Elvis ’56, The Beatles ’64, Bruce Springsteen 1975. These numbers all mean something to the musical savant. In much the same way that stats like 714 or 61 rings true to baseball fans, the year 1975, will always be remembered by musicologists as the year that broke Bruce and his E Street Band to the masses. He found himself landing on two covers on the same week on Time and Newsweek magazines. In hindsight, the mass adulation and fame hadn’t even begun.
Now in 1975, I was a mere 14 year old that devoured all the music mags out there. I was tired of reading of the hoopla involving the new musical messiah. When I finally got the chance to hear “Born to Run”, it changed my opinion of this bearded dude. I dug the record and purchased his prior musical catalog and proceeded to buy all the available live bootlegs that I could find. Now remember folks, this isn’t the posturing “Born in the USA guy that played to 100,000 people at a time. This is still Bruce and the E Street Band, almost stripped down, in comparison, to what they became. Now it took me until 1981 to finally see Bruce live, by then they were pretty solid, not to say they do not shred on this CD, but at this point in time they are shaking off the skin of being a bar band to being one of the tightest musical machines ever known. Before I witnessed Bruce live, I used to sit in my bedroom and listen to these live tapes and wonder what he was doing onstage, what the band was doing onstage, and wishing for the fateful day when I too would become privy to this live event. Folks, you must remember, this show was on the last day of a tumultuous year for them. I am sure they were glad to finally see the year come to an end. The weariness does seem to rear its head in some parts of the show. Again, this is a band that is just starting to hit their stride as a unit and not the uber polished road show that it later became. There still seems to be pacing issues and of course there is not a huge backlog to throw into the set list yet so if you like covers, early Bruce is for you.
The Tower Theater seats about 3,000 people. I am not even sure if this show was sold out. Bruce was very popular in Philly so I assume it was, but judging on the crowd noise, it seems like a much more intimate venue. The sound of this CD is high quality but the only deterrent is that on a few songs you truly get to hear every note that the late “Phantom” Dan Federici plays. This is not the best live show that I have heard them play but between you and me, I would gladly give up a couple years of my life to have been there in person. Ladies and gentlemen, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band…
Disc one starts the show with “Night” from Born to Run. It seems like an odd choice to me. The band sounds a bit tired on this one. Remember New Year’s Eve is a tough show to play. I have played a few shows on New Year’s and people expect magic. There is a little more pressure than normal to be good and to give people entertainment fun. Perhaps the band was just pacing themselves. Next is a slow bluesy version of “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out that I wasn’t familiar with. Usually this song is a damn barnburner! Talk about starting on some low energy. “Spirit in the Night” is up next. This is one of those songs that made you wonder what Bruce was doing to elicit all of the cheers and catcalls in the quiet parts. He doesn’t seem to be playing too much to the audience like he normally would. Like I said before, there is a kind of weariness in their playing that is very rare for this band. “Does This Bus Stop at 82nd Street” has a very different beginning that I had never heard before and a lilting quality with almost a read through by Bruce. So far, not too impressed. This brings us to the first cover of the night, “It’s My Life”. I have heard Bruce do a version of this that absolutely kills! Unfortunately, this version isn’t it. I am not a Bruce hater, people, quite the opposite; this show just isn’t up to the expectations of a Springsteen live show. It is also the first time that he talks to the audience through the now legendary intro storytelling of his battles with his father in the darkened room with the cigarette burning etc. Again, this is slowed down quite a bit. “She’s the One” starts with a hoedown-esque harmonica that really doesn’t seem to fit too well, even the audience quits their offbeat clapping halfway through the intro. The song does get going about halfway through. “Born to Run” is next??!! This is not the best-paced set list in the world folks. This is the hit, already?? Bruce knows best, I reckon. Max tends to be driving this song a little fast. Maybe he can sense the pace of this set. This next song is one of my favorite Bruce covers of all-time, “Pretty Flamingo”. It has a special place in my heart due to romantic circumstances at the time. We all have our “pretty flamingo”. The girl you are so intimidated to talk to, the girl that you just watch her walk, the girl whose hair catches the sun just right and glints in your eye and you think that you see heaven, if only for just one brief second, but you will never forget that second, the girl that you foist your future upon, even though she may not know that you even exist (see “Just My Imagination” also). Another cool story by Bruce precedes this great soulful rendition. This is the highlight so far. This is the turning point of the show. You can feel the band start to warm up now. All the band production stop and starts, soft to loud, spoken word to soul shouts, and the razzing of Miami (later Little) Steve all make appearances in this one. We get some onstage tuning before the band breaks into a powerful “It’s Hard to be a Saint in the City”. Now we are talking! Great musical interplay between Max’s snare and Bruce’s guitar drives the end of this song. “Backstreets” is up next. Has there ever been a bad version of this song played live? I don’t think that exists. It is very strange to hear the intro of this song (and many of these “hits”) without a crowd erupting to the sound of the opening notes. Disc one closes (after more onstage tuning, no guitar tech??? Where’s Dougie S.?) and swings with the Harold Dorman classic, complete with some botched notes by the Big Man proving that he was human, “Mountain of Love”. Seems like Bruce is starting to lighten up and have fun finally.
