Bruce Springsteen - Classic or Dud ?

Love what Tom Petty said about those shows. Before he went onstage, someone said, “Now Tom, it might sound like people are booing, but they’re actually saying ‘Brooooce!’” Petty said, “Well…what’s the difference?”

lol

xpost it's pretty wild to consider, but just about every springsteen show from the '70s through the BitUSA tour is pretty awesome. just different to degrees.

The thing that knocks me out about this period is the energy level, it’s like they start at a 10 and end on a 15! they must fully collapse after each show, it’s so crazy

Honestly, I got many other same vibes during the reunion shows. It would feel like it's hitting peak, then you realize you're only 90 minutes, halfway, and how many must play songs he's going to get around to.

yeah, i mean they still have a crazy energy level even now, but those late 70’s show to me are like a whole different level

hook them up to a generator & they could power a small midwest town!

I totally agree. My take in 1999 was basically "this is incredible ... and 20 years past his peak."

Mr Veg got the 2-night SF Winterland shows from 1978… so good. Another reason love the 78-79 shows are that almost every song in the setlist is a favorite lol

Highlight: night 2 - “The Fever”
Such a great rare track, I love when it shows up in his setlists because the whole song is such a mood. I read that until the 78 darkness tour they hadnt played fever for like 5 years or something

from wiki:

“RADIO INTERVIEW ED SCIAKY August 19, 1978, WIOQ-FM (Philadelphia) Ed Sciaky: Wait a minute—you didn't do “Fever” for about five years. Bruce Springsteen: It was just a surprise, you know. We'd done it two or three times and the tape had gotten out through someone's help whose name I won't mention. So we did it a few times and we had to do it here. I used to have kids run up onstage and yell in my ear, “BRUCE! ‘FEVER’!” That was always a request. Ed Sciaky: You used to say you didn’t like the song, and a lot of people think it’s one of your best. Bruce Springsteen: I don’t know. It was just something that I wrote so long ago. It was just an older song and never a real favorite of mine. I liked it. I always liked it. But just for myself. I liked Southside Johnny’s version—I liked what he did with it a lot. But we wanted to have something extra, so we pulled it out.”

and Candy’s Room from night 2 sounds fucking amazing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NagFTFjfdyM

Just got a vintage half-speed master Darkness on vinyl for $5!

wrote another piece for the E Street Shuffle blog
https://estreetshuffle.com/index.php/2021/11/27/two-faces-rockaway-the-days/

Looking fwd, esp. since i just now read the first one!
One of the striking quotes (after Tennyson's"baths of the western stars," for inst)
East to the desert where the charros, they still ride and rope
Our American brothers cross the wire and bring the old ways with them. Scary bit in there, I think, and another reminder, as is your whole take, that the song can go where the narrator and maybe writer can't see, maybe doesn't want to see, if he "takes the optimistic view," and maybe also the writer wishes, without saying it out loud to himself, that his own life was as simple as the guy's in the song, simple and upholstered/filtered just enough, so far (R. Crumb character: "Is this a system?" Sure it is!)

Wow. Study of verses/ and x chorus otm---wonder if he'd been thinking about the "Born In The USA/"Glory Days" syndrome, where dark verses keep getting upstaged by bright choruses, too easy to take out of context, esp. the former, getting played at Republican ralltess?

(Tyler and I were talking about that phenomenon on the The Band thread, re some peoples' takes on "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down.")

I wonder! It was really hard to do the recap part of that one because of the sheer amount of flat exposition in the verses; so much of it is "well this happened, then this happened, then this happened."

He's definitely trying something different with narration, a lot like "Shut out the Light," which also has that third-person verse, first-person chorus thing going on. Though in "Shut Out the Light" the chorus and verses are pretty clearly about the same person; it doesn't have the ambiguity there is here.

Entirely possible I'm reading too much into it and "Rockaway the Days" is closer to "Shut Out the Light" than it is to "Wreck on the Highway."

In contrast to the selections whose currents, plot-twists, depths are so well explored by Lily Dale, here's one that plays itself in my head pretty often, something simpler, but distinctive (my comments to a bonus track for personal Top 50, posted in the series of such lists on RockCritics.com):
Bruce Springsteen labored for years on Born To Run, as the title became ironic, but a lot of it worked, to varying degrees–most of all, for me, in “Meeting Across The River,” which still sounds like a magical one-off: a seemingly basic scenario, with no purple passages, as written, sung, and played. Roy Bittan’s keys get room to breathe, Richard Davis’s bass slips through shadows, as it did on Astral Weeks, and Randy Brecker, having left his own purple passages far behind in Blood Sweat & Tears and The Brecker Brothers Band, leans his trumpet waaay out of
Cherry’s nightside window and fire escape (I don’t think she’s home).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6OAtvjSf1Y

(PS: this may be the only instance of Springsteen having a solo complete the song---a trumpet solo, of all things---rather than full E Street and maybe more, as setting for words and journeyman vocal.)(Or same function for small group/unaccompanied guitar)

Lily Dale, anybody: check w RockCritics.com editor to see if he's still taking lists; they're still showing up on there for sure---comments and links aren't required---scottmichaelwoods at gmail dot com (at least get on the mailing list, for some fun reading)

Wrote one about "Cynthia"
https://estreetshuffle.com/index.php/2021/12/06/two-faces-cynthia/

Completely unintentionally posted on the anniversary of Roy Orbison's death, which I hope doesn't come across as mean-spirited.

Greg Tate on Bruce Springsteen

Where are all my Negroes at? Why aren’t there more Black people out here screaming Bruuuuce like Dolly Earshatterer to the rear of my right lobe? Could it possibly be because The Boss’s ascendancy roughly coincided with the landing of The Mothership and the rise of another hellified Jersey band by the name of Parliament-Funkadelic? But Springsteen? Man, I didn’t know, fool that I sometimes be. Wasn’t like folk hadn’t tried to tell a brother— Nelson George proclaiming Bruuuce The Hardest Working Man Since James Brown and whatnot, moreso than The Artist even.

But to finally see Springsteen live is to become some kind of believer. First, because he’s truly unruly and got That Thang, which one might roughly translate as the ability to enchant, delight, and power-fuck a crowd for two and a half hours as he did at the Meadowlands Saturday night. Second, because he’s not taking indifference for an answer and you’d have to be dead to not respond to his shock tactics. From his humble and introspective MTV/VH1 sound bites you wouldn’t necessarily know Springsteen was such a stage hogg, dogg. A shameless ham with an ego the size of Bill Gates’s money tree who lives to leave an already hysterical crowd limp or speaking in tongues.

Like David Bowie is the last rock star, guardian of that music’s aristocratic high castle, Springsteen is the last real rock and roller, final embodiment of that working-class music hero whose name and fame got built from hometown roots on up. Twenty-five years beyond superstardom Bowie and Springsteen still impress because they both still take it to the stage like they’re hungry for your love. To see Springsteen in a Jersey arena is to see Springsteen under a revival tent. It’s in fact where his blue-collar creed connects up with his all-American Confidence Man Carny Barker Televangelist shtick. So that you get band introductions being delivered as prophecy (“And the gypsy woman said you need looooove in your life! Introducing Patty Scialfa, ladies and gentlemen! And she said you need rhythm! Max Weinberg!”) and the man’s patented grandstanding on top of Roy Bittan’s grand piano being made into a forum for crowd-incitement that would give Robert Duvall’s Apostle a run for his money, or maybe even the Muhammad Ali of What’s-My-Name fame. Springsteen’s rapport with his folks staggers not only for the degree of adulation present, but for his ability to move them from vulgarity to deep thought in a heartbeat.

I do not think that the existence of Parliament-Funkadelic meant that you couldn't or shouldn't like Bruce Springsteen. Plenty of people like more than one band. At one point I suspect I might even have liked three (3) different bands

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8lRKCw2_Pk

xpost you are missing the point slightly
also dude just passed away & it’s a great piece!

"Since I accepted my editor’s offer of a fool’s mission to write about some cat I’d barely paid attention to in 30 years of record buying, all I can offer by way of apology is that I’m now catching up on my homework."

Hah, nice!

Maybe Jon Bon Jovi finally got through to him, because Bruce has apparently allowed himself to go grey!

https://scontent-ort2-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/263409066_270088391825896_7104403400672515086_n.jpg?_nc_cat=103&ccb=1-5&_nc_sid=8bfeb9&_nc_ohc=UxINKshyOhcAX96Wa4b&_nc_ht=scontent-ort2-1.xx&oh=9a6cde27305882491015d99496cf744a&oe=61B78CD0

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/dec/16/bruce-springsteen-sells-entire-back-catalogue-of-music-to-sony-for-500m-report

Meanwhile, Bruce appeared at a Steve Earle benefit show the other night for his first electric (mini) set since I think 2016 (SNL aside), and he sounded good!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lyR_VpBTWA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOGg6IluugY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_jVltfkL-xo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evOJmE2OCXM

Jesus I was not prepared for how big mad online people were going to get for Springsteen's catalog sale. Jesus some people are furious that he's not like, giving the songs away for free because he's already too rich?

I guess people are just mad that Bruce managed a (relatively) rare feat in the music biz, being able to hold onto the rights for an impressively large and fruitful catalog long enough to cash out on his hard work. Good for him, tbh, I mean isn't that what every songwriter would want to do?

Yeah, especially since Bruce is otherwise such a relative purist. No endorsements, not even a Bruce-model Tele, only that one (shitty) commercial that got pulled so fast it almost makes me think it was a stunt, doesn't typically license songs for TV or movies, certainly usually not for commercials, Jeep-ad exception aside, keeps concert ticket prices modest (by major artist standards). Probably better to sell the rights now and pocket the money than die and let people squabble (and sell/license your shit, anyway).

Let him sell his music and tax the shit out of it is the actual answer here imo. Anyway yeah, it's a dumb windmill to joust with. You're not going to persuade Bruce fans to be mad at him for being rich, that ship has long sailed.

He wrote actual songs about that ship sailing iirc.

Someday we'll look back on this and it will all seem funny.

Your papa says he knows that I'm a filthy capitalist

Everybody sells out
Baby that's a fact

Adam raised a bitcoin

57 Channels and Jim Cramer's On

the record company, rosie, just gave me HALF A BILLION DOLLARS

Glory Pays

the river OF CASH

He ain't gonna ride in no used car again, that's for sure.

Getting made at any artist past 70 for selling their catalog is idiotic. Robbie Robertson talked about this in his Rolling Stone interview when they discussed similar sales by guys like Dylan - to put it succinctly:

"I certainly understand, seeing when some people pass away, like Prince or Tom Petty, and then the families are stuck with a mess and everybody hates one another and all of that shit. It’s not a bad idea to get this shit sorted out while you’re still around."

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/robbie-robertson-interview-the-band-the-weight-stage-fright-bob-dylan-1122213/

I guess he could leave it to specific family members and hope they don't license his stuff (and also be okay with administering his catalog as another job - even then that on its own won't last), but regardless, he can't live forever and has to relinquish control eventually.

Wasn't there also something about the economics of the value of catalogues changing because of streaming, not sure.

Let's go easy on Bruce. His daughter needs a reserve horse to augment her backup horse in case something is wrong with her main horse

Wasn't there also something about the economics of the value of catalogues changing because of streaming, not sure.

Yeah Robertson mentioned that. Basically, publishing was the most valuable bond in the music business - he said he learned from the start NEVER sell your publishing, but that's longer the case as the economics have changed so much.

*no longer the case

I guess the alternative is throwing it all into the public domain or setting up some kind of charity, but I would not be surprised at all if he does some *major* donations in the next few years.

Me and her went for a ride, sir,
And 500 million dollars later…

Let's go easy on Bruce. His daughter needs a reserve horse to augment her backup horse in case something is wrong with her main horse

She's an easy target, but tbf one of his other kids is a firefighter, so maybe they balance out.

"what may be the biggest deal in music for an individual body of work"! That's really something.

I don't understand why I, as a fan of any of these people, would care if they decide to sell their catalog? It doesn't change anything about the delivery of that music or how I might hear it, aside from maybe hearing "State Trooper" in a Geico ad in five years.

I already suffered through this Volvo ad so I don't know that anything can be worse on that front.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2FFCBAY4G-g