magic tour bruce springsteen

• Sep 25, 2022

'Magic' at 15: Why it's one of Springsteen's greatest albums

Bruce Springsteen's "Magic," in addition to its other accolades, has the distinction of being the album that helped inspire Blogness on the Edge of Town — this blog launched in November of 2007, just two months after "Magic" dropped in September of that year. Given it got bumped from my 2012 book " Glory Days: Springsteen's Greatest Albums " for space reasons, its 15th anniversary seemed like a great excuse to give it some long overdue appreciation.

After roaring back into the public consciousness with his expansive E Street Band-backed album “The Rising” in 2003, Bruce Springsteen surprised exactly no one by releasing a smaller, personal solo album, “Devils & Dust” in 2005. (It’s something he’d done before, following up “The River” with “Nebraska,” and his one-two punch of “Human Touch” and “Lucky Town” with “The Ghost of Tom Joad.”) But what he followed that with surprised exactly everyone.

“We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions,” a rollicking Americana tribute to songs popularized by Pete Seeger that was recorded in his barn, basically in one day, was not on anybody’s 2006 Springsteen bingo card. And a tour to follow with that motley crew of banjo and trombone players was even more of a shocker. Hello, didn’t he just get the E Street Band back together?

In the end, you can certainly make the argument that it was a worthy diversion, especially in the way Springsteen reinterpreted some of his own earlier material during those shows, something he’d almost never done. But it also meant that afterwards, his fan base was, perhaps more than ever, ready to rock and roll — and fortunately for them, so, it seems, was Bruce.

“Magic,” recorded in the spring of 2007 and released on Sept. 25 of that year, was what Springsteen fans had been waiting for, arguably since “Born in the USA” 23 years earlier: An album that, like “The Rising,” was rocking and versatile — but that sounded like a Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band album. That’s something “The Rising,” with its haunting fiddles and organs, never really did.

But it’s worth noting that “Magic,” like “The Rising,” is also about something: specifically, the state of the nation, in a way none of Springsteen’s earlier albums really had been. Granted, some of the issues he was concerned about — the war in Iraq, the erosion of civil liberties post 9/11, the questionable actions sanctioned by the Bush administration on many fronts — seem almost quaint in our current era of Trump-inspired election deniers and MAGA insurrectionists. But at the time they represented a disturbing turn for the country, and Springsteen, like he’d done with 9/11, was one of the few artists to call them out head-on.

That’s not to say “Magic” is some pastiche of Billy Bragg-style political polemics. Instead, it does what Springsteen does best: tells the story of our nation’s woes and challenges through clearly drawn characters, cutting turns of phrase, and a variety of well-executed musical styles, from straight-ahead rock to blue-eyed soul to lush pop, all (or at least most) in service to a furious overarching message.

“The album hides its raw disillusionment deep within the music, mingling it with a weary optimism and a thoroughly committed lustiness that have not diminished with age,” Stephen M. Deusner wrote in his review of the album for Pitchfork . “The result is a surprisingly complex album that recalls ‘The River’ in its heartfelt populism, ‘Darkness on the Edge of Town’ in its small-town scope, and ‘Tunnel of Love’ in its mature take on love and sex.” It was one of a raft of glowing reviews, and the general populace seemed to agree: “Magic” debuted at No. 1 in the U.S. and easily sailed to platinum status. Not bad for a 58-year-old artist’s 15th album.

Granted, “Magic” doesn’t start with what you’d call an instant classic. “Radio Nowhere” is lively but has some cringey moments, particularly when Springsteen evokes his decades-old concert audience query — ”Is there anybody ALIVE out there?” — as a repeated lyrical interlude. (Was that absolutely necessary?) Also, the unfortunate resemblance of its chord progressions to Tommy Tutone’s “867-5309/Jenny” doesn’t help.

What “Radio Nowhere” does do well, however, is lay down the album’s attitude: “I want a thousand guitars, I want pounding drums, I want a million different voices speaking in tongues,” Springsteen sings amid crashing and at some points dueling guitars, wailing backing vocals from Stevie Van Zandt, and even a strident sax solo from Clarence Clemons. (Max Weinberg of course provides the requested pounding drums throughout.) Musically, this record will be everything “We Shall Overcome” wasn’t, Bruce seems to be saying.

Apparently to that end, Springsteen once again utilized the production talents of Pearl Jam producer Brendan O’Brien, who’d also handled “The Rising.” The results have been a sticking point for fans ever since: The prevailing sentiment seems to be that the O’Brien-produced records tend to make it sound like the band had been recording from inside a cement mixer. And granted, there is a lot going on in some of these tracks, making it harder to discern, say, Roy Bittan’s striking piano lines and Danny Federici’s organ flourishes amid the clamor.

That’s certainly true in some cases, but a listen to “Magic” today reveals it’s far from a disaster, and many of the tracks are actually inarguably successful — although in terms of sheer listenability, the ones with the crispest production tend to come off the best.

Case in point: “I’ll Work For Your Love,” which kicks off the album’s second half with a classic Roy piano intro before diving into some of Springsteen’s best and most beautiful romance-meets-religion metaphors in years. “'Round your hair the sun lifts a halo, at your lips a crown of thorns,” he sings to the bartender for whose love he’s prepared to work, adding later, “'The pages of Revelation lie open in your empty eyes of blue.” Bittan’s piano buoys the track throughout, but Bruce’s own brief harmonica solo is also a welcome standout.

One track earlier, meanwhile, “Girls in Their Summer Clothes” is a looking-back ’60s-style nugget that evokes Phil Spector and the Beach Boys’ “Pet Sounds,” while at the same time embracing a sense of melancholy in a way those rarely did. “The girls in their summer clothes pass me by,” sings the song’s down-on-his-luck but ultimately optimistic hero (“Things been a little tight, but I know they're gonna turn my way”), more as an observation than a lament. (One wonders if Springsteen had read fellow New Jerseyan Philip Roth’s “Everyman,” released a year earlier, whose aging protagonist finds his charms no longer carry the weight they did in his youth.) The lush pop orchestration — which some might argue Springsteen would go on to overdo on 2009’s “Working on a Dream” — is simply perfect here, anchored by Garry Tallent’s ever-underrated bass brilliance.

Then there’s “Livin’ in the Future,” the album’s nod to “Born to Run”-era E Street soul, complete with glockenspiel, classic Federici organ riffs, and plenty of Stax-style honking from the Big Man. The lyrics, meanwhile, are some of Springsteen’s cleverest and most biting in his entire catalog, capturing the damaging effects of Bush-era swagger via figurative phrasing worthy of Elvis Costello:

“Woke up election day

Sky's gunpowder and shades of gray

Beneath the dirty sun

I whistle my time away

Then just about sundown

You come walking through town

Your boot heels clicking like

The barrel of a pistol spinning ’round.”

That verse, and the song in general, paint the perfect picture of a nation caught with its pants down as the powers that be drag it in a direction it never should have gone.

While not necessarily as interesting musically, two other tracks also do a good job equating the country’s political troubles with a failed relationship. “You’ll Be Comin’ Down,” a jangly, almost Byrds-style scorned lover lament, predicts a fitting end for the song’s titular target: “Easy street, a quick buck and true lies, smiles as thin as those dusky blue skies,” Springsteen describes, in as appropriate a take on George W. you’re likely to find, concluding later, “You'll be fine long as your pretty face holds out, then it's gonna get pretty cold out.”

