On the final night of the (first?) American leg of this River Tour 2016 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, Bruce announced that he and the Band had decided against playing the full album at every show of their upcoming swing around the European continent. This news was greeted with excitement (“Yay! More setlist variety!”), disappointment (some European fans: “Wait! I want to see The River performed in full! Not fair…”), and self-hatred (me: “Crap! There go all of the pieces I was in the middle of writing that were based on the setlist structure built around the nightly full album performance). Since I’m planning to write recaps of all of the shows that I attend in Europe, I was originally saving a few of my thoughts inspired by the aforementioned setlist structure for various European shows that may have featured more of the same old setlist choices. But since it appears as if static setlists could be a phenomenon of the past for this tour – and since I want to keep my European recaps show-specific rather than tour-specific – a lot of these thoughts have sadly reached their expiration dates.
Author: Steven Strauss
PENN STATE: Down in a College Man’s Town
A slightly edited version of this post originally appeared on Backstreets.com, which you can read here.
Two types of fans predominantly populate your average Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band concert. The first group are the normal folks who only see the Band when they visit their hometown and love the performance regardless of the – unbeknownst to them – static setlists. The second group are the rest of us, those who basically stalk a geriatric band of rockers around the world to note and thus enjoy even the smallest changes between shows. As the (first?) North American leg of The River Tour 2016 enters its homestretch with only a week’s worth of shows remaining before hopping the pond for the summer, Bruce’s rambunctious stop at State College’s Bryce Jordan Center was a concert mostly filled with, played for, and appreciated by the aforementioned first group, dominated this evening by an inordinate number of exceedingly enthusiastic local university students. Though the second group of fans may have been dismayed at only the same old songs being played for the most part, the show and the crowd provided enough purified rock and roll juice to satiate even the snobbiest of audience members.
GREENSBORO: We Take Care of Our Own
Though Bruce Springsteen undoubtedly has written many more overtly political songs, his most widely known one must be “Born in the U.S.A,” a rock and roll anthem that a large number of people have misunderstood in different ways over the years. Some have criticized it for being a mindless “rah-rah-rah / USA! USA! USA!” rallying cry that Ronald Reagan infamously and mistakenly labeled it as during his 1984 presidential re-election campaign. Those who understand the many criticisms of post-Vietnam America contained in the song – which really only requires reading the lyrics – have labeled it as unpatriotic. Interestingly, in a classic Springsteen-ian interrelated dichotomy, both of these seemingly oppositional camps provide worthwhile perspectives…but not for the reasons they think.
DALLAS: Cowgirls in Their Hoedown Clothes
A marginally edited version of this post originally appeared on Backstreets.com, which you can read here.
At a Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band concert, everyone expects the former’s presence to be felt more than anyone else’s in the building. Yet at their sole stop in the Lone Star state on this River Tour 2016, the Boss surprisingly wasn’t the lone star of the evening; stationed mostly around the side platforms in the pit were an overwhelming bevy of Born in the U.S.A.-styled, dolled-up Texas “cowgirls,” emphasis on the latter half of that term. These bushels of broads – who have made appearances at shows of Texas past – were indeed more girls than women, with not a single one looking a day over 30 and a majority of them probably a decade away from being able to enjoy an adult beverage. Yet even without liquid courage, these gals were complete balls of vivacity, and Bruce not only fixated on them but derived increased energy from their liveliness from the very first note, which in turn further ignited the crowd. On a night when the setlist provided no real surprises – only one song differentiated it from OKC’s two evenings prior – these young ladies helped set the night apart, mostly for the better but regrettably sometimes for the worse.
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DENVER: ‘The River’ Tour Express 2016
A much shorter version of this post originally appeared on Backstreets.com, which you can read here.
Minutes after Bruce and the Band – sans Patti – bounded onto the stage of Denver’s Pepsi Center for their first stop on The River Tour 2016’s Midwestern swing, the former had a special introduction planned for the Mile High City during “Meet Me in the City.” Referencing the state’s most popular local resource, Bruce posed a new question to the crowd for the first time on this tour: “What I want to know is…WHERE ARE THE MARIJUANA GUMMY BEARS?!” Receiving an expectedly huge ovation – including many around me offering their own personal stash to the Boss – the crowd probably didn’t realize at the time that this city-specific joke would set the whole mood for the night: it was an out and out PARTY, with both Bruce, the Band, and the crowd on a pure rock and roll jovial high from beginning to end.
SEATTLE: Setlist-less in Sign-attle
A condensed version of this post originally appeared on Backstreets.com, which you can read here.
What the hell do they put in the water in Seattle?!
From the moment Bruce literally sprinted up the stairs and onto the Key Arena stage to begin Thursday night’s rip-roaring concert in the Emerald City, it was clear he was in rare form. Yes, Bruce almost always looks like a man on a mission, but after skipping the E Street-deprived city on the last three tours, this stop felt like a release of over eight years of pent up energy from both the Boss and the Boss-ravenous crowd. And for one of the first times all tour, this show featured a bevy of something that Bruce’s more passionate fans have been clamoring for since Pittsburgh: surprises.
Look Over Yonder See My Name Up in Lights
Though I’m scared this post will come off as excessively showboaty (totally a real word…), I couldn’t resist sharing something so cool.
Last week, writer-editor extraordinaire Greil Marcus published his latest offering in his monthly series “Real Life Rock Top 10” for one of the true promised lands of online music journalism: Pitchfork . Each entry “offers incisive commentary on what he’s called everyday culture and found objects—including songs, albums, movies, novels, commercials, TV shows, overheard remarks, and more—making connections across time and circumstance.” He’s been writing this column for three decades, and Pitchfork only recently began publishing them on their website.
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An Open Letter to Bruce Springsteen
Hi Bruce,
I know you’re aware of what happened earlier this week, but allow me roughly 90 seconds to catch up all of those unlucky souls who were not in attendance at your concert on Sunday night at Oakland’s Oracle Arena:
RANKING THE RIVER – Introduction
In recent months, Bruce Springsteen has spoken more about what he was thinking when writing The River – objectively his most expansive and longest album; subjectively my favorite album of his, which is REALLY saying something – than he has at any other point in his career. For its 35th anniversary in 2015, Bruce Inc.[1] released a rather marvelous box set that includes:
ROCHESTER: I Wanna Be Goin’ Down With You
A fairly edited version of this post originally appeared on Backstreets.com, which you can read here.
Rochester?!
Those setlist-watching from home may have expressed the above sentiment many a time throughout Saturday night’s barnburner of a concert at Rochester’s Blue Cross Arena, but they would have forgotten one of the cardinal rules of E Street Nation: expect the greatest shows in the most unexpected of cities. Though many just assume Bruce and the Band will deliver their best performances in the biggest markets, the smallest, most rundown dumps of venues[1] located in oft-forgotten cities commonly bring out their absolute A game. And that’s exactly what the electric fans squished into Rochester’s tiny arena[2] were treated to over and over and over again in yet another 34-song, three-hour and 15-minute set that included three (3!) tour premieres, including one rare outtake, one gem off their most popular album, and the return of perhaps one of the most seminal songs in their entire catalogue, ultimately rivaling Philadelphia to take the title of top show of the tour thus far.
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Write All Nite 