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Down To The River: Notes On Seeing Bruce Springsteen At MSG

BEN YAKAS IN ON JAN 28, 2016 4:16 PM

Bruce Springsteen greeted snowbound New York City at Madison Square Garden last night for the first NYC-area show of The River 2016 Tour—what should have been the first MSG show was cancelled Sunday night because of the blizzard. As a result, the crowd had an extra buzz before the set, with fans murmuring about The Boss making up for the missed show with an extra long set. While he may not have played until 2 a.m., we still got an exhausting, exhilarating32-song performance from a 66-year-old kid from NJ who shows no interest in kicking back andopening a wine bar.

The River, he explained, was an album about "trying to figure out where he fit in," exploring bonds between people from different angles (most of them car-related) in an attempt to forge his own bonds. It was "a big record that felt like life," he said. Celebrating both its 35th anniversary and a new box set filled with outtakes and vintage footage, Springsteen said we were in for a special night.

I've already reviewed Springsteen in concert before, so this time I tried to divide things up into notes and observations of the show, for those interested or curious in going. Suffice to say: this is the most fun you can have surrounded by 50- and 60-year-old white people from NJ

The Fans: At some point before entering the arena, you may find yourself standing behind a family of five bonding with their fellow fans over their devotion to The Boss. You will quickly see that they are as impassioned, loyal, and dedicated to spending their disposable income on their favorite musician as your average Phish or Grateful Dead fanatics.

Their matriarch may brag about the time her 16-year-old daughter turned to her and asked whether it was weird to have a crush on a 60-year-old man. That daughter, who is now 22, will then giggle as her mother brushes her hair aside to reveal the back tattoo near the top of her shoulders, which reads: "Roll down the window and let the wind blow back your hair." You are left to wonder what the mother's Bruce tattoo (because they got them together, of course) may be.

I’m A Grit And Dust Man In A Dirt And Rubble Town: Is there something slightly jarring about a millionaire rock god who has built his career on his empathic blue collar persona selling a $65 plaid shirt with his name embroidered above the front right pocket while a majority of his fans can neither afford (nor get access to) tickets to his shows? Maybe, but the shirt is so warm. And so what if Bruce's apparel veers dangerously close to J Crew gingham shirts.

Into "The River" We Dived: As you may have heard, the band is starting this tour with the very fun outtake "Meet Me In The City," then performing all 20 tracks from The River in order. It is ahell of an album—some might even say it is among Bruce's top five best records. Being a double album, it's very overwhelming, ambitious, and undeniably brilliant. It's also long and repetitious and meandering and a little boring at times, but hey, that's why there are about 200 peppy songs on it dedicated to Bruce's penis, uh, I mean, cars (looking at you, "Ramrod").

What really became apparent experiencing the album live was how oddly sequenced it is: the first half is packed with sweaty, fast tunes (only "Independence Day" brings the tempo down), and then things get dark and chilly from the title track onwards. The kinds of songs that come across as fun but silly trifles during the first half of the album ("Crush On You," "You Can Look (But You Better Not Touch)") turn into desperately needed moments of levity ("Ramrod," "I'm A Rocker") in the second half, which is otherwise a hermetically-sealed, pressure-cooking NJ dark night of the soul, containing some of Springsteen's most harrowing music ("Stolen Car," "Drive All Night," "Wreck On The Highway").

I'd strongly recommend getting familiarized with The River before going—although one of the major joys of seeing Springsteen live is the thrill of the setlist, which could contain almost anything from his large catalog, the structure of this show could seem very static for some fans. There are pluses to this as well: after they finish The River, the audience is treated to what is essentially a very long and furiously performed set of encores filled with fan favorites ("Candy's Room," "Cover Me," "Because The Night" have all made appearances this tour) and classics ("Born To Run," "Thunder Road," "Dancing In The Dark" and "Rosalita" aren't going anywhere for a reason).

Seeing as how the floor was literally shaking at several points last night, we don't think anyone was too disappointed:

Everybody's Got A Crowdsurfing Heart: The other interesting thing about playing an album like this all in a row is that a song that would normally be reserved for the encore ends up being played seventh in the night. If anybody thought the energy dipped too low for "Independence Day," they were immediately roused by "Hungry Heart," with the whole arena singing the first verse and chorus solo while Bruce roamed the floor. It culminated in him crowd surfing back to the stage, as you can see in the video below. It was very charming and very not-embarrassing! But we can only imagine how many times he was groped on the way.


"Hungry Heart" Crowd Surfing by Gothamist

Steven Van Zandt Is The Best Sideman In Rock: When Van Zandt is having fun, everyone is having fun. Unlike the rest of the band, who basically play it (and wear it) pretty straight, Van Zandt has always really embraced the theatricality of the live shows. It used to be enough to throw on a bandana, maybe a feather earring, and pop a couple buttons on his shirt, but no more: now he looks like a turtle who has raided both Cher and Axl Rose's wardrobes. There is at least a decent chance that Van Zandt still thinks he's playing Silvio Dante.

Mike Bloomberg: Speaking of turtles, President Bloomberg was spotted in the crowd! Look how much fun he's having sipping on wine and, um, shuffling his feet a little! Bet he went drag racing down to the Jersey Shore afterwards. (Chris Christie apparently missed the show, and also some major flooding in NJ, since he was back on the campaign trail.)

Max Weinberg Needs To Find A New Barber: He used to look like Charlie Watts circa 2005. Now he has a terrible bowl cut that makes him look like Charlie Watts circa 1986. This is the opposite of progress.

Songs About Cars: Bruce explained why he decided to make The River a double album before launching into "The Ties That Bind:" "I wanted the record to contain fun, dancing, laughter, jokes, good comradeship, love, sex, faith, lonely nights and teardrops." He left out the most important character/emotion on The River however: cars. At least half the album either takes place in cars or uses them as thinly-veiled metaphors. It just feels weird to leave "cars" off of that list.

The Highlights That Bind: Leaving aside the encore for now, here were the best moments fromThe River live:

  • Those first thrilling "bai ai ai ai ai ai ai inds" on the chorus of "The Ties That Bind."

 

  • Everything about "Sherry Darling," one of my favorite bratty Springsteen songs. Everyone was singing along to that one, as well as the chorus of "Out In The Street."

 

  • "The River" itself was dedicated to Springsteen's sister (the subject of the song, who happened to be in the house last night), and everyone there knew every word (bummer singalong time!).

 

  • Even with elongated song times, The E Street Band has never been remotely confused with a jam band, but the longer intro for "I Wanna Marry You" was the one nice musical extrapolation that stood out.

 

  • I can't stress this one enough: "I'm A Rocker" is so dumb, but I loved every second of it.

 

  • Nobody was having more fun than Bruce and Stevie as they vamped and mugged their way through "Ramrod" (they also had fun with "You Can Look") at what I would describe asbumper car speed.

 

  • But the absolute best performance had to have been "Drive All Night," which earned its long, emotional build-up and then some. If Bruce was trying to write a more frightening version of "Racing In The Streets," it came across.

 

 

12816bruce4.jpg
Ben Yakas/Gothamist

 

Maximum Mic Optimization: Is there anything better than those iconic, photo-ready moments when Bruce, Patti and Stevie crowd around a mic to sing with their arms around each other? They've been doing it for over 30 years together (even longer for Bruce and Stevie). But there is one thing better: when Bruce, Patti, Stevie, Jake Clemons, Nils Lofgren and Soozie Tyrell all do it together, as they did toward the end of "Crush On You" last night. You could certainly power a factory for blue jean manufacturers if you harnessed that energy.

When To Take A Pee Break: "Point Blank" seems like the obvious choice at first—it's a long, drawn out, dramatic song that may be part of "the heart and soul" of the album, but it is a hit-and-miss live performance (the energy in the crowd went way down when he performed it). But you don't want to miss "Cadillac Ranch," which is a shot of energy that brings the crowd right back in afterwards. So my recommendation is "Fade Away," which comes over halfway through the set, and doesn't carry quite the weight (or melodic resonance) of many of the other brilliant slow songs from the album (you definitely DON'T want to miss "Independence Day," "Drive All Night," "The River").

Special Shoutout To The Rafters: When we got to the post-River portion of the evening, everyone basically flipped their shit over every song. "Wrecking Ball" is now an essential part of the Late Period Springsteen Canon (along with "The Rising," "Radio Nowhere," "Waitin On A Sunny Day" and "Land Of Hope And Dreams"). A full-band rendition of "Brilliant Disguise" was maybe my personal favorite moment of the night. But the most jaw-dropping musical moment came with "Candy's Room"—it was a rush watching the camera operators switch between Bruce, Stevie, and Max's furious drumming. It was around then that I looked up and saw this poor camera guy dangling on top of the arena by his lonesome.

 

12816bruce6.jpg
Ben Yakas/Gothamist

 

Because The Night Belongs To Us: I saw the best balding and besuited men of the generations above me embrace each other filled with fraternal love, starving hysterical joy, weeping to this song. Bruce may have given "Because The Night" to Patti Smith, but it is his again. And bonus points to Lofgren for ending it with a very twirly, dizziness-inducing guitar solo.

 

12816bruce5.jpg
Ben Yakas/Gothamist

 

Sax Is Only One Letter Different Than Sex: I can't stress enough how great Jake Clemons is at hitting The Big Man's marks, now that he's had a few tours with The E Street band under his belt. Nothing turns Bruce fans on like the sax solos in "Thunder Road" and "Born To Run."


"Born To Run" by Gothamist

Dancing In The Bright Lights Of MSG: For the final four songs of the night (this was the officialencore, although the band never got off stage/didn't really stop playing), Bruce had the arena turn on the house lights so we could all make awkward eye contact as grown people openly wept to the ending of "Rosalita." And while Bruce picked out two ladies to dance with during "Dancing In The Dark" (including the pink-haired woman you can see below), Patti got more attention from a young admirer who had a poster with her face on it. The whole evening ended a little after 11 p.m. with the now-ritual, extra-long version of "Shout," which is really how all concerts should end.


"Dancing In The Dark" Dancing by Gothamist

The Freehold Rule: When you go to see The Boss, you will end up sitting near someone from Freehold, NJ (you can probably substitute any working class NJ town into this scenario). You may realize this when security guards yell at him to put his beer-stained shirt back on (before the concert has started) and he yells, "I'M FROM FREEHOLD THIS IS HOW WE DO IT," or perhaps when he yells for the band to play "Two Hearts" after the first song, even though he knows damn well that the song is going to be played since it's fucking ON The River. Throughout the show, you will hate him for shrieking in your ear about how "Independence Day" is his favorite song, or how "Point Blank" is "very underrated." But after two hours or so of this, you will find his random, unprovoked, but nevertheless sincere shoulder-grabs completely tolerable. And you will feel something approaching affection toward him once you realize that the two of you are the only ones screaming the lyrics to "Brilliant Disguise." But then he will start shrieking again over "The Rising" (Jesus Fucking Christ) and you're back to square one. Nod goodbye if you feel the urge, but don't make eye contact or else you'll end up at Billymark's West ranking your favorite Springsteen car songs all night.

http://gothamist.com/2016/01/2...msg_river_review.php

____________________________________

The SPL Rocks!

Prego che tu stia danzando con San Pietro alle porte perlacee del cielo





Pulled up to my house today
Came and took my little girl away!
Giants Stadium 8/28/03



Oats

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Good review.  I had a blast, my first time EVER in the pit (97 shows).  I feel like a person who has flown first class and can never go back to coach.

Band sounded great.  Stolen Car and Drive All Night were highlights.  The River is my favorite album, but I don't feel like I need to see this show again, and I do fear that the band is going to be sick to death of playing this thing after a month or two, if not already.  

I still miss seeing (and hearing) Danny and Clarence.  Patti and Soozi are still essentially useless, don't understand why they're up there.  Steve is starting to look like Chris Christie, and Max is starting to look like Mr. Magoo.  But they are still better than any band out there.  

 

 

 

 

The pit experience is hard to explain.  It's like everyone is possessed with the energy of an NBA Basketball team, those that couldn't dance before are suddenly Baryshnikov, those that can't sing well they are drowned out by the others. that'd be me. lol

Anyway until you do the pit, you don't know what you're missing.  And once you do it, you want to do it again.

Sorry I missed you, Bobby.  Where in the pit were you?

____________________________________

The SPL Rocks!

Prego che tu stia danzando con San Pietro alle porte perlacee del cielo





Pulled up to my house today
Came and took my little girl away!
Giants Stadium 8/28/03



Oats

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