And on “Your Own Worst Enemy,” Springsteen even more brilliantly conflates relationship malaise and political upheaval, painting a stunning picture of a guilty, possibly cheating lover for whom “the times, they got too clear, so you removed all the mirrors.” By the end it’s clear the enemy (as the song’s title would suggest) is us, having let our guard down and allowed the country to veer toward collapse under the weight of false patriotism: “Your flag it flew so high, it drifted into the sky,” he ends on, bitingly, in contrast to the song’s lush California sound — not quite as compelling here as on “Girls in Their Summer Clothes,” but still an effective vehicle for Bruce’s impressingly plaintive croon.

Not all of “Magic” has aged perfectly: The title track feels more like an interlude than a fully fleshed-out song, but its imagery and musical sense of foreboding make it stick. And “Last to Die,” with its dramatic string riffs and doubled vocal tracks, feels like it’s trying just a bit too hard (O’Brien’s frenzied production really doesn’t help here) — although, like “Magic,” it features more than its share of devastating, acerbic turns of phrase. (“We don't measure the blood we've drawn anymore, we just stack the bodies outside the door.”)

Two other tracks, meanwhile, are notable for offering some of Springsteen’s most compellingly literary lyrics, evocative and moving at the same time. What’s notable about “Gypsy Biker” and “Devil’s Arcade” is that they don’t fall back on the folk/country story-song style Bruce employed for songs like “Highway Patrolman.” Instead, they’re rife with finely drawn scenes that, woven together, both complete the story and break our collective hearts.

In “Gypsy Biker,” which tells of a small-town man lost to war, we meet the mother who “pulled the sheets up off [his] bed,” the grieving sister clutching his folded flag, the drunken brother, the room full of silent relatives “just waitin' on the phone.” Then Springsteen — whose driving harmonica and resigned vocals combine to riveting effect throughout the track — poetically describes his friends’ final pilgrimage with the lost soldier’s bike:

“We rode her into the foothills, Bobby brought the gasoline

We stood 'round her in a circle as she lit up the ravine

The spring high desert wind rushed down on us all the way back home.”

“Devil’s Arcade” starts much more quietly, building from silence to an eerie hum and haunting cello before giving way to eventual driving drums (some of Max’s best work on the album), plaintive, emotive guitar and far more strident strings. Told from a woman’s perspective, it starts with mingled images of lust and death before springing forward to paint the effects of war on her wounded lover and herself.

“The cool desert morning, then nothin' to save

Just metal and plastic where your body caved

The slow games of poker with Lieutenant Ray

In the ward with the blue walls, a sea with no name

Where you lie adrift with the heroes of the devil's arcade.”

In the last verse, she allows herself to dream of “a bed draped in sunshine, a body that waits,

for the touch of your fingers at the end of the day.” As the slow beat of Max’s drum fades away to end the track, the unlikelihood of those hopes ever coming to pass is agonizing.

(This would have been a fitting way to bring the album to a close; instead it ends with “Terry’s Song,” the solo tribute to Springsteen’s just-passed longtime colleague, confidant and friend Terry McGovern, added just before release. It’s spare, personal, moving, obviously heartfelt — and probably should have been left off.)

“Devil’s Arcade” would definitely be in the running for the album’s masterpiece, but I’d argue for another track: “Long Walk Home,” a song that encapsulates the album’s theme and is, ultimately, quintessentially Springsteenesque. Its images of small-town decay — “The diner was shuttered and boarded with a sign that just said ‘gone’” — are as haunting as any in the Springsteen canon, and when the narrator quotes his father in the last verse, it’s a damning indictment of where we were as a country:

“You know that flag flying over the courthouse

means certain things are set in stone

Who we are, what we'll do and what we won't.”

And yet, the song is hopeful in that way that the best Springsteen songs always are: in its upbeat melody, in in the driving thrum of his guitar and the choral backing vocals from Stevie and Patti Scialfa, in the thrilling guitar and saxophone breaks — and in the sentiment behind the idea that “it’s gonna be a long walk home.” It’s an idea built on Springsteen’s long-stated belief that the America we carry in our hearts is waiting, and if we have the determination to seek it out, eventually we can get to it. (Of course, the walk home may be even longer now than it was then — but that’s another story.)

In the end, “Magic” funneled something Springsteen likely also found appealing in those old songs he sang during the Seeger Sessions — namely, righteous anger and the idea that things can be better, if only we wake up to the need to make them that way — into something that stands neck and neck with his greatest and most representative works. And all through is the much-welcome return of the E Street Band as we knew it: sometimes a bit lost in the mix, but with enough inspiring standout moments to feel like they were more than helping Bruce carry the weight.

Sadly, the photo on the gatefold of the album’s vinyl version — featuring Danny, Max, Nils, Clarence, Bruce, Patti, Stevie and Garry in glorious black and white, boasting various expressions of joy and contemplation — was the last time we’d seem them together like that on one of Bruce’s recorded works; Danny would wind up leaving the Magic tour and passing away from melanoma in 2008, and of course we lost Clarence to a stroke a few years later. That the band was able to come together as a whole that one last time, and create something as glorious and important as “Magic,” is something for which we should be forever grateful.

More on "Glory Days: Springsteen's Greatest Albums" here .

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The Magic Tour was Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's 2007–2008 concert tour of North America and Western Europe.

The tour began October 2, 2007, in Hartford, Connecticut, and concluded August 30, 2008 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. This was his first tour with the E Street Band since 2004's Vote for Change shows and the first prolonged outing with them since the 2002–2003 Rising Tour.

After the conclusion of the tour's first leg on November 19, 2007, organist Danny Federici took a leave of absence from the tour, to pursue treatment for melanoma. He was replaced by Charles Giordano, who had played with Springsteen on the 2006 Sessions Band Tour. Federici made his only return to the stage on March 20, 2008, during the tour's third leg, when he appeared for portions of a show in Indianapolis. He died on April 17, 2008; the next two shows of the tour were postponed.

The Magic Tour was one of the biggest tours of the year and won the 2008 Billboard Touring Awards for Top Tour, Top Draw, and Top Manager (for Jon Landau). The Magic Tour had the second-highest gross worldwide for 2008 in Billboard's rankings, with $204.5 million and trailing only Bon Jovi's Lost Highway Tour. In Pollstar's calculus for North America, the Magic Tour had the sixth-highest gross for 2008 at $69.3 million. In any case, in total over its two years, the Magic Tour grossed more than $235 million.

Recordings [ ]

Early on the first leg, the starting three songs (one more than planned) of the October 10, 2007 Continental Airlines Arena show were broadcast live over VH1 Classic. Throughout much of the tour, video clips of one performance from a show, usually cut down to a one- to two-minute excerpt, would be posted on Springsteen's official website.

On July 4, 2008, with much fanfare, Sirius Satellite Radio's E Street Radio channel broadcast selected songs from the show that day at the Ullevi in Göteborg, Sweden, although in practice there was much more of host Dave Marsh talking with phone callers than there was of the concert.

On July 15, 2008, Springsteen released the live audio and video EP Magic Tour Highlights , which collected guest appearances from the third leg, including Federici's only return.

