Springsteen Live In North Charleston 8-16-08

(There are already videos of several songs from this concert on Youtube, they will not allow reposting into other sites so I’ve included direct links for three of them)

For his first concert with the E Street Band in the Charleston, SC area since 1978, Bruce Springsteen did not disappoint. Playing to the locals from the start, the show kicked off with a spirited take on the Swinging Medallions’ “Double Shot Of My Baby’s Love,” introducing the song as, “A little beach music.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NXnU_ewmCLg

From there, Bruce and the band tore through classics old and new, from “Radio Nowhere” to “Out In the Street” and a lot more inbetween. Much of the main set turned into a request hour, with Springsteen collecting posters from the audience which he showed to the band before launching into whatever song it was written on each one. The crowd was treated to a few rarities and early cuts in this manner, including “Janey (Don’t You Lose Heart)” and “Growin’ Up.” The latter was played as a birthday request for a fifteen-year-old, to which Springsteen commented wryly, “This song was written twenty-five years before you were born–but I wrote it just for you.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbdAmC2bUjM
The band was visibly loose on the less familiar numbers, to the point where they had to search for a way to end “Janey” and took two tries to shut it down effectively. When you have as unpredictable a set list as Springsteen, however, moments like that are to be expected.

After a two hour show, the encore ran nearly an hour itself, including lengthy numbers “Jungleland” and “Rosalita” helping the minutes add up. At this point the band appeared to be having a blast, even extending the encore one more song with a rousing rendition of, “Twist and Shout” that left the audience exhausted but still yelling for more even as the lights came up and the roadies began tearing down the stage.

Springsteen himself said it best when he commented on the exuberance of the crowd, saying, “We gotta get down here more often.” I’m sure there are 12,000 of your fans who were there Saturday night that feel the same way, Bruce.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbEHLbCRjqI

A Long Walk Home

(This is the first in a short series of posts leading up to the Springsteen concert in North Charleston, South Carolina this Saturday.)

“Long Walk Home,” from Bruce Springsteen’s 2007 album Magic, has become a favorite for me in the almost year since the album’s release. In the mold of “My Hometown” without the dirge-like tempo, it’s a song that speaks directly of Freehold, the small central New Jersey town where Springsteen grew up. As I’ve mentioned previously, it’s also where my own parents spent most of their younger days, and I have fond memories of summer vacations at my grandparent’s house on East George Street.

In “Long Walk Home,” then, when Bruce sings about the Veterans Hall, or South Street, these are places that I’ve seen in person. The image of the flag on the courthouse may be a common one to many small American towns, but for me, it’s about being there for many years on the Fourth of July and watching the parade roll through the heart of town and right past it.
Springsteen has often been hailed as an All-American kind of rock ‘n’ roller, and his roots in Freehold, however tortured back then, are what made that result possible. So when he sings,

My father said “Son, we’re lucky in this town
It’s a beautiful place to be born
It just wraps its arms around you
Nobody crowds you, nobody goes it alone.
That you know flag flying over the courthouse
Means certain things are set in stone
Who we are, what we’ll do and what we won’t.”

Many listeners may think he’s singing of an ideal that can’t be reached any more in America, but I think it is still possible, in Freehold and many other towns where “Everybody has a neighbor, everybody has a friend, everybody has a reason to begin again.”

Magic is in many ways an album about new beginnings, but that restart would be impossible, Springsteen knows, without the support of those who have been with him from the start, like the E Street Band members, his family, and those in and around Freehold he still calls friends and neighbors. It may be a long walk home, but what’s there is always worth the wait, especially if there are others to share it with.

Long Walk Home, Bruce Springsteen