U2 tickets for Las Vegas show on sale now — with a catch

By Melissa Arseniuk

Published Tuesday, April 14, 2009 | 3:39 p.m.

Updated Wednesday, April 15, 2009 | 8:59 p.m.

Membership has its benefits, especially if you’re a diehard U2 fan.

Tickets for the band’s Oct. 23 show at the Sam Boyd Stadium don’t go on sale publicly until Saturday, but members of the band’s online fan club were given advance access to tickets this morning.

U2.com’s premium “Horizon” members were first able to purchase tickets today at 10 a.m. this morning. “Breathe” and “Boots” members, meanwhile, will have to wait until tomorrow to get their hands on some advance seats.

“Breathe” members get first dibs at 7 a.m. Wednesday, while “Boots” members won’t be able to purchase anything until 3 p.m.

You can also buy your way into a seven-hour presale. For $50, fans can buy a year’s membership to U2.com and gain access to day three of advance sales on Thursday.

The new member presale is scheduled to start at 10 a.m. and close at 5 p.m.

In addition to a two-day lead on the general ticket sales, new members will also get access to a members-only area of the site featuring exclusive videos, enhanced archives, interviews, and members-only message boards; a U2.com e-mail address; and a double CD featuring new, rare, and remastered tracks.

(Note: Membership activation can take up to 48 hours, so if you want to get in on Thursday’s new member presale, the time is now. Each new member can buy up to four tickets.)

Those unwilling or unable to shell out the $50 extra bucks, however, will have to wait until Saturday to try their luck at scoring seats to see the supergroup and their three-time Grammy Award-winning opening act, The Black Eyed Peas.

UNLVtickets (UNLVtickets.com or 1-877-522-8499) will open the floodgates to the remaining tickets at 10 a.m. Saturday.

The North American leg of the U2 “360” tour will make 20 stops across the continent, starting with the first of two shows in Chicago on Sept 12 and concluding in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Oct. 28.

NOTE: The original version of this story stated presale tickets to U2's Oct 23 performance are being sold through Ticketmaster, which was what was stated on both U2 and Ticketmaster's Web sites. However, UNLVtickets is handling both the presale and public sale of the tickets.