Several shows were released as part of the Bruce Springsteen Archives:

• Scottrade Center, St. Louis, MO, 8/23/08 , released April 14, 2017
• TD Banknorth Garden, Boston 11/19/07 , released April 6, 2018
• St. Pete Times Forum, Tampa, FL April 22, 2008 , released February 1, 2019
• Greensboro Coliseum Complex, Greensboro, NC April 28, 2008 released November, 6 2020
• Conseco Fieldhouse, Indainapolis, March 20, 2008 released October 22, 2021

Postponed dates [ ]

• 1 Born In The U.S.A. Tour
• 2 Cindy Mizelle
• 3 E Street Band

Magic Tour Highlights - EP

July 15, 2008 4 Songs, 24 minutes ℗ 2008 Bruce Springsteen

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Bruce Springsteen|Magic Tour Highlights

Magic Tour Highlights

Bruce Springsteen

• Released on 7/7/08 by Columbia
• Main artists: Bruce Springsteen
• Genre: Pop/Rock

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This four-song EP spotlights special moments on Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band's tour in support of the album Magic, although none of the songs come from that disc. Each song features another performer in addition to Springsteen, starting with "Always a Friend," by Alejandro Escovedo, who joins the band on-stage to perform it (and who just happens to be another client of Springsteen's manager, Jon Landau). Next up is Tom Morello, guitarist of Rage Against the Machine, whose band once covered Springsteen's "The Ghost of Tom Joad." He and Springsteen sing it together, and he takes characteristically angular guitar solos, transforming it into something of a metal stomp. Roger McGuinn then steps up for an excellent version of "Turn! Turn! Turn!," joining a man who, like him, has demonstrated an affinity for the music of Pete Seeger. Finally, the old Springsteen ballad "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)" gives a showcase not to a guest, but to a now-departed bandmate. It features the late Danny Federici, stepping forward on accordion, and here serves as a valedictory to the E Street Band's longtime keyboardist, who died a few months before this EP was released. © William Ruhlmann /TiVo

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Not Documented, Producer - Bob Clearmountain, Mixing Engineer - Chuck Prophet, Lyricist - Chuck Prophet, Composer - Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Performer - Alejandro Escovedo, Performer - Alejandro Escovedo, Composer - Alejandro Escovedo, Lyricist - Brett Dicus, 2nd Engineer - Brandon Duncan, Mixing Engineer - Bob Ludwig, Mastering Engineer - John Cooper, Recording Engineer -

(P) 2008 BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN

Not Documented, Producer - Bob Clearmountain, Mixing Engineer - Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Performer - Brett Dicus, 2nd Engineer - Bruce Springsteen, Composer - Bruce Springsteen, Lyricist - Brandon Duncan, Mixing Engineer - Tom Morello, Performer - Bob Ludwig, Mastering Engineer - John Cooper, Recording Engineer -

Not Documented, Producer - Bob Clearmountain, Mixing Engineer - Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Performer - Brett Dicus, 2nd Engineer - Pete Seeger, Composer - Pete Seeger, Lyricist - Brandon Duncan, Mixing Engineer - Bob Ludwig, Mastering Engineer - John Cooper, Recording Engineer - Roger McGuinn, Performer -

Not Documented, Producer - Bob Clearmountain, Mixing Engineer - Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Performer - Danny Federici, Performer - Brett Dicus, 2nd Engineer - Bruce Springsteen, Composer - Bruce Springsteen, Lyricist - Brandon Duncan, Mixing Engineer - Bob Ludwig, Mastering Engineer - John Cooper, Recording Engineer -

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About the album.

• 1 disc(s) - 4 track(s)
• Total length: 00:24:44
• Composer: Various Composers
• Label: Columbia

(P) 2008 Bruce Springsteen

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Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band Get Loose in Los Angeles

By Ethan Millman

Ethan Millman

Three hours into Bruce Springsteen ‘s epic return to Los Angeles on Thursday night with the E Street Band, he stared down the sold-out crowd at the Forum. “Do you have anything left?” he shouted, midway through “Twist and Shout,” the second-to-last song of his first L.A. show in eight years. Five decades in, the magic of a Springsteen show remains: He always seems to have a little bit left in the tank. 

The 2024 version of the tour has been looser than last year’s, which stuck fairly close to a single set list, and Thursday was no exception. Springsteen kicked off with a true rarity, a cover of John Lee Hooker’s “Boom Boom” (most frequently played on the Tunnel of Love Express Tour back in 1988), before jumping into “Lonesome Day” (rarely played last year, but now a staple in the set) and “Prove It All Night,” then his live -favorite arena-rock reworking of Jimmy Cliff’s “Trapped.”

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Six dates into their return to the road, Springsteen and the E Street Band sounded like they had never been interrupted. “Are you having fun yet? Because we haven’t had fun yet,” Springsteen told the crowd just over an hour into his show. “This is our pre-fun. We’re here to wake you up, shake you up, and take you to higher ground. The E Street Band is here to bring the joyous power of rock & roll into your life. But we need your help. We plan on sending you home with your feet hurting, your hands hurting, your ass in paralysis, and your sexual organs stimulated.”

Springsteen maintains a remarkably simple setup and show presentation compared to the other blockbuster live shows currently on the road. The visuals are limited to video screens and elegant stage lights, keeping the focus on the 17 musicians onstage with him. He doesn’t really need much else. 

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From there, the show was all joy and catharsis, with an unbroken string of hits and live favorites, beginning with Nils Lofgren’s jaw-dropping guitar virtuosity on “Because the Night,” and inevitably reaching “Thunder Road” and “Born to Run.” As he has throughout the tour, Springsteen finished the show alone with his meditation on life after death, “I’ll See You in My Dreams.” 

Springsteen and the E Street Band will play another Forum show on Sunday.

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• Darkness  ( 112 )
• Devils & Dust  ( 72 )
• Forward  ( 7 )
• Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J.  ( 165 )
• High Hopes  ( 34 )
• Human Rights Now!  ( 20 )
• Lawsuit Tour  ( 57 )
• Magic  ( 102 )
• Reunion Tour  ( 133 )
• Seeger Sessions  ( 58 )
• Springsteen & E Street Band 2023 Tour  ( 66 )
• Springsteen On Broadway  ( 236 )
• Springsteen On Broadway 2021  ( 30 )
• Springsteen & E Street Band 2024 World Tour  ( 11 )
• Summer '17 Tour  ( 14 )
• The Ghost of Tom Joad  ( 133 )
• The Rising  ( 123 )
• The River  ( 145 )
• The River Tour 2016  ( 75 )
• The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle  ( 207 )
• Tunnel of Love Express  ( 68 )
• Vote for Change  ( 10 )
• Working on a Dream  ( 88 )
• Wrecking Ball  ( 136 )
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Average setlist for tour: Magic

Note: only considered 100 of 102 setlists (ignored empty and strikingly short setlists)

• Radio Nowhere Play Video
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• Magic Play Video
• Out in the Street Play Video
• Reason to Believe Play Video
• Prove It All Night Play Video
• The Promised Land Play Video
• She's the One Play Video
• Because the Night ( Patti Smith Group  cover) Play Video
• Livin' in the Future Play Video
• Devil's Arcade Play Video
• Mary's Place Play Video
• The Rising Play Video
• Last to Die Play Video
• Long Walk Home Play Video
• Badlands Play Video
• Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out Play Video
• Girls in Their Summer Clothes Play Video
• Born to Run Play Video
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Bruce Springsteen and E Street Band at MetLife: 6 magical moments you might have missed

4 minute read.

