U2 book signing causes mayhem on O'Connell St

250 fans, who won tickets via their website and radio competitions, had their dream come true when all four members signed copies of their new book, U2 By U2.
However that didn't stop plenty more people gathering outside the store, which had to shut for five hours to allow the event to take place. And their dedication paid off: The four musicians spent 10 minutes shaking hands and waving to fans who had waited for hours in the rain.
In other U2 news, their collaboration with Green Day, the much-vaunted cover of The Skids’ 1978 chestnut ‘The Saints Are Coming’, got a public airing on September 25 when the two bands played before the New Orleans Saints’ NFL encounter with the Atlanta Falcons.
It was the first game to be played in the Louisiana Superdome since Hurricane Katrina ripped through the city in August 2005.
The previous week found the two bands convening in Abbey Road studio with producer Rick Rubin to record the song for single release.
“They just went straight in and started playing,” says U2 soundman Joe O’Herlihy. “Quite different bands but what they have in common is this amazing musical vitality.”
Due for physical release on November 6, the cover of the single will feature U2 shaking hands with Green Day on the level-crossing outside Abbey Road, which was immortalised by The Beatles. It'll also join another new song on a "definitive" 16-track Best Of..., which follows a fortnight later.
“To be sitting there in the studio with U2 and talking on a creative level was something you wouldn’t imagine in your wildest dreams,” Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong reflects. “We started playing Buzzcocks songs and a little bit of Stiff Little Fingers and, because it was Abbey Road, some Beatles songs too. Some of it sounded god-awful, and some of it was pretty good!”