The Poets Down Here Don't Write Nothing At All (21/6/13)

If you've been paying attention to this blog at all then you'll be aware that I'm more than happy to succumb to hyperbole; every record I talk about is the best album in the world, every gig is the best gig ever. Until the next one.

I'm not even going to attempt any such claim here. Anybody that 'gets' Bruce Springsteen will understand that the only thing you can compare a Springsteen gig to is another Springsteen gig and anybody that doesn't get him won't believe the claims to greatness anyway. Suffice to say, there is nobody that does what Bruce Springsteen does, what the E Street band do, there is nobody that can.

A night watching 'The Boss' is like nothing else, it's a unique experience that you can only understand by experiencing it. The show is, as legend dictates, longer than anybody else's show and no two nights are the same; any two nights can be absolutely, wildly different. There will be surprises, there will be moments of warmth, there will be interaction and there will a total dedication to bleeding every moment out of the night. Every night is unique and special. The band may be there every night but the audience is there (generally) for that one night only. Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band have never lost sight of that fact; as they grow older and the fact of their own mortality continues to stare threateningly in their direction they seem more aware of how special each night has the potential to be than ever before.

So, last night. It was inconceivable that the passing of James Gandolfini wouldn't affect the show in some way; guitarist Steven Van Zandt had acted alongside Gandolfini for six seasons of The Sopranos, his tweet earlier in the day had spoken of losing 'a brother and a best friend'. The night's tribute would be fulsome and appropriate. It would also appear midway through the set which gives us much to focus on before hitting that moment.

There was a free-wheeling, ad hoc feel to the night from the start; an acoustic 'Ghost of Tom Joad', a driving 'Long Walk Home', the now traditional/bordering on legendary request section with Bruce hauling signs from the crowd to dictate the next song, any thought of set list discarded immediately. The River as the choice of a nine year old boy brought on stage to announce his request, The band's cover of Jimmy Cliff's 'Trapped', a horn driven 'Seeds', the first ever full band performance of 'Long Time Coming' requested for the parents of a four month old (there's a story behind that sign that we'll never know)

In this way we were able to reach one hour and 11 songs into the set (at least the midway mark for most acts but a warming up point on a night like this) before Bruce announced that "We played London last week" - London had seen a full reading of the 'Darkness On The Edge Of Town' album as the highlight of an incredible setlist- "and that was a good night, we had a good time. And we played here last spring and we like to keep things different so tonight, Coventry, 'Born To Run', start to finish, the whole album"

As the first notes of Thunder Road opened the reading of his breakthrough 1975 classic he added "We'd like to dedicate this to the memory of our great friend, James Gandolfini"

Such moments are real, there's no showmanship involved just genuine humanity, genuine love for a lost friend, it's a feeling that resonates throughout the next song of the album; 'Tenth Avenue Freeze Out' has always been special, generally been the introduction of the band culminating in the announcement of Clarence Clemon's name. Clemons, 'The Big Man', Springsteen's thoroughly iconic onstage foil. "They made the change uptown and the Big Man joined the band" says the song and now, since his passing, the screens display images of Clarence in his pomp overlaid on footage of the night's crowd and the onstage Springsteen. Truly emotional.

And if you want a moment - the rain had threatened for a while, it managed to break through for one minute and one minute only; at the beginning of the album closer, the epic 'Jungleland', as Bruce sang of a 'barefoot girl sitting on the hood of a Dodge drinking warm beer in the soft summer rain' the soft summer rain made its one appearance of the night. You can't write these moments, nobody would believe them. They happen to the E Street Band.

The album ended with the giant screens showing an utterly drained, exhausted, 63 year old Springsteen. His solution to this exhaustion? He played for another hour and turned the stadium into a party. Badlands, Born In The USA, Bobby Jean, Waiting On A Sunny Day, the New Orleans stylings of Pay Me My Money Down and Shackled And Drawn, ending with a joyous romp through Dancing In The Dark replete with dancers (and one guitarist who had requested the job with a hopeful sign earlier in the night) drawn from the crowd, a cover of Eddie Floyd's 'Raise Your Hand' and the boisterous Irish Folk anthem 'American Land'.

Three hours and ten minutes. Thirty songs. You wouldn't take a single song away. You could add another ten without thinking too hard. You could push this band to four hours and you get the feeling that as long as they thought their bodies could last the distance that they'd do it because this is what they do.

Thank God that they do because there is genuinely nobody else that can do their job. They are unique and if you get the chance to see them then you absolutely must. Even The E Street Band can't do this forever.

And I got to share this whole experience with my 17 year old son. It's unlikely that he will ever see anything quite like this ever again.

Honestly, an utterly incredible night.