There were spirits in the night and magic at MetLife Stadium for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's three show run on Wednesday, Aug. 30; Friday, Sept. 1; and Sunday, Sept. 3.

But not all the magic took place on stage at the East Rutherford venue. Here are some magical moments you might have missed:

Leapin' lizards, Little Orphan Annie was in the general admission pit of the Wednesday, Aug. 30, show.

She was holding a sign that said “Song for Orphans,” a reference to the Springsteen song that dates back to the '70s but was released on the 2020 album, “Letter to You.”

“It's one of my favorite songs but he's not really taking on requests on this tour," said Annie, aka Cassidy Quinn of Rahway. “I didn't expect him to play it, but i just wanted to get his attention and it worked. He winked at the sign and he laughed. I got acknowledged by him and I'm really happy about that.”

More: Bruce Springsteen rocks, and gives dating advice, at MetLife Night 3: Review and setlist

More: Springsteen Archives 'Wild, Innocent' symposium to feature 'original E Street' members

The Boss sat on the pit rail next to an out of costume Quinn during Sunday's show. The 26-year old was part of a new generation of Springsteen fans at the shows, which gave the run an extra spark of energy.

“Bruce's music does appeal to people of the younger generation,” Quinn said. “Not to get political, but he does make political statements and he does talk about the working class and I think that does appeal to people who are interested in social justice. So it's not just music of our parents' generation. It appeals to young people.”

E Streeters visit Spring-Nuts

Not all the E Street Band action took place on the MetLife stage.

Band members Garry Tallent, percussionist Anthony Almonte and trombonist Ozzie Melendez joined the fans known as the Spring-Nuts on Aug. 31 at Redd's Bar and Restaurant in Carlstadt for their annual Seaside Serenade.

Nicki Germaine, girlfriend of Tallent, signed copies of her book, “Springsteen: Liberty Hall,” and Almonte led the crowd in a chorus of the Springsteen song, “If I Were a Priest.” All four signed autographs. The event raised more than $34,000 for WHY Hunger.

“There's no one like the E Street Band, period,” said head Spring-Nut Howie Chaz. “There's just not. They're so gracious and they went above and beyond.”

Moon over the Meadowlands

There was a surprise in the sky toward the end of Wednesday's show: a Super Blue Moon rose over the Meadowlands. It was shown on the stage's video screens.

“Full moon fever over Jersey,” tweeted Nils Lofgren after the show. “It felt real good. Thanks for coming out.”

On Friday, Springsteen referenced the moon from the stage. Not only was there a “Spirit in the Night,” but there was a big moon in the sky as well.

The spectacle added to the magic.

Nils Lofgren on a bike

If you were outside the E Street Lounge about a half hour before showtime on Sunday, you saw the darnedest thing.

Nils Lofgren riding a bicycle back and forth with the big grin. He was wearing his stage clothes and he kind of looked like Paul Newman in the bicycle scene from “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.” A few passes and off he went to rock the 50,000 at MetLife.

He traded his wheels for wings.

E Street Horns and the E Street Choir

The E Street Horns and the E Street Choir provided plenty of highlights at MetLife that were hard to miss.

Other times their contributions were a little more subtle, like the melodic brass lines for “Spirit in the Night,” which lent the song a swing element that agreed with the boozy Greasy Lake vibe of the track.

Jake Clemons and Eddie Manion on sax; Curt Ramm and Barry Danielian on trumpet; and Ozzie Melendez on trombone are among the best in the business, and it showed at MetLife.

The choir — Curtis King, Michelle Moore, Lisa Lowell and Ada Dyer — brought a richness and depth to the show as well. Sure, the choir on “Nightshift” stood out. Especially King, who teamed with Springsteen on the track, and stole the song with a mic moving vocal trill.

But again, their voices were stirring throughout the shows, including their background harmonies on the final verse of “The Promised Land.” It made the hair on the back of this reviewer’s neck stand up.

Not to mention that the energy and charisma of Moore of Eatontown is infectious.

'Kitty's Back'

The three performances of the Springsteen jump blues classic “Kitty's Back” were highlights of the MetLife shows. Those who saw them will be hard-pressed to experience again such a stellar example of a large rock ensemble.

That's the problem: A portion of the MetLife audience used the song for their bathroom/beer breaks. It was amazing — they got up and left before Springsteen's guitar intro to the song was finished.

Kitty didn't even leave before they were gone. When they returned, they probably regretted leaving.

The song is amazing, with spotlight turns by Roy Bittan on piano, Charles Giordano on organ, Springsteen on his Fender Esquire, and the entire E Street Horn section.

We offer one suggestion: How about a bass run by Garry Tallent in the jam? We promise we're not going anywhere.

Subscribe to app.com for the latest on Bruce Springsteen and the New Jersey music scene.

Chris Jordan, a Jersey Shore native, covers entertainment and features for the USA Today Network New Jersey. Contact him at @chrisfhjordan; [email protected]

At a Clark concert 50 years ago, Bruce Springsteen heralded things to come

Before he was chrome-wheeled, fuel-injected and selling out stadiums, Bruce Springsteen was another aspiring, up-and-coming artist on the club and college circuit.

And it was 50 years ago this year — on Oct. 6, 1974, to be precise — when Clark University students became some of the first ones in Worcester to catch “The Fever.”

On April 12, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band will be playing at Mohegan Sun Arena, Uncasville, Connecticut. This will be Springsteen’s first show in New England since he postponed the remainder of his current tour back in September as he recovered from peptic ulcer disease.

Last year, Springsteen played three shows in the Bay State — March 20 at the TD Garden in Boston, and Aug. 24 and 26 at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough. On Aug. 26, his last New England show before the scheduled April 12 show, Springsteen suffered a self-diagnosed panic attack when E Street Band guitarist Steven Van Zandt revealed he was from the Bay State and not New Jersey.

I call that a bargain

On Page 9 of the Oct. 3, 1974, edition of the Clark University’s student newspaper, The Scarlet , ran an unassuming quarter-page advertisement that had more white space than type for two different concerts.

The unassuming, easy-to-miss ad plainly read Sonny Terry and Brownie McGee and Willie Dixon were playing Oct. 4  

Further down the page and supplying the same amount of little or no urgency, the ad read Bruce Springsteen was playing just two days later on Oct. 6.

Even in smaller type, the ad sheepishly read, almost as an apology, “Tickets: $2, Oct. 4; $3, Oct. 6; $4, for both. Talk about a bargain for three blues legends, but I don’t know about the other guy.

For you see in 1974, most Clark students who heard the name Springsteen would say, “Who?” while anyone off-campus who got wind of the Bruce show at Clark probably would have shrugged, “Who cares?” or “I’ll save my money.”

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Springsteen’s Clark show was a year before “The Boss” was on the cover of Time and Newsweek in the same week on Oct. 27, 1975, and roughly 10 months before his breakthrough third album “Born to Run,” which was released on Aug. 25, 1975.

