1988-09-02 Wembley Stadium, London, England

Scheduled: ??:?? Local Start Time ??:?? / End Time ??:??

Info & Setlist | Venue

First show of "Human Rights Now!", a worldwide tour to raise awareness of both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the work of Amnesty International. Other than Springsteen, the concerts feature Sting, Peter Gabriel, Tracy Chapman, and Youssou N'Dour, plus guest performers from each of the countries where the concerts are held. The days proceedings begin at around 4pm with a stripped-down version of "Get Up, Stand Up" performed by Springsteen, Gabriel, Chapman, Sting and N'Dour - the first ever Springsteen performance of the song. After the introduction and sets by the other performers, Springsteen and the E Street Band play a 15-song set, featuring the first (and only) "Spare Parts" without the horns and the familiar piano/spoken introduction. "Light Of Day" includes "Land Of 1000 Dances", and "Born To Run" is the full band version, as it will be throughout the tour. "Chimes Of Freedom" and a full-band "Get Up, Stand Up" close the show. Only known tour performances for "Spare Parts", "She's The One", and "Light Of Day".

Pre-Set

Show

Tracy Chapman (Guest)
Peter Gabriel (Guest)
Youssou N'Dour (Guest)
Sting (Guest)

Milly the Kid	He was just stunning that night. I started crying at the start of Thunder Road and he looked me dead in the eye for several seconds. What an evening.
Martin J. Brewer	This was a very cold day for the second day of September and, sad to say, the concert was a little disappointing. Bruce had already played Wembley earlier in the summer and treated the crowd to well over 3 hours of music. On this night he played about a 75 minute set because we had to sit through Youssou N'dour (we knew none of his songs), Tracy Chapman (she is not a stadium artist), Peter Gabriel (he mumbled his songs) and Sting (his ego was at an all-time high). By the time Bruce hit the stage we were ready to bust loose and rock. It was good to hear him open with "Born In The USA" again and thankfully he reverted to playing the original version of "Born To Run", not the acoustic version he'd played on the Tunnel of Love tour. Everybody joined Bruce on stage at the end for Dylan's "Chimes of Freedom" and Marley's "Get Up Stand Up". This could best be described as a glorious mess. If I'd known at the time that it would be another 11 years before Bruce would play with the E-Street Band then I would have savored every moment of those all too brief 75 minutes. This was also the very last time I saw Bruce in England since I moved permanently to the States soon after. The Amnesty cause was noble - the concert was average.
Mark A. Wright	The Human Rights Now! Tour featuring Bruce Springsteen, Sting, Peter Gabriel, Tracey Chapman and Yossou N’Dour kicks off at Wembley Stadium. This show was just the greatest gift I could ever have hoped to have received. Having become a fanatical Bruce convert a few weeks earlier at the first Villa Park show on June 21st I couldn’t believe when it was announced Bruce would be coming back AGAIN in Sept!!! My friends and I bought our tickets and hopped on the train to Wembley where we arrived at around 10am. The gates opened and we rushed to get as close to the front as possible. We got about 10 rows back or so. Result! My friend Neil Soffe smuggled in his newly purchased Sony Walkman recorder specifically bought for this occasion cunningly packed into a Ribena container. Security suspected nothing! Double result!! We were bootleggers now!! My two friends decided it would be a good idea to use the toilet before the show began and so took turns to make their way through the crowd to the gents. Then came my turn. A security guy immediately waved me down and said if I went I couldn’t come back to my spot. I was bursting!! Ok. Mind over matter. For 10 hours… A 15 yr bladder is capable of achieving things a 51 yr old bladder could only dream of. Showtime eventually came and out they all walked. Yossou N’Dour, Tracey Chapman, Sting, Peter Gabriel and Bruce who was looking ludicrously cool. ‘Bruuuuuuuuuce’ went the crowd. ‘Get Up, Stand Up’, they sang. And then off they walked. ‘Bruuuuuuuuce’. Let’s be clear. My friends and I were there to see Bruce and nobody else. As far as we were concerned all the other acts were doing were taking up valuable time that could be spent watching Springsteen. And we had a long wait. Still, it was important to let them know that we were only there for Bruce. On walks Yossou N’Dour. ‘Bruuuuuuuuce’. Basically every artist after every song was Bruuuuuced by the crowd who were overwhelmingly there to see Springsteen. Quite rude, really. But we were 15 and didn’t care. And we weren’t the only ones much to the chagrin of an increasingly exasperated Peter Gabriel fan who was being driven slowly insane by the constant ‘Broooooocing’ in his ear. Incredible as this may seem, there was even somebody there with a Sting t-shirt!! Be gone!! ‘Bruuuuuuuuce’ Peter Gabriel caused a near riot amongst the Springsteen fraternity amongst us when he interpreted our sheer elation as his finishing his set as a demand for an encore!!! Which he then duly delivered!! ‘Bruuuuuuuuce’. And then, after an interminably long wait, the lights went down and in the darkness onto the stage they walked. ‘Hun, who…hun, who, three, fawww’ and the band launched into a brainstorming ‘Born In The USA’. What followed was just the most incredible set that had a momentum that did not let up for a single second. It was just so good to see them again. I’d just started learning to play guitar since that first Springsteen show back in June and I can remember being chuffed that I could already make out some of the guitar chords he was playing. This show was the most incredible affirmation of everything that Springsteen’s music can deliver. I’d been struck by lightening by going to my first concert of his a weeks earlier and here I was being struck by lightening all over again. This time right near the front!! At the end of his set the rest of artistes came back out and joined him for a ragged reprise rendition of ‘Get Up, Stand Up’. It was the most amazing night. Neil’s recording came out fantastically well, easily as good as some of the bootleg cassettes we’d been buying from the Jump brothers at the monthly Brighton Record Fair, lol. As we filed out of the stadium I just had one thing on my mind… To find a toilet as fast as humanly possible. It was the most satisfying piss I’ve ever experienced, lol. To this day I still don’t know how I managed it. The power of rock & roll!! As we made our way back to London Victoria and our train back home to Portslade station and eventually home we were as excitable and hyper as you’d expect any 15 yr olds to be. School was starting next week. But we didn’t care. We’d got to sneak in another dose of ‘Bruuuuuuuuce’ before school went back on Monday. And we were more sure than we’d ever been that we’d learned more from a three minute record than we ever learned at school…

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77,000 in London Hear Rock Stars Make Music for Human Rights

A cheering crowd, many tossing beach balls and Frisbees, filled Wembley Stadium tonight to watch a lineup of top rock musicians, including Bruce Springsteen, Sting, and Peter Gabriel, sing, dance and strut across the stage during the opening concert of Amnesty International's six-week international tour to promote human rights.

The audience leaped to its feet as the tour's five performers, who also include the American singer and songwriter Tracy Chapman and the Senegalese musician Youssou N'Dour, burst onstage and, accompanied by a drum and tambourine, chanted, ''Get up, stand up, stand up for your rights.''

And the crowd clapped in unison when Mr. Gabriel and Mr. N'Dour, both wearing brightly colored African vests, brought both of their bands onstage and sang together, accompanied by a boisterous African dancer. Many in the audience, waving umbrellas and balloons, danced and sang along with the musicians.

''This is a good concert,'' said Andy Skuse, a London fan who said he regularly attended rock concerts. ''There's certainly a good atmosphere here, and the age spread is bigger than what you usually see at rock concerts here.'' Sweatshirts and Snacks

A capacity audience of close to 77,000 people packed Wembley for the concert, many of them sitting on canvas placed on the stadium's soccer field after early-afternoon showers. As the evening cooled, some people paid $42 to buy black-and-red sweatshirts bearing the concert logo. Most people wore waterproof jackets or carried umbrellas; nearly everyone seemed to be eating.

The concert, which is billed as the largest and most ambitious political-awareness rock tour ever attempted, will visit at least 16 cities in 13 countries and play to more than one million people. Human Rights Now, as the tour is known, is intended to raise awareness rather than funds, as it celebrates the 40th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a manifesto adopted by the United Nations.

On the stage at Wembley, which was framed in a blue-and-green map of the world, was a huge banner marking the declaration's anniversary, and members of the audience were given pocket-sized copies of the 30-article manifesto. Late in the program, a new 20-minute animated film was shown that illustrated the declaration with specially commissioned images by 31 international animators. The voices were those of Jeff Bridges and Debra Winger. Occasional Political Songs

But for the most part, the musicians made little direct mention of the evening's human-rights message, choosing instead to sing the occasional political song, such as Peter Gabriel's ''Song for Steven Biko,'' a remembrance of the black South African activist who died in police detention in 1977.

''I think people come out to see the rock show, to dance and have fun,'' said Mr. Springsteen prior to the concert. ''But if you reach a small percent, if you reach just one person, you've done something.''

Many in the audience seemed to agree. ''You want the truth?'' said Kevin Hall, a printer from London with a gold hoop in each ear. ''I came for the music, though I believe in the cause.''

Nick Varley, a computer programmer who made a 90-minute trip from Bristol for the concert, said: ''It's a good cause, but with those performers, I'd have come anyway. It's the concert of the year.''

The concert's organizers said they were pleasantly surprised by the audience. ''We did expect a sellout, but it's going better in terms of people signing petitions and picking up Amnesty International leaflets,'' said Marie Staunton, president of Amnesty International in Britain. Two Years of Planning

The tour, which may include as many as 21 cities by the time it ends, is the result of 23 months of planning, according to Mary Daly, a tour coordinator. ''We sat down the other night and figured out that there were 1,520 visas issued, 1,572 injections given and 2,240 malaria pills taken.''

The musicians, organizers and technical crew, who number more than 150, will spend more than 100 hours in the air during the tour, ferried to each destination in two chartered DC-10 planes.

In addition to the concerts, a variety of other activities will be held in most tour cities to publicize the human-rights declaration.

Before today's concert, Pat Riley, coach of the Los Angeles Lakers, held a basketball clinic at Wembley for British players and coaches. ''If there's one thing that basketball expresses, it's freedom and the freedom to play, which a lot of us take for granted,'' he said.

But the message for the most part will come from the music, the organizers said. ''It's important to remember that music is a very important political tool,'' Sting said before the concert. ''In a sense we're just coming into the realization that we can influence people by what we sing.''

^{By Terry Trucco via The New York Times.}

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