Thoughts on the Bruce Springsteen show last night, in no
particular, except for this first one: Bruce Springsteen is a very good looking
man. Like, very. I know. It’s a shock for you to hear that I find a legendary
rock star attractive. It’s so unlike me. He’s 66 years old, apparently, and his
long-standing career would suggest this is true, but...I don’t see it. He ran
and hopped and skipped and crowd surfed and shook his cute little jeans-clad bottom
around for three and a half hours without taking a single break and never even
broke a sweat. That voice, too. Did I mention he crowd surfed? He ran out on to
the walkway that cut through the standing floor crowd, turned around, held his
arms up and fell back into their waiting hands. They guided him slowly back to the
stage. With their hands. On his body.
Mmm hmm.
Oh, the songs were great too. This is called The River tour
and, as it turns out, I don’t know many songs from that album. That didn’t
matter though. The River is a double album and playing it in its entirety was
just the start of the night. The E Street Band is highly entertaining. They had
a ball together up there. They seem to be great friends, or perhaps just great
actors but I think it’s the former. Guitarist “Little Stevie” Van Zandt and Stevie
Nicks definitely shop at the same flowy scarf store. Jake Clemons, the nephew
of Clarence Clemons, more than filled his late uncle’s saxophone shoes. During
Dancing in the Dark Bruce himself literally lifted a woman out of the front row
and brought her up on stage to slow dance with him. Not a pert little buxom thing but a woman who has probably been his biggest fan since day one. I'm pretty sure it made her entire life.
The “encore” was six or seven songs, including my two
favorites, Born to Run and Thunder
Road. It wasn’t technically an encore because they
never left the stage. They just brought up the house lights and finished the
night with those on. The very last song was the Shout song.
(“Buffalo!
Are you ready to take it home? Buffalo,
I SAID, are you ready to. Take. It. Home?? Are you ready to carry me home???)
(YES!!)
I don’t know if he did the Shout song just because he was in
Buffalo or if
it’s a tour regular but the crowd loved it. I got home well past my bed time
and my ears are still ringing but hot damn it was worth it. Now, if you’ll
excuse me, I have to get back to learning everything there is to know about
Bruce Springsteen.