On Sept. 19, 1974, pianist Roy Bittan and drummer Max Weinberg played their first show in the E Street Band. By the time the two played at Clark, Bittan and Weinberg had only been rocking out with Springsteen for two-and-a-half weeks. Not at Clark was Steven Van Zandt, who wouldn't become a full-fledged E Street Band member until July 1975.

The night things changed

Springsteen is a legend now, but 50 years ago he was just another struggling rocker who was playing at area clubs, college halls and small concert arenas, and who was building a slow but steady reputation in the Tri-State area and beyond for his unorthodox tight band and legendary marathon concerts.

In 1974, Springsteen was nobody as far as people of Worcester were concerned. Unless you were from or had a cousin from the Garden State, chances are you never heard of the guy or any of his music. You certainly weren’t hearing Springsteen on Worcester radio. If you did, it was Manfred Mann’s Earth Band’s cover of Springsteen’s “Blinded by the Light.” And he wasn’t being played on turntables in college dorms.

But that was about to change on the night of Oct. 6, 1974, at Clark’s Atwood Hall in Worcester, the same New England city where Springsteen would go on to sell out multiple nights on his “Born in the U.S.A.” tour and play his tour opener for his “Tunnel of Love” tour, all in the ‘80s at the Worcester Centrum , now the DCU Center.

To date, Springsteen has play eight sold-out shows at Worcester’s downtown arena.

Read more stories of timeless rock

The day Clark University 'Experienced' Jimi Hendrix, live in concert

More: U2 played its first arena concert 40 years ago in Worcester

'Controlled energy'

So what did Springsteen and his E Street Band (noncredited in The Scarlet ad) deliver that night 50 years ago at Clark?

“Controlled energy,” according to college scribe Ruth Rachel Polsky, who reviewed the show and left behind one of the few documents of Springsteen’s first-ever concert in Worcester.

“Onstage, silhouetted dramatically by green light, the slight man (Springsteen) became a magician, deftly manipulating his band, his body and us, his audience,” Polsky wrote in The Scarlet published four days the show.

Despite only being a junior at the time, Polsky was astute, especially with her Springsteen-magician analogy.

Nightly during the 267-date, sold-out run of “Springsteen on Broadway” at the Walter Kerr and St. James theatres in New York City, the Boss says it all starts with a big “magic trick,” a sleight of hand that has given Springsteen "a furious fire" that’s need to come face to face with 80,000 screaming rock ‘n’ roll fans.

“I am here to provide proof of life to that ever elusive, never completely believable 'us,'" Springsteen said. “That is my magic trick. And like all good magic tricks, it begins with a setup.”

A life-changing event

When Clark seniors Dennis M. Dimitri and Sue Kurz (later Sue Kurz Eleftherakis) went to the Springsteen concert at Atwood Hall together as friends, they were unaware of the life-altering event that was about to unfold inside.

“I was not a Springsteen fan going into the show,” Dimitri said. “The reason I made a point of going is my cousin was attending Seton Hall in New Jersey at the time. And he always used to say to me that there’s this guy who plays there in the student union named Bruce Springsteen. He’s great.  If you ever get a chance to see him you should go. And that’s what prompted me to get the tickets and go. I’d never listened to one of his albums prior to that.”

Dimitri, a Worcester-native — now a retired professor and former vice chair of Family Medicine & Community Health UMass Chan Medical School — and Kurz, originally from White Plains, New York, were sitting in the front row of the balcony in Atwood Hall.

“I just had two tickets and Sue was a friend of mine,” Dimitri said.  “And I asked her to come with me, and I told her the story about having heard about him and we should probably go.“

“I was a big music fan but not a Springsteen fan,” Kurz said. “I never heard of Springsteen before. But I was a rock ‘n’ roll music lover and the show was inexpensive and on campus.”

And there were also other fellow Clarkies and Clarkie friends that they knew in the audience.

“Ironically, also in the crowd, was the woman who later became my wife. She was on the floor with her girlfriends, just a few rows back from the stage,” Dimitri said. “We got married several years after we got out of college.”

'He just took the crowd'

Touring behind his sophomore album, “The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle,” Springsteen opened with “Incident on 57th Street” accompanied only by pianist Roy Bittan.

“For the opening of the show, Springsteen came out with an acoustic (guitar) and played a slow ballad,” Dimitri said. “I didn’t know it at the time but, later, recognized that it was 'Incident on 57th Street,' which we all nicknamed 'Spanish Johnny' because of that opening line, ‘Spanish Johnny drove in from the underworld last night.’”

“When Springsteen got on the stage, I only focused on him,” Kurz added. “And he just took the crowd. He just controlled the audience. He was just amazing. And I think I was so surprised how good he was. And I never forgot it. He was just so wonderful.”

Then everything changed when “Scooter” and the “Big Man” and the rest of the E Street Band came out and bust Atwood Hall in half.

“When he jerked his hips to the left and to the right, a double-barreled drumroll and flashes of purple and red light occurred simultaneously, radiating to us in a wave of total sensuality,” Polsky continued in her review. “When his voice dropped to a husky, caressing whisper, we held out collective breath and rose with him to the crescendo on Clarence Clemons’ ethereal sax.”

'He knew how to work a crowd'

Springsteen played “Spirit in the Night,” an extended version of “Kitty’s Back” and a “crashing, ecstatic “Rosalita (Come Out Tonight),” the latter which the crowd was dancing in the aisles, according to The Scarlet.

“The other thing I remember about that concert that I can’t recall ever experiencing before that and not much since is the ability of this band to take you up to this incredible high, and then slow it down and then bring it up even higher again,” Dimitri said. “It was just a manipulation of emotions of the audience that I don’t know if I’ve experienced that with other bands.”

“Bruce was feeding off the energy, and he really knew how to work a crowd,” Erlander said. “He really knew how to get them going. He was a real performer, which he still is.”

Clark senior Leon Erlanger wasn’t a Springsteen fan going into the show at Atwood Hall. And he wasn’t much of Springsteen fan going out.

“I’m a mild Springsteen fan. I’m not like a big Springsteen fan,” Erlanger said. “A friend of mine had seen him in Boston and told me he was fantastic and I have to see him. But not many people knew who he was.”

What Erlanger found extraordinary was how Springsteen instantaneously made the crowd go bonkers.

“Springsteen showed up, and he started singing and I would say, within two seconds, these people who didn’t know him, pretty much the whole audience, went crazy,” Erlanger said. “I’d never seen anything like it. Honestly. I was just looking around and thinking, what the hell was going on around here? And it was like the Beatles or something.”

'They went nuts over him'

Erlanger said he noticed that the women, especially, in the audience were going particularly nuts over Springsteen.

“All these women that I thought were nonchalant about men but I guess it was just they were nonchalant about me, they were all talking about how sexy Springsteen was. And I mean they were getting like really excited. I was just really blown away about the whole thing,” Erlanger said. “They went nuts over him. I’ve never seen anything like it …And it was instant, just instant. Everybody went crazy and was going crazy through the whole concert.”

Appearance-wise, Dimitri and Kurz remember Springsteen being a skinny, scrawny little guy in a muscle shirt and blue jeans sporting a beard and wearing sunglasses who became larger than life onstage, feeding on the excitement of the crowd’s collective energy.

