Mr. Springsteen

[vgonis]

RIP Pete Seeger. One of the last of his generation.

[Pottel]

no way, for real? it is like, EVERYONE learned to play guitar from his books, right? dylan, gilmour, knopfler, etc..

[vgonis]

And he's the one who tried to chop of with an axe the electric cables at Newport electric Dylan outing in 65...

[MusicGirl1]

Love Bruce. Am an equally big fan of both Mark and Bruce.
Both are an inspiration to me (musically & personally), off course each in a different way....

In my book, Bruce is the most incredible performer you will ever see &  Mark is the best guitarist you'll find. What they have in common is their talent for songwriting/storytelling.

Maaike

[Fletch]

We saw Bruce last Sunday at the Hope Estate venue - it was a fresh experience for me & pleasant too, he doesn't disappoint, the energy & legendary concert length, we didn't get home till 2am!

The set lists are in setlist.com so I checked the following day to see what he'd performed the night before there and there were lots of changes, he really mixes it up! Amazing!!
I was super happy to hear two songs from The Wild & Innocent

[MusicGirl1]

We saw Bruce last Sunday at the Hope Estate venue - it was a fresh experience for me & pleasant too, he doesn't disappoint, the energy & legendary concert length, we didn't get home till 2am!

The set lists are in setlist.com so I checked the following day to see what he'd performed the night before there and there were lots of changes, he really mixes it up! Amazing!!
I was super happy to hear two songs from The Wild & Innocent

Show in Brisbane happening as we speak, he's doing the whole Wild, innocent & E-street Shuffle album right now. Crowd is totally amazed, die-hard fans need to prevent getting a heartattack!!!

Maaike

[vgonis]

He is the boss!

[Fletch]

he's doing the whole Wild, innocent & E-street Shuffle album right now. Crowd is totally amazed, die-hard fans need to prevent getting a heartattack!!!

Maaike

Yeah!! If you check our setlist 23feb he grabbed a banner from the crowd and unveiled Rosalita one letter at a time - all real fans went nuts, there were lots drinking wine who you could tell only know one 80s album!
But he began a 75 minute encore with Sandy, before pleasing the masses with all the hits..
What was really special was that Bruce finished with two acoustic guitar solo songs, the first was a proper request I Wish I Was blind from the Human Touch album (a little obscure for the 10000+ crowd) but Bruce asked the dude if he'd "broken up with someone, people who ask for this have usually broken up.... no?... You're just an appreciater of art then.." Big grin!! And a rare performance. Followed by Thunder Road with the audience in the palm of his hand.. walked off stage quietly, and we all walked off to the sound of atmospheric synths, kinda eerie & spiritual.
A first for me.
I only have Bruce's live 75-85 set. My wife & I prepped our guests (my daughter & her 15yr old friend) by playing the speech intro and song The River... I'm pretty sure the girls were impressed even though it's a far cry from their usual musical influences.

[JF]

I only have Bruce's live 75-85 set. My wife & I prepped our guests (my daughter & her 15yr old friend) by playing the speech intro and song The River... I'm pretty sure the girls were impressed even though it's a far cry from their usual musical influences.

as my english is pretty poor, I never understood the speech intro to the river, even I believe it's very emotionnal, about his childhood, right ?
I would be grateful if you could summarize and explained it
 

[Fletch]

JF i can try and summarise what IS a very emotional speech (Other Bruce fans may know better?)

Bruce is talking about his relationship with his father and the common misunderstandings or generation gap issues. He specifically mentions his dads anger at his long hair as an example, he mentions it a few times, for instance "tucking it under his shirt" - hoping his Dad will not notice it.
The two points driven home towards the end, is his "talking to his girl all night" which is an obvious context straight into the song, but more directly is his Dad saying "that's good" when Bruce fails the Vietnam medical test, long after saying that he wants the army to "make a man out of you" & "they'll straighten you out."
It's a powerful message of a brief moment of his Dads love that he expressed verbally in spite of their turbulent relationship.

Man, I really did find that hard to explain, can anyone help?

[JF]

I understood he talked about his father , about "really long hairs upon his shoulders", but I didn't understand that his father blamed it.
I understood the final word "that's good", but I never understood about army-vietenam-medical-test


so many thanks for your explanation, it's far clearer now 

[MusicGirl1]

I only have Bruce's live 75-85 set. My wife & I prepped our guests (my daughter & her 15yr old friend) by playing the speech intro and song The River... I'm pretty sure the girls were impressed even though it's a far cry from their usual musical influences.

as my english is pretty poor, I never understood the speech intro to the river, even I believe it's very emotionnal, about his childhood, right ?
I would be grateful if you could summarize and explained it
 

I would have to hear it again...,  but if I am correct in this speech he talks about how he avoided his army draft. He talks about how friends of his eventually were sent off to Vietnam, Bruce even lost some friends who were involved in the Vietnam war. He also talks about how his father used to say "the army will make you a man." Bruce would come home late at night and his dad would be waiting up for him. Bruce would try to sneak into the house, putting his long hair inside the collar of his coat/jacket so his dad wouldn't notice. Off course his dad would always catch him quietly entering the house, he would always have Bruce sit down at the table......

Actually an emotional speech, it says a lot about Bruce and the at the time bad relationship with his dad.
Still get goosebumps when I hear that speech.....

Maaike

[JF]

Maaike, many thanks for your explanations too