The audience was silent as he told how he “embarked on the greatest adventure of my young life” in 1965 by joining his first band, The Castiles. Halfway through the show, the band took a break and Springsteen approached the mic alone with acoustic guitar. The song recorded on his latest record, “Only the Strong Survive,” of soul covers featured beautiful backing vocals by Curtis King whose impressive ability to hit high notes put a smile on Springsteen’s face. He joked that he practices the motions in the mirror at night.Īfter a jazzy jam of more than 10 minutes on “Kitty’s Back” that had Springsteen open the tune by running his fingers along the fretboard of his Fender electric guitar to produce a screeching wail of feedback and growled like Tom Waits, the band eased into “Night Shift” a Commodores tribute to R&B singers Marvin Gaye and Jackie Wilson. He conducted the E Street Band like a symphony, waving his arms, swinging his hand to indicate a downbeat or counting out time with his right hand. He sat on the stairs to finish the song and Clemons sat next to him. It was not as awkward as a fall on stage at an Amsterdam show in May. On a rousing “Out in the Street,” in which he sings “I walk the way I want to walk,” he stumbled climbing stairs back to the stage. Then, as he did throughout the night, Clemons took center stage and wailed on his sax that glimmered in the setting sun.ĭespite a few cancellations on the tour due to unspecified illness, Springsteen remains a formidable performer though he moved a little more stiffly as he hustled along the stage or walked down several steps to slap palms and pose for selfies with ecstatic front-row audience. Saxophonist Jake Clemons, the nephew of Springsteen’s longtime sax player and friend, Clarence Clemons, who died in 2011, had his arm around Springsteen’s shoulder as they sang a seemingly countless string of la-la-la’s at the end of the song. He had 17 supporting members of the E Street Band that has been rocking for 50 years in an evolving cast of talented musicians, that included some of the longest-serving members: guitarists Little Steven Van Zandt and Nils Lofgren, drummer Max Weinberg, bassist Garry Tallent and keyboardist Roy Bittan. He followed with “Ghosts,” a soaring tribute to bandmates he had lost that concludes with “I’m alive and I’m out here on my own/I’m alive and I’m comin’ home.”īut Springsteen was not alone. “Young faces grow sad and old,” he sang in a stanza that gives way to “I’m ready to grow young again” before the eventual chorus vow of “no retreat. His short-cropped silvery hair slicked back, Springsteen wore a black button-snap shirt with short sleeves rolled up to show his still-taut pipes, dark jeans cuffed at the ankle and oxblood Doc Martens boots.Īfter the requisite “Hello London,” he promptly counted out “one, two, three, four” for the chest-thumping drum intro to “No Surrender” that set fans roaring and band charging forward like a hard-rocking freight train.Įven that opener about friendship and the power of music with its memorable line about learning “more from a three-minute record … than we ever learned in school” captured the theme of the evening. to a roar of “Bruuuuuce” that can sound like boos to the uninitiated. Springsteen followed the members of the E Street Band onto stage just after 7 p.m. The tour, Springsteen’s first in seven years, kicked off in Tampa in February and has included almost the same set list every night, which is unusual for a performer who has often played requests fans post on handwritten signs.
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