Disc two begins with “Jungleland”. Okay, now we hear the yells of recognition, albeit faintly. Again, it is very strange not to have Bruce let the audience sing parts of this song. So used to this being his anthem of familiarity with the arena/stadium crowd. I dig it! The less people the better! Oh, if we could only turn back the hands of time. I swear one day we will be able to see these club shows in the comfort of our living rooms with the hologramic E Street Band circa 1975. I have always gotten the feeling that this is one of the favorite songs of the E Street band to play. More tuning, then a slow Spanish, Jay and the Americans style (“Come a Little Bit Closer” comes to mind) meets Fiddler on the Roof starts “Rosalita (Come Out Tonight) a rocking rendition complete with “Shaft” intro of Clarence on sax and “tell them (parents) I ain’t no freak because I got my picture on the cover of Time and Newsweek!” vocal break. The band totally flexes their Famous Flames-esque tautness on this one. Again, they had yet to approach the tightness that the nonstop years of arena touring that turned them into one of the tightest musical machines in history.
This brings us to the encore section of our show. “4th of July Asbury Park (Sandy)” has a touching, lost innocence feel to it. Bruce knows he ain’t got no boss no more. He knows where he is, knows he made it out of the circuit. Bruce pleads for Sandy to come follow him…maybe she did…maybe she became Mary in “Thunder Road” that later became the girl in “Racing in the Streets”. This is all in the future and we, the listener, have that hindsight when we listen to this show. This rendition brings out the sadness that is buried in the recorded version. At this point, Bruce asks how much time until midnight. Unfortunately he still has seven more minutes to kill, which brings us to the Detroit Medley, and we all know what this brings…and at the end of this, he brings an audience member up for the New Year’s countdown and of course, the band hits full stride on “Jenny Jenny” after the 12 o’clock hit.
Second encore brings us a Gary U.S. Bonds jumper, “Quarter to Three”. He has done this one better. The No Nukes film immediately comes to mind. He does do his “prisoner of rock and roll” exclamation at the end of this song.
Third encore, these are in real actual time folks, lots of waiting and clapping on this CD, brings us a nice beautifully melodic Roy Bittan piano intro of “Thunder Road”. This is just the Boss and the Prof onstage and it is a fantastic version. It is sung beautifully with great phrasing and tenderness and softness that usually gets lost in a full band version. The full band comes out and for the final song we get more of an Isley Brothers version of “Twist and Shout” than The Beatles, heavy on the latino influence. Again, we can hear an uncharacteristic E Street flub of the ending but this is rock and roll. This is E Street band rock and roll. I don’t think Bruce wanted to go home but it feels like the band did.
All in all, this is a great record of the time and place. Again we have hindsight to show us what a great band they turned into. How this (1975) was a point in time when rock and roll meant the world to Bruce, and to myself. I too was a prisoner and believer in rock and roll. I highly recommend this to the Bruce aficionado. To ones that only have a passing interest, I don’t think that you will understand what all the fuss was about. I believe you have had to have been there or been darn close to it. Unfortunately time has a way of beating on one’s soul and wearing away its importance as you get older and you have other worries that permeate ones life. This era brings back a youth filled with hope and dreams. When only the music mattered. I wondered if I got to review this show in my early 20’s, how much more glowing of a review it would have been.
