Tom Dunne: I met the Corkman who has ultimate control at U2 in Las Vegas  

Joe O'Herlihy began his association with U2 in 1970s as a soundman at the Arcadia in Cork. He's still a sound man in every sense of the word, and it was great to catch up with him at Sphere in Las Vegas 

 A file picture of Joe O'Herlihy, the Cork-born sound engineer for U2. (Photo by Tom Herde/The Boston Globe via Getty Images)

Worth pointing out that in all the U2 hoo-ha – the $2.3 billion Sphere, the 167,000 speakers, the state-of-the-art screens, the haptic speakers in the seats, the AI-generated Elvis Presleys and the contributions from Eno, Es Devlin and Marco Brambilla – there is one unique and irreplaceable element: A man from Cork.

He has been in position, front of house, since the 28th of September 1978 when a young four-piece band from Dublin asked him to do sound at their gig in the Arcadia near the train station in Cork. He has done U2’s sound ever since.