Tag Archives: E Street Band

September 23: Happy 66th Birthday Bruce Springsteen

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photo: alldylan

For me, I was somebody who was a smart young guy who didn’t do very well in school. The basic system of education, I didn’t fit in; my intelligence was elsewhere.
~Bruce Springsteen

The best music is essentially there to provide you something to face the world with.
~Bruce Springsteen

They call him the Boss. Well that’s a bunch of crap. He’s not the boss. He works FOR us. More than a boss, he’s the owner, because more than anyone else, Bruce Springsteen owns America’s heart.
~Bono (induction speech for at the 1999 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)

Thunder Road – live @ Hammersmith 1975:

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September 19: Bruce Springsteen @ Capitol Theatre, Passaic NJ 1978 (videos)

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September 19: Bruce Springsteen @ Capitol Theatre, Passaic NJ 1978 (videos)

The September 19th 1978 concert at the Capitol Theatre in Passaic, in Bruce’s home state of New Jersey, is arguably Bruce Springsteen’s single greatest live performance. I’ve listened to quite a lot classic Springsteen bootleg concerts over the years.. this remains my favorite.

This show has been widely bootlegged under the title “Piece de Resistance”. It is a stunning concert not least with Roy Bittan’s brilliant piano playing and Max Weinberg’s clockwork drumming providing a backdrop as hard as diamonds. It also has that characteristic feature of the tour that the slow songs are played with a burning intensity while songs like “”Badlands” and “Born to Run” sometimes display a New York Punk intensity. ~Red on Black (amazon.com review)

190978 springsteen From brucebase: Radio broadcast, soundboard tapes (all three nights in Passaic were recorded by the Record Plant’s mobile unit, both on multi-track and live-to-two track) and professionally shot in-house black and white video. Probably one of the best all-time concert recordings. Broadcast on WNEW-FM New York and nine other stations in the north-east, including WBCN-FM and WCOZ-FM Boston, WIOQ-FM Philadelphia and WIYY-FM Baltimore. Set includes great versions of “Because The Night” and “Fire,” and also includes what many consider to be the finest examples of “Racing In The Street” and “Thunder Road” ever. Essential. Also, video footage is available. A short live excerpt from this show (Bruce’s band introduction during “Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)”) was officially – and exclusively – released on a promotion-only 7″ flexidisc issued to subscribers of Austrian pop magazine “Rennbahn Express” in June 1981. Thanks to Lost in the Flood for that info. Following the show, WBCN-TV news reporter Felipe Luciano interviews Bruce. Released on CDs:

  • ‘Piece De Resistance’ (Great Dane)
  • ‘Southside Bruce And The E Street Jukes’ (Seagull)
  • ‘USA 1978’ (Arriba)
  • ‘Passaic Night’ (Crystal Cat)
  • ‘Passaic Night’ (Scorpio)

Also available on CDR ‘The Way It Was – September 19th’; a direct transfer of the radio broadcast and includes all the station breaks, chat and interviews as they were heard on WNEW. Continue reading September 19: Bruce Springsteen @ Capitol Theatre, Passaic NJ 1978 (videos)

April 13: Al Green was born in 1946

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I’m thankful for every moment.
~Al Green

 

 

The music is the message, the message is the music. So that’s my little ministry that the Big Man upstairs gave to me – a little ministry called love and happiness.
~Al Green

April 13: Al Green was born in 1946

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Today: The late great Clarence Clemons was born in 1942

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“Clarence was big, and he made me feel, and think, and love, and dream big. How big was the Big Man?  Too fucking big to die.  And that’s just the facts.  You can put it on his grave stone, you can tattoo it over your heart.”

– Bruce Springsteen

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Today: Bruce Springsteen played Roxy LA in 1978

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“…all them bootleggers out there in radio-land, roll your tapes!”
– Bruce Springsteen (Roxy, 1978)

One of the best concerts in the history of rock took place at the Roxy 7 July in 1978.

Some of you may already be familiar with one of the many bootlegs from this show, but for those of you who haven’t yet had the pleasure. I would strongly recommend you to seek it out, they are fairly easy to find on the web.

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When I first got a copy of “Roxy Night” I played it constantly for four days. In the house, on my discman (google it, young folks) and in the car, I couldn’t get enough. It was and still is the best bootleg I have ever heard.

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It’s a radio broadcast of a show Bruce Springsteen did at the Roxy Theater in Los Angeles in July of 1978, 8 songs from this concert were used on Bruce’s official Live 1975-85 album, albeit in an edited form (and too extensive editing in a song or two, a 5 and a half minute long “Sad Eyes” interlude was cut out of the version of this performance included on the Live 1975-85 release). Once a person hears the unedited version of “Backstreets,” they realize how much that is missing in the released/edited version. This show must be heard in its unedited entirety.

Full Concert at The Roxy 1978:

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I have more than 300 hundred Bruce Springsteen shows/bootlegs on CD/Vinyl or Hard-disk (and I’ve heard a lot more!) and this is one of my all time favorite shows.

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It’s from the so called Darkness Tour. The atmosphere is electric throughout due to the intimacy of the venue (The Roxy only held 500 people) and the fact that those who did get in are really big fans (he apologizes at the start of the concert to those poor unfortunates who had queued up all day in the heat and were still unable to get in).

Roxy 7 vinyl

The performance is incredible, and though it is true that there are bootlegs from later on in the tour that collectors often prefer because the songs from the Darkness on the edge of town album are more full, more fleshed out (such as the radio broadcast of the Winterlands show in San Francisco from 15-12-78 or the Passaic shows), but they don’t have the electric energy that runs through this set, it is a perfect Bruce Springsteen concert.

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