In other words, Springsteen, 25, was already a powerhouse.

“I’m not quite sure what this guy is all about,” Dimitri said. “He’s from New Jersey, and he looks a little bit like a greaser, to tell you that truth. And his songs had a lot of car references in them.”

“Springsteen looked so small to me, but, I think it was because he was so young but also, he was standing next to Clarence Clemons, who I really didn’t notice because I was focusing on Bruce,” Kurz said. “He was very scruffy-looking but the way he controlled our hearts and heads and just got us going. I couldn’t look away. It was just great.

Kurtz, who has seen Springsteen five times in her life, said “Rosalita” was her favorite song that night at Atwood Hall.

“A lot of that bands at that time were a bunch of hippies,” Erlanger said. “And Springsteen didn’t look like that. He looked more like a biker, pre-hippie era.”

Sounds of change

Springsteen was a different sound from what people were used to in the early ‘70s, Erlanger added.

“At that time, a lot of bands were unscripted and they would play a song and have a jam in the middle, stuff like that, and it was very loose,” Erlanger said. “But Springsteen’s act was very scripted, building into these crescendos. And I don’t think people were used to that. I found it kind of contrived, that was my feeling about it. But everybody else seemed to be eating it up.”

Erlanger said while he kind of liked Springsteen, he didn’t go crazy over him as did so many concertgoers.

“I was thinking his lyrics were like he was trying to be like Bob Dylan but not quite succeeded, ‘Blinded by the Light’ and scared of the night, things like that,” Erlanger continued.  “He was OK but he was not great.”

In addition to The Boss, The Big Man, Mighty Max and The Professor, Polsky also gave high marks to organist Danny Federici and bassist Garry Tallent in her review.

“Through sheer professionalism combined with humor, emotion, and charisma, Bruce Springsteen gave Clark a show that won’t soon be forgotten — a synthesis of rock and jazz that communicates on the level of pure soul,” the Scarlet review said.

Dimitri agrees.

“You could see the music moving back and forth among the various players, whether it was Bruce with his guitar, Clarence with his sax, Roy with the keyboards, Max with the drums,” Dimitri said. “It just moved around so much back and forth among them and building to crescendos that just blew you away.”

A legendary sax player

Like Polsky, Dimitri had high marks for the shared chemistry between Clemons and Springsteen.

“I have not seen a lot of rock bands that had a saxophone player in them. And Clarence Clemons would come in on those saxophone solos and just blow the lid off of the place,” Dimitri said. “Clearly, Bruce and Clarence stuck out, man. Those were two imposing figures on the stage that drew you right in. It was hard to take your eyes off them. It was a stark contrast, absolutely, but they fit together like hand and glove. And they played off each other back and forth,”

At Clark, Springsteen played the yet-to-be-released tracks “She’s the One” and “Jungleland” (both off “Born to Run”) for the first time for a Worcester crowd at Clark University.

“One of the other songs that really struck me and I didn’t really know what it was at the time was 'Jungleland,’” Dimitri said, “When '“'Born to Run'”' came out the next year, I immediately recognized the song when I played it. Oh! That’s definitely one of the songs I heard him play.”

'What did we just see?'

At the end of Springsteen’s performance at Clark, a totally stunned and blown-away Dimitri and Kurz turned to each other and said in unison, “Oh, my God! What did we just see?”

“I say this all the time. Of all the bands that I have ever seen, I think the E Street Band is the tightest band,” Dimitri said. “I never seen anything quite like it. There’s no other way to describe it. It’s like they’re all connected all the time. Now, with the hindsight of 50 years, I realize that’s because of the workmanship of Bruce Springsteen bringing those guys together. They are just incredible.”

On Nov, 18, 1975, Springsteen played the Hammersmith Odeon in London. Kurz, who has seen the concert film made from the ’75 London show, says the Clark University show was a lot like that, just with fewer funny hats.

“Springsteen at Clark University was the best show I’ve ever seen,” Kurz said. “And I’ve seen the Rolling Stones in the third row at Shea Stadium. I’ve seen a lot of great shows. But I still have to go back to that because it has stuck with me all these years.”

'I was sort of baffled'

Clark University was the first and only time Erlanger saw Springsteen. Erlanger, who’s originally from New York, cites Bob Marley as the best show he ever saw. He also rates Bob Dylan high on his personal list. Erlanger said he saw Dylan in Sweden when he had a cold and he sounded better than he normally sounds.

“I thought Springsteen’s band sounded good, but they didn’t sound as good as everybody else seemed to think,” Erlanger said. “I was just sort of baffled by it. I thought they were good. I liked them. I didn’t understand what the mania was about.” 

The next day, Dimitri and Kurz went to Carl Seder's Music Mart in downtown Worcester. One of them bought “Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.” while the other bought “The Wild, The Innocent and the E Street Shuffle.” Neither of them had enough money to buy both of them so they bought one each.

“It was probably, I don’t know, $3.99 at the time,” Dimitri said.  “I don’t remember which one of us took which one but eventually, I know for sure I went back at some point later and bought the other one that I didn’t have so I had them both and played the heck out of both of those.”

More than a moment

At the time of this writing, general admission, standing-room-only, verified resale tickets for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band’s twice-postponed April 12 concert at the Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Conn., were going for $2,380 each on Ticketmaster.

To date, Dimitri has seen Springsteen nine times, five times in the ‘70s and three times with his first wife, who died 10 years ago.

Dimitri married his second wife six months ago. His current wife has never seen Bruce Springsteen but all of that is going to change when they see Springsteen on April 15 at the MVP Arena in Albany, New York, which will also be Dimitri’s 10th time seeing The Boss.

Concert review: Did Bruce Springsteen deliver a classic show at Mohegan Sun? You bet.

UNCASVILLE, Conn. — I have seen the future of peptic ulcer disease and its name is Bruce Springsteen.

Not to make light of the medical ailment that sidelined the 74-year-old rocker for six months starting back in September, but Springsteen’s twice-rescheduled concert played Friday night at the Mohegan Sun Arena was clearly done by a man who wasn’t hurting from a bellyache.

Quite simply, Springsteen looked great, sounded even greater and was working on all cylinders.

And keeping up with The Boss all night was his “heart-stopping, pants-dropping, earth-shocking, hard-rocking, booty-shaking, earth-quaking, love-making, Viagra-taking, floor-(expletive), history-making, legendary” E Street Band.

More: At a Clark concert 50 years ago, Bruce Springsteen heralded things to come

Measuring 17 members strong (18 if you count Springsteen), the E Street Band is a rock 'n' roll juggernaut, featuring three killer guitarists (Springsteen, Little Stevie Van Zandt and Nils Lofgren), bassist Garry W. Tallent, drummer “Mighty” Max Weinberg, keyboardist “Professor” Roy Bittan, keyboardist/accordionist Charlie Giordano and violinist Soozie Tyrell, as well as a five-piece horn section led by Jake Clemons, along with trumpeters Curt Ramm and Barry Danielian, saxophonist Eddie Manion and trombonist Ozzie Melendez; four backup singers — Curtis King Jr., Michelle Moore, Lisa Lowell and Ada Dyer — and percussionist Anthony Almonte.

