?

- Its closest city in the US to Toronto where they rehearse.
- Very upbeat, younger sort of crowd with more than 10 big colleges in the city.
- They probably want to start the tour doing the outdoor, east coast venues before the colder weather sets in.
- If the idea of the tour is to do lots of baseball stadiums than Fenway is the place to be right now with the Red Sox just winning the world series and the ballpark itself is one of the oldest and most historical, sort of similar to the Stones themselves.

Don't know the reason for sure but those are a few ideas.

Actually, Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo are closer to Toronto than Boston (I think).
As Hound Dog mentioned, hitting major cities when the weather is still okay would be a major factor. As well, geographically, it kind of makes sense to start in a corner of the country and work your way outward from there, as opposed to say, starting in St. Louis. U2 started in San Diego and worked northward from there.
Also, perhaps the Stones think Boston rocks?

According to Peter Rudge in 1975 and Bill Graham in 1981, the Stones always want to start in a city that is rather large, but doesn't have a very lively music (mostly written) press. They want to warm up and make mistakes without it being all over the press, and then later when warmed up go to "more important" cities like New York, Chicago and L.A.

Mathijs

Today’s medium works different than in the 70’s. A tour premiere is a premiere wherever it is. And the premiere is covered by all the dragons even in Boston.

If they want to do stadium shows in northern US maybe they can’t wait longer. Or when is the summer supposed to end in these areas?

Robert Greenfield said the thing in STP, Mathijs. In '72 they started in Vancouver and via San Fransisco to LA so they would be warmed up before they hit the big town!

Cheers,
Wuudy