A week after Donald Trump’s victory last November, I was in Winnipeg, Manitoba, for Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band’s first ever concert in the city. I wondered if the Boss — who has a podcast with Barack Obama and vocally endorsed Kamala Harris’s campaign — would make any political statements. Beyond introducing “Long Walk Home” (a 2007 protest song about the effects of George W. Bush’s presidency on local communities) as a “prayer for my country,” mid-way through the twenty-seven-song set, no explicit political commentary was made.
Springsteen’s signature tune, “Born in the U.S.A.” (a scathing indictment of the treatment of Vietnam vets, often lost amid the fist-pumping flag-waving military beat) was not played once on his band’s eight-date Canadian tour. Fast-forward five months, and Springsteen reclaimed his most misunderstood hit to kick off encores for the three dates in Manchester, England, which were the opening nights for the Land of Hope and Dreams European tour. Running for sixteen dates (including four concerts rescheduled from last year after Springsteen was forced to postpone on medical orders), the tour wraps up with the second of two sold-out dates at San Siro Soccer Stadium in Milan on July 3.
As Will Hodgkinson wrote in his review for The Times, “By the law of averages Springsteen must have bad nights, but they are hard to find.” I’ve yet to see one, although my tally of nine Springsteen gigs over the years pales in comparison to the superfans who travel the world to see their hero in the flesh.
The Boss fronting the E Street band through marathon concerts on arena and stadium stages is simultaneously dependable and filled with surprises, playing around with set lists and curfews. But the surprises come no greater than opening night in Manchester: Springsteen followed his seventeen musicians onstage to launch into a tirade against a “corrupt, incompetent, and treasonous…
Auteur: Duncan Wheeler