Springsteen’s performance Friday night at Mohegan Sun was joyous, triumphant, spirited and, in many ways, inspirational and life-affirming. This was not a man on his last leg or ready to throw in the towel on the live concert circuit just yet. This was a man in the prime of his life and at the top of his game. Maybe Springsteen didn’t perform one of his signature marathons of the past, but two hours and 47 minutes, with 27 gems, isn’t shabby either.

Springsteen was rolling nothing but sevens with the set opener “Roll of the Dice,” the same song he opened with the last time he played the Connecticut casino on May 18, 2014.

“We’re back,” Springsteen roared at the crowd before singing a single word. “I don’t care if you lost your money or you won your winnings. Tonight we’re going to make you the luckiest people in the world.”

And Springsteen wasn’t kidding.                   

Wearing a buttoned-up, striped gray vest, a gray, long-sleeved shirt with rolled-up sleeves, a polka-dot black tie (later revealed tucked in his shirt), gray dungarees and leather working boots, Springsteen was dressed more like a card dealer from the casino than a rock star.

But the audience soon found out that Springsteen held all the cards and the cards were stacked in his favor.

And while Springsteen stared at his own mortality straight in its eyes in several numbers — and there were a few moments that he looked a little weak at the knees — Springsteen is still the best ticket rock 'n' roll has to offer.

True, Springsteen’s recent guest-starring stint on “Curb Your Enthusiasm” opposite Larry David showed The Boss has a career in situation comedy if his music career ever peters out. I can see it now, a reboot of “The Odd Couple” with Springsteen as messy Oscar and Steven Van Zandt as fussy clean freak Felix; or better yet, “Who’s The Boss,” with Springsteen and his wife, Patti Scialfa (a no-show Friday night), taking over the Tony Danza and Judith Light roles.

Then again, sitcom TV has to wait because Springsteen shows no signs of slowing down on the live rock front quite yet.

Strengthening the theme that the audience could thank its lucky stars for being there Friday night, Springsteen delivered the tour debut of the underrated gem “Lucky Town,” which featured The Boss wailing on trusty, beat-up Fender Telecaster.

The gritty precursor to “The Ghost of Tom Joad,” “Seeds” started subtle and rough around the edges before erupting into a riveting, band-driven barn-burner.

“The Promised Land” featured a harmonica-playing Springsteen huffing and puffing his belief that there has to be something better out there. Surveying the crowd, Springsteen tossed his mouth harp to one lucky fan in the pit.

In full rock 'n' roll preacher mode, Springsteen cried out, "Can you feel the spirit?" before breaking into the evening's undisputed highlight, "Spirits in the Night."

As he poured out his guts and magically transported himself back to the "Greasy Lake" of his youth, Springsteen initially treated fans sitting behind the stage the best view of the performance, while later taking a playful breather with saxophonist Clemons, first with the two sitting in front of Weinberg’s drum-riser and later with Springsteen stretched out on the floor, singing the lyrics while resting his back on Clemons.

Ten songs in, Springsteen talked about the mission at hand that he shares that night with the E Street Band.

“We’re here tonight to bring the joyous power of rock ‘n’ roll into your life. We’re here to bring some (expletive) fun. We are here to wake you up and shake you up and then take you up to higher ground,” Springsteen said. “We need you to take us where we want to go tonight. Because we plan on sending you home with your feet hurting, your hands hurting, your sexual organs stimulated. It comes with the price of admission.”

Perched in front of the stage, Springsteen explained that the powerful rock ‘n’ roll sermon “My City of Ruins” is “a story about yesterday. It’s a story about tonight and, hopefully, a story about tomorrow. It’s about hellos and goodbyes and the things that leaves us and the things that remains with us.”

During the band's “roll call,” Springsteen asked, “Are we missing anyone tonight?”

At first, the faithful in the audience knew Bruce was addressing E Street Band organist/accordionist Danny Federici and the band’s beloved saxophonist Clarence Clemons, who died in 2008 and 2011, respectively.  

Then Springsteen embraced the spirits of the loved ones that audience members have lost, while offering solace with these inspirational words, “I don’t know where we go when all of this is over, but I know what remains. The only thing I can guarantee tonight is that if you’re here and we’re here, together, they’re here with us.,”

Talk about cover me. Springsteen performed arguably his best cover in his musical repertoire, Jimmy Cliff’s “Trapped,” while the E Street Choir led by Curtis King Jr. channeled the voices and spirits of the soul/R&B greats Marvin Gaye and Jackie Wilson did during the cover of the Commodores’ “Nightshift.”

Springsteen stood tall and proud and mostly on his own on the poignant guitar ballad “Last Man Standing,” his loving ode to the greatest adventure of his young life, his first real rock ‘n’ roll band. Here, Springsteen reminisced how he was recruited to join his first band, The Castiles, when he was 15 by his sister’s then-boyfriend George Theiss, and how in 2018, Theiss, the only surviving member of the group beside Springsteen, died, hence making Springsteen the subject of the song’s title.

The Boss carried this heavy theme over to “Backstreets,” rattling off the physical mementos he inherited from his old bandmate, including his old records and a faded snapshot, then concluding, “And the rest, the rest, I’m going to carry right here,” as he pats his heart.

By the time Springsteen played the tour debut of “I’m on Fire” in the midway of the set, Springsteen seemed to be stating the obvious.

After inviting the crowd to come on up for “The Rising,” Springsteen ended his main set with the one-two punch of “Badlands” and “Thunder Road.”

And if that wasn’t enough to please the crowd, the roof was raised once again during the timeless rock anthem “Born to Run,” which kicked off the first encore.

Although the Three Stooges-inspired hijinks of late were toned down a bit (a lot of mugging to the camera but no face poking or nose twirling), the always show-stopping "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" was an absolute delight.

After a double shot from “Born in the U.S.A.” (“Bobby Jean” and “Dancing in the Dark”), the first encore ended with the perfect tail-end blowout, “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out."

Springsteen closed out the night with a second encore, a solo acoustic rendition of “I’ll See You in My Dreams.”

Not if we see you first.

Bruce Springsteen Makes Comical Promise About His U.S. Tour Finale

B ruce Springsteen is getting ready for the final concert of his current U.S. tour leg with the E Street band, and—surprise, surprise—he has a message for fans who will be coming out to the show this Sunday, April 21, in Columbus, Ohio.

Springsteen has posted the latest in a series of videos promoting his upcoming gigs on his social media sites. In the new clip, the Boss is captured backstage at a recent concert.

[Buy Bruce Springsteen Concert Tickets]

“Columbus, welcome to my dressing room,” Springsteen says. He then points to his wardrobe and comically shares, “These are my clothes. Those are my pants. I’ll only be wearing one pair of ’em when I come to see y’all on Sunday. And we are gonna rock you, me and the E Street Band, into the ground! I warned you. See you Sunday.”

Hanging from a wall in the dressing room is an Italian flag with the phrase “Our Love Is Real” written on it. The phrase, which is reference to a famous line in “Born to Run,” is now regularly used by Springsteen fans to express their affection for the rock legend.

[RELATED: Bruce Springsteen Shares Funny Memory About His First Show in Syracuse from 1973]

As with Springsteen’s previous couple of promo clips, the new video was shot by his sister, veteran photographer Pamela Springsteen.

Fans React to Springsteen’s Post

Not surprisingly, Springsteen’s video inspired many fans to share messages of their own in the comments section of his Instagram page.

