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music · Friday 25 September 2026 · 7:00pm 
U2 Tribute ZOOROPA at OPIUM LIVE - U2 Fan Festival U250
At Opium · Opium, 26 Wexford Street, Dublin 2
At Opium · Opium, 26 Wexford Street, Dublin 2
ZOOROPA are Ireland’s leading U2 tribute act, and this September they take to the Opium stage on Wexford Street as the opening night of a landmark weekend marking 50 years of U2. The occasion is the U250 fan festival, put together by Welcome To The Northside - a Dublin fan organisation that has been celebrating U2’s roots in the city for a decade. If you care about the music rather than just the hits, this is the kind of night worth planning around: a proper live set, a room full of people who know the catalogue, and a band that has built a reputation for getting the sound and the spirit right.
ZOOROPA open the U250 weekend with a set that runs from the anthems you’d expect to the deep cuts and album tracks that only real fans know. The band are known for covering the full breadth of U2’s catalogue rather than sticking to a radio-friendly clip-reel, so expect tracks from across the decades - Achtung Baby era intensity, the pop phase, and the stadium-rock standards. The Eventbrite listing hints at a special guest or two on the night. The wider festival weekend also includes live music at other venues, fan meet-ups, guided U2 walks around Dublin, and an exclusive film screening. Friday at Opium is the live music anchor. The venue itself is a purpose-built live room with a proper stage, high-spec sound system, LED screens, and capacity for around 700 people - a good size for this kind of show, close enough to feel the room but big enough to breathe.
Opium is at 26 Wexford Street, Dublin 2, a short walk from St Stephen’s Green. Wexford Street sits between Camden Street and Aungier Street, in a stretch well served by Dublin Bus. The Luas Green Line stops at St Stephen’s Green, about a ten-minute walk. If you are driving from outside the city, the Harcourt Street and Drury Street multi-storeys are the closest paid car parks, though weekend city-centre parking fills early on a Friday evening. The DART brings you into Pearse or Tara Street stations, both walkable. The area is one of Dublin’s main live-music corridors, so you will have no trouble finding it.
Wexford Street leads directly up into Rathmines, and the area around Portobello and the Grand Canal is worth an hour before the show - good coffee, independent shops, and the easy pace of a neighbourhood that has not fully been swallowed by the city centre. There is more to see in Rathmines and across Co. Dublin.
Heading to Opium in Rathmines? Dublin has plenty more to see. Read the Rathmines area guide, find what else is on, and explore the towns and villages nearby.