U2 Break Biggest Tour Ever Record in Sao Paulo

Time to update the record books, for this weekend U2 laid claim to ownership of the highest grossing tour ever.

While Bono and The Edge's Spiderman musical suffers on Broadway, their band's career reaches ever greater heights. On Sunday, April 10, U2's second show at the Estádio do Morumbi in Sao Paulo, Brazil, saw their 360 tour break the previous record set by the Rolling Stones.

U2 have inched past the $558 million (£341 million) set by the British veterans for their A Bigger Bang extravaganza from 2005-7, though the Irish rockers are set to reach $700 million (£428 million) by the time they wrap up in Canada on July 30 at the Magnetic Hill Music Festival, Moncton, New Brunswick.

Billboard.com reports that by shifting seven million tickets for 110 shows, U2 will also snatch the record for highest attended tour -- another one currently held by the Stones. They boast a 6.4 million attendance for their 'Voodoo Lounge' tour, back in 1994-5.

U2's band manager Paul McGuinness said gaining the record was, "something we're very proud of having set. And to set it with a further 20-plus shows to go on the tour is kind of mind-blowing. It means that it's a record that will probably never be outstripped."

McGuinness believes the success has been hard won and relies on the importance U2 put on live shows. "We were always very conscious that we had two parallel careers, as recording artists and as live performers, and each was absolutely vitally important," he said.

McGuinness also revealed his charges take their global reach very seriously, especially the singer. "In our own kind of quiet way we were all somewhat military about it," he admitted. "We would talk about territories and conquering them, and if there was somewhere that was slower to come along, we would go back there and work it again. Bono is kind of a closet General Patton. So, for us, this is a real victory."

Tour producer Arthur Fogel, meanwhile highlighted the fact prices started as low as $30 (£18) and the unique staging that helped increase capacity. The attendance mark was "absolutely the bigger accomplishment," he said. "There are so many factors that play into it: the unique nature of the production, the ticket pricing model, the strategy of where to play and how many tickets are in the market."

Watch U2 Perform 'Where the Streets Have No Name' at the Hollywood Bowl