“Can’t wait to see you Sunday!” one fan wrote. “It will be my 53rd show and the first one that I’m taking my sons. We are psyched!”

Another commented, “These are the best little clips and exactly how social media should be used IMO. Delightful!”

A third fan quipped, Fantastic but now I wonder what [E Street band guitarist] Steve Van Zandt’s dressing room and clothes rail looks like!” Van Zandt, of course, is known for his flamboyant fashion sensibility and colorful head scarves.

Best of Bruce Springsteen Compilation Out Now

Just in time for the tour leg’s finale, Springsteen released a new compilation titled Best of Springsteen on Friday, April 19. The retrospective offers a selection of noteworthy songs from throughout the Boss’ 50-plus-year career. Best of Bruce Springsteen is available now as an 18-track CD or two-LP set, and as a deluxe 31-song digital release.

Springsteen’s Upcoming Tour Plans

After wrapping up their current U.S. leg on April 21 in Columbus, Springsteen and his band will head to Europe. That trek runs from a May 5 concert in Cardiff, Wales, U.K., through a July 27 show in London. Bruce and the gang also will visit Ireland, France, the Czech Republic, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, and Norway.

Springsteen and the E Street Band will then mount a second U.S. leg in August and September. That will be followed by a Canadian trek that runs from late October to late November. Visit BruceSpringsteen.net to check out his full itinerary.

Tickets for the concerts are available via a variety of outlets, including StubHub .

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

The post Bruce Springsteen Makes Comical Promise About His U.S. Tour Finale appeared first on American Songwriter .

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Bruce Springsteen previews Syracuse concert with ‘plans to destroy your city’

• Updated: Apr. 16, 2024, 7:06 p.m. |
• Published: Apr. 16, 2024, 8:01 a.m.

(L-R) Nils Lofgren, Patti Scialfa, Bruce Springsteen, Steven Van Zandt, Max Weinberg and Garry W. Tallent perform live during a concert at the Olympastadion on June 19, 2016 in Berlin, Germany. (Photo by Frank Hoensch/Redferns) Getty Images

• Geoff Herbert | [email protected]

Bruce Springsteen previewed this week’s Syracuse concert with a special message on social media.

“First time I came to Syracuse was 1973 and you were looking at the only two members of the E Street Band that were there 51 frickin’ years ago,” The Boss said in an Instagram video alongside original E Street Band bassist Garry W. Tallent on Monday.

“It said ‘Welcome Bruce Spring-stine,’” Tallant recalled.

It’s unclear if he was referring to a misspelled name (Springstein?) or a mispronunciation of the bandleader’s surname. A review in the Herald-Journal newspaper of that 1973 concert at the Onondaga County War Memorial misidentified the band opening for Chicago as “a five-member combo from New Jersey called Bris Christy .”

“50 years later and guess what? Me, this gentleman Garry W. Tallent, and the rest of the E Street Band have plans to destroy your city and rock you into the ground!” Springsteen said Monday.

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band are set to perform at the JMA Wireless Dome in Syracuse on Thursday, April 18. The concert was originally scheduled for September 2023 but was postponed after Springsteen was diagnosed with peptic ulcer disease .

“You sing with your diaphragm. My diaphragm was hurting so badly that when I went to make the effort to sing, it was killing me, you know?,” the 74-year-old Rock and Roll Hall of Famer told E Street Radio host Jim Rotolo last month. “So, I literally couldn’t sing at all, you know, and that lasted for two or three months, along with just a myriad of other painful problems.”

More than 30,000 tickets have been sold for the Dome concert, which will be Springsteen’s first performance in Central New York since playing Vernon Downs in 2012 . Past Springsteen concerts also include performances at the War Memorial in 1973 and 1978, the Landmark Theatre in 1996, and the Carrier Dome in 1985 and 1992.

Here’s what else you need to know, according to Syracuse University’s website:

Tickets purchased for the original Sept. 7, 2023, date will be honored for the rescheduled date of April 18, 2024.

A few thousand tickets are still available for the Syracuse show through Ticketmaster (prices start at $74.40), as well as VividSeats , StubHub , TicketNetwork or SeatGeek . Attendees are encouraged to download their ticket on their phone before arriving.

Guests with a General Admission Pit ticket should enter through Gate D.

PARKING / TRAFFIC

Gates open at 5:30 p.m. Concertgoers are encouraged to arrive early due to traffic as the concert will begin promptly at 7:30 p.m. Springsteen has no opening act.

If you purchased advance sale parking, please display your parking pass on your rearview mirror so it is easily viewable for the parking attendants and to help with traffic flow. ( See a list of parking lot addresses .) If you purchased a parking pass for the original concert date, that pass is still valid.

• On event day, $35 parking will be available at the University Avenue Garage, UAG, (1101 E Adams St) and Comstock Avenue Garage, CAG, (501 Comstock Ave). Additional parking may be available at UNVN, UNVS, Harrison and Waverly. All lots will accept major credit cards, debit cards and mobile payment (Apple Pay, Android Pay and Google Pay). Cash will not be accepted.
• $30 paid parking will be available at the Skytop (1600 Jamesville Avenue ) parking lots. Free shuttle transportation is provided between the College Place shuttle drop off and the Colvin, Comstock and Skytop parking lots. These lots will open at 1 p.m. with shuttle service beginning at 4 p.m.
• Skytop: If you are using Route 81 south to get to the SKY or SKYD lots, SU suggests you use Exit 17. At the bottom of the ramp turn LEFT and at the next light head up Brighton Ave., then left onto Ainsley Drive to your lot.

All lots will accept major credit cards, debit cards and mobile payment (Apple Pay, Android Pay and Google Pay). Cash will not be accepted.

CASH OR CREDIT?

Credit. All official SU parking lots are now cashless (though there may be some cash options near campus). Everything inside the Dome is also cashless, including the merchandise stands. Beverages, including alcohol, will be grab-and-go.

CLEAR BAG POLICY

The Dome’s Clear Bag Policy will be in effect. Therefore, one clear bag and one small clutch or purse is allowed. Fans will be asked to return non-approved bags to their vehicle prior to stadium entry. There will be no check-in location for prohibited bags at the Stadium. Please plan accordingly.

An exception will be made for medically necessary items after proper inspection.

ITEMS NOT ALLOWED

Metal detectors will be in use. The following items are not permitted:

• Audio Recording Devices
• Vinyl Album Covers
• Pocket Knives
• Weapons of any kind
• FOOD & BEVERAGES (excluding items needed for health/special reasons)
• ALCOHOL of any Kind
• BACKPACKS or large purses
• Containers/Coolers (including soft sided)
• Baby Strollers
• Animals (excluding service animals)
• Laser Pointers
• Noise Makers/Air Horns
• Video Recorders (including Go Pros)
• Cameras with a lens 6″ or greater
• Large Chains
• Spiked Bracelets
• Wallet Chains
• Waist Packs
• Selfie Sticks

When will the concert end?

According to Syracuse University, the concert is expected to end between 10 and 11 p.m. At Monday’s MVP Arena concert in Albany, Springsteen reportedly played for 2 hours and 45 minutes. If the Syracuse show starts at 7:30, expect the Boss to be rocking until about 10:15 p.m.

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