2008-07-28 Giants Stadium, East Rutherford, NJ

Scheduled: 21:30 Local Start Time ??:?? / End Time ??:??

Info & Setlist | Venue

"Held Up Without A Gun" returns to the set, for only the third time ever. Jessica Springsteen is onstage during "Girls In Their Summer Clothes" and also, along with some friends and Garry Tallent's daughter Olivia, during "Twist And Shout". Jay Weinberg drums on "Born To Run", his first appearance with the E Street Band. Jesse Malin and Dave Bielanko of Marah guest on "Twist and Shout." "Two Hearts" includes "It Takes Two" and "Mary's Place" includes "The Monkey Time". Final tour performances for "It's Hard To Be A Saint In The City" and "Sherry Darling". "Held Up Without A Gun", "Sherry Darling", and "Waitin' On A Sunny Day" are played by sign request.

Dave Bielanko (Guest)
Jesse Malin (Guest)
Jay Weinberg (Guest)

Eric G.	I went to this show after still being exhausted from the previous night. I barely had any energy left after the night before, and wondered how the band could have the energy. Another great show, but for me personally I had a better time the previous night, as I was closer to the stage the first night. The second night I was in the back of the place, on top, with 4 empty rows in back of me, and the audience near me didn't stand up until Badlands, so that kinda took away from the experience. Still enjoyed the show though. Highlights for me: Out In The Street - I didn't get this on the other 4 Magic tour shows I went to, and as this was my last show I'd be seeing this tour, I was glad I saw it. Tunnel Of Love - Saw it played for the first time the night before, and was so glad to see it again. Nils did this amazing guitar solo at the end of the song that I don't remember him doing the previous night. Hungry Heart - I did the sing a long thing in the beginning that Bruce has the crowd do. Except I was the only in my section singing it. Oh well. Held Up Without A Gun - Bruce should play this more since it fits what is going on today with gas prices. Sherry Darling - FINALLY! I never saw this one played before, and finally after 3 E Street Band tours I got it. I jumped out of my seat and was so glad to finally sing the "Tell her she wins if she'll just SHUT UP" line. Again, nobody else in my section reacted to the song. Because The Night - Nils had another great solo, and even did his trademark flip during the song, not even missing a note along the way. Drive All Night - I wasn't sure what this was at first. I hadn't listened to a few of the songs on Disc 2 of The River in a long time. The audience kinda treated this as a bathroom break song at first, but once it got going, it really got people's attention. Sounded great. Thunder Road - Again, glad to hear it as it wasn't played at the other Magic shows I went to. Born To Run/Glory Days - These were the two songs that my Mom was hoping for more than any other, and she got them back to back. Before the show started, me and a bunch of people in my row were all talking that we wanted Glory Days, and felt that we had a good chance since it wasn't played the night before. Glory Days was the first song of Bruce's that I knew when I was 5 years old, when it was first released as a single, so this song means more to me than any other. Again, it wasn't played at the other 4 Magic shows I went to, so I was glad to get this one at the end of the last show I was going to see this tour.
Lucy in the Sky	DRIVE ALL NIGHT!!! With the warm, summer breeze blowing and Bruce's passionate lyrics, the moment made my top 5. Put this show out on cd!! Want to relive the experience hearing Drive all Night live on a CD from this tour. Come on, don't be foolish, it was a moment of true soul. Thank you, Bruce!
Mar	Sat in upper deck 314 never would of known sound was great been to 100 plus shows rates in the top 3 brought my daughter 27 to her 1st show she couldn't believe what she was seeing or hearing. Bruce's energy was too much. Thursday show will be the one to go to Jersey Girl.
Opester	The setlist was strong with some songs rarely heard in concert. The energy level was strong as well. A family affair with Max's son on drums and Bruce's family in the mix too! His political rant was kept to a minimum. I was a little disappointed at the closing song of twist and shout. I can think of a lot of better choices but overall a great concert.
Sally	Better than when I saw him at the Garden. Not that the Garden shows were bad, but this one knocked my panties off! Loved Out in the Street, Hungry Heart and DRIVE ALL NIGHT! Oh, Bruce, I would drive all night, too, just to see you perform.
Steve Spencer-Davis	I am a bit late in posting this, but for all the fans out there that know me & Julie here goes. We met in Paris - France at a Boss concert Oct 2002, been together ever since, we have been fans for years, first gig on the River tours way back. Seen him most years since (4 times on Magic), during this gig as Bruce sang Thunder Road I asked Jules to marry me and I slipped the ring on….. she cried I cried and I said "I take that as a NO then?"…. it was a yes! Then after the medley we got Glory Days which was my dads song… he passed on 2 years ago and I read the words at his funeral… I cried again as I took it as a sign dad approves of the WONDERFUL Lady I have after many years at trying, thanks Bruce & the band, we love you… you are a big part of our lives and thanks too to Viv & Andy Dixon who crossed the big sea with us to NJ x.
Tom Cantillon	The show, from start to finish, brought me joyfully back to my first experiences with Bruce and band during the River Tour. As great as night one was, this one, for me, was off the charts. Easily in my top 10 of over 140 shows. The River collection was what first drew me to Bruce and my first concert had been December 8th 1980, the night John Lennon died. Tonight's show recaptured the feeling, the high, the spirit and magic of seeing Bruce and E Street Band those first few times. Out in the Streets, Two Hearts, Sherry Darling and Held up without a Gun were amazing as all songs were played with the same passion and energy I remember from the River Tour. Summer time Blues simply kicked ass tonight—Bruce bringing it to another level as the band rocked out.Tunnel of Love is just a great live song and one that is perfect for this tour. Saint in the City had a rough start, but Bruce and band salvaged it and tore it up — unbelievable. Then Nils sets the place on fire with his blistering, sommersault guitar solo during Because the Night!! Bruce keeps the energy level high with a powerful, rockin' She's the One — glad it's back in the set. After a strong Mary's Place, Bruce really surprised me with a heartfelt, passionate Drive all Night — a highlight of not only the night, but the tour. If a live CD is to ever come out from this tour, Drive all Night definitely needs to be included — AMAZING! Great versions of Long Walk and Badlands. Then come the encores and as Bruce and band played Thunder Road, Detroit Medley and Born to Run, I was still feeling that magic and energy as if seeing them for the first time. After American Land, Bruce rocked us with a fun-filled Twist and Shout three hours later. I'm still flying high from this show. It had that overall effect on me that those early shows had as Bruce and the band and the music worked its magic, making a rock 'n' roll show, a spiritual experience unlike any other. Thanks for a truly memorable night that rocked me, body and soul! You guys are hands down — THE BEST thing to happen to rock 'n' roll!

^{© All credits to the original photographer. We do not monetize a photo in any way, but if you want your photo to be removed, let us know, and we will remove it.}

These Two Lanes Will Take Us Anywhere

East Rutherford

FIFTY THOUSAND guests were gathered at a twilight party in this straitened, immobile summer, and the host knew just what was on their minds.

Bruce Springsteen had collected from the front rows in Giants Stadium the signs that fans have been bringing to concerts lately, scrawled with the names of the songs they hoped to hear. He chose from among them one that, he said, he had performed live only twice before, “Held Up Without a Gun.”

“I’m going to dedicate this to what it cost you guys to drive here,” he said, and then ripped so fast through the song — the shortest of the night — that it was over almost as soon as it started, much like the summer journeys of many in the crowd.

Gas at $4 a gallon. Mortgages past due. Canceled flights and airport chaos. Looming layoffs and truncated vacations. Where do you go and what do you do when everything seems to be keeping you in one place, with a lock on your wallet?

One lesson of this grounded summer is that if you can’t get away from home, at least you might take a new look at it. Another — for those who may not have lived here long enough to learn it already — is that New Jersey is a much bigger place than it seems: You don’t have to go far to get someplace new, which happens to be the lesson at the heart of Mr. Springsteen’s work, too.

When the great French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson was shooting images for a photo essay of the United States, he spent much of his time here. “New Jersey is America,” he said by way of explanation. Our state sits at the center of the Northeast Corridor like a natural history exhibit, a compendium of dioramas from other states, conveniently arranged at short distances from each other.

You can see Vermont in the green and rounded hills of Morris County, New Hampshire in the craggier reaches of Passaic County, the Finger Lakes of upstate New York in Sussex County. You can see Cleveland and Pittsburgh in Trenton and Newark, Niagara Falls in Paterson. Martha’s Vineyard is in Ocean Grove, Nantucket in Cape May. Las Vegas is in Atlantic City, Churchill Downs in Monmouth Park. The San Joaquin Valley is in the vegetable farms around Vineland and Bridgeton. Island Beach State Park is Cape Cod, without the houses.

Drive through the drowsy, shady small towns that hug the banks of the Delaware River and you might be tracing the upper reaches of the Mississippi. Warren County noses so far toward Pennsylvania that it is almost indistinguishable from it. The Palisades echo the Oregon coast, the salt marshes of Cumberland and Salem counties the coastal lowlands of the Carolinas. The piney, sandy expanse of Fort Dix might easily be in Georgia.

Even here in the Meadowlands, if you had detoured on the way to the concert, you could drive down an unmarked road into the marshes, stand amid the tall swaying grasses under a huge, unbroken sky, and imagine for a moment you were in Nebraska.

And what is the Shore — the part of New Jersey that Mr. Springsteen evokes more sweetly than any other — but Southern California, with a Labor Day expiration date?

“So how has your summer been going?” Mr. Springsteen asked the audience, and the answer they roared back seemed to say that things hadn’t been too bad after all, no matter how many places they hadn’t been.

Staying in one place can show you some other things, too, beyond these scenic postcards. You get to see how things turn out. New Jersey gave Mr. Springsteen — whose roots in the state predate the Revolution, and who has raised his family here — a rich store of raw material, of characters and stories and wisdom, from which to build the songs that 50,000 people knew the words to when he turned the microphone to them.

“I’ve always found it deeply resonant holding the hands of my kids on the same streets where my mom held my hand, swimming in the same ocean and taking them to visit the same beaches I did as a child,” he said in May, when he was inducted as an inaugural member of the New Jersey Hall of Fame. “That’s what New Jersey is for me. It’s a repository of my time on earth. My memory, the music I’ve made, my friendships, my life. …”

You don’t have to go far to get someplace new — over and over again, he pounded out the same message with his band. I was in the upper tier, and all through the evening, I could glance up and see the lights of the planes heading in and out of Newark. They were going somewhere else, but so was I.

^{By Kevin Coyne via The New York Times.}

Springsteen Takes Requests, Shows How “Magic” Tour Has Evolved at Jersey Stand

Midway through last night’s Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band concert at Giants Stadium, Bruce held up a sign from an audience member that read “Play ‘Incident on 57th Street’ for your old, bald fans.” He was seconds away from complying when another sign caught his eye. “Ooh, that’s a good one — let’s do that instead,” he said, before blasting into “Blinded by the Light.” Such last-second decisions were the norm during Springsteen’s three-night stand at the venue, where he played to sold-out crowds of 55,000 fans a night — many holding up gigantic homemade signs like they were at Wrestlemania. The overall effect made night felt like a gigantic Jersey house party.

When Magic tour began last September each night was a carefully planned out, two-hour show with little room for surprises. As it winds down nearly a year later, much has changed. Many of the Magic songs have been dropped, and the show regularly stretches well past the three-hour mark. Bruce’s knee slides, preacher rants and even the occasional goofy dance with guitarist Steve Van Zandt have returned. Although the pacing occasionally felt a tad bit off compared to last fall (did “Mary’s Place” really have to be 15 minutes every night?), the thrill of never knowing what may come next more than made up for it. In total, a whopping 55 different songs were played during the three shows.

The highlights are nearly too many to list. Night one of the Jersey stand began with a bang when Springsteen and company took the stage to 1975’s “Tenth venue Freezeout,” which had the entire stadium jumping up and down like it was a Robbie Williams concert in Barcelona. The nightly cover of Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues” featured great vocal interplay between Bruce and Clarence Clemons was always a blast, while Nils Lofgren astounded everyone (including Bruce) with a mid-guitar solo somersault during “Because the Night” on night two. Quiet, long rarities like “Drive All Night” and “Incident on 57th Street” were played to perfection — but they seemed lost on the gigantic crowd who used them for mass bathroom breaks and loud conversations.

Problems like that proved that it’s very hard to play a stadium. The few acts that can fill them (Pink Floyd, U2) prepare carefully rehearsed, hit-packed visual extravaganzas that don’t vary at all from night to night. Springsteen took a complete opposite approach with a bare-bones stage and a willingness to play anything he felt like at the moment. On the second night — after seeing a sign for 1973’s “It’s Hard to Be a Saint in the City” — Sprinsteen had to repeatedly tell the band he wanted to play it in C, much to the confusion of his band who could be heard yelling something close like, “Don’t you mean A?” Such a scene sounds like something you’d see at the Stony Pony, not a filled-to-the-rafters football stadium.

Word on the street is that six nights at Giants Stadium were originally planned, but when sales were initially soft (they all eventually sold out) they scaled back to three. It sure felt like they could have done at least one more, with scores of fans desperate for tickets outside last night and not a scalper to be seen. The tour goes on for eight more shows before wrapping up August 30th at the Harley 105th anniversary concert in Milwaukee. It’s a very odd way to end an epic tour. Hey Jon Landau, how about one more Giants Stadium show in September?

^{By Andy Greene via Rolling Stone.}

Links: