Mullen Jnr health and happiness), the quiet acoustic memorial to Shane MacGowan of the Pogues, a voice catching, a shared emotional beat across thousands of people. These are not programmable events. They emerge from lived experience.

This is where the conversation about AI must remain grounded. As systems become more capable, more fluent, more responsive, more “creative”, there is a risk of overestimating their independence. AI can generate imagery, analyse scripts, and even mimic narrative structure. But it does not possess intention. And, for now, it cannot originate emotional truth.

The following morning, we drove back to LA. As we drove through desert planes, we saw real Joshua Trees for the very first time in real life. And, as we played that 1987 album, singing along at full volume, we knew that was when we were dreaming beneath a desert sky.