40 years later: Ultimate satisfaction for Rolling Stones fans at Slane Castle in 1982
Mick Jagger performing at Slane Castle, Co. Meath in 1982. Picture: Eddie O'Hare/Examiner Archive
The news in April 1982 that the Rolling Stones would perform their first gig in Ireland for 17 years was huge. There was a rush on tickets — 70,000 sold at a price of £12 each.
Irish music fans hadn’t seen the likes of it before. The concert dwarfed the scale of Slane Castle’s first outdoor gig a year earlier — when Thin Lizzy, supported by U2 and other bands, sold 20,000 tickets. According to a contemporary RTÉ report, the Stones gig at the same venue was going to be “the biggest event of its kind ever held in this country”.
