U2 celebrate 50th anniversary with concerts in Dublin and their former high school The band also paid tribute to “king busker” Glen Hansard

U2 returned to their former high school and played a surprise gig from Dublin’s Grafton Street yesterday (September 25) for special concerts to mark their 50th anniversary as a band. Check out photos, footage and more from what went down below. READ MORE: U2 – ‘Songs Of Surrender’ review: the classics, but not as you know them Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. – who played his first live concert since undergoing neck and back surgery in 2023 – performed in front of 1,000 pupils and staff above Mount Temple Comprehensive’s school playground, half a century after their sticksman first posted the handwritten note: “Drummer seeks musicians to form band”. Speaking ahead of the show on the playground, the band’s former RE teacher Sophie Shirley, now 80, told NME about seeing the note for the first time. U2 performing at Mount Temple in 1977. Credit: Press/supplied “I remember it well,” she said. “One day I happened to mention ‘God has a particular purpose for each individual’ and Larry’s hand went up and he said: ‘Miss I want to be a drummer in a band’. I’d never seen Larry speak with such emphasis and he never spoke up so much like that.” She continued: “I had to walk pa...