Since Bruce first toured without the E Street Band over a decade ago, he’s been like a half-domesticated hound torn between the lure of the strange and the security of the familiar. The reunited ensemble’s late ‘90s comeback tours were rip-snorting triumphs of course, but Bruce, you got the feeling, sometimes chafed under such an unwieldy yoke. Problem was, for all the magnetic power of his solo shows, he never could find a live combo to match his old comrades’ sense of community.
Until now, that is. The Seeger Sessions Band is no substitute for the full throttle roar of the Asbury jukebox (there ain’t a telecaster in sight) but it does supply Springsteen with the means to muddy his motorcycle boots with every conceivable strain of pre-Elvis Americana. It’s as if he’s on a misson to remind everyone – his kinsmen included – that American culture need not equate with Scud missiles and Starbucks.
It helps that the plain people have taken to what should be a public service remit roots record in numbers to rival the O Brother and Buena Vista Social Club phenomena. The 8000-plus crowd in The Point greeted selections from the Seeger Sessions – ‘Pay Me My Money Down’, ‘Mrs McGrath’, ‘O Mary Don’t You Weep’, ‘Jesse James’ and a wonderfully Van-like ‘How Can A Poor Man Stand Such Times And Live’ – like the standards they are. At times it was reminiscent of the partisan trenchfoot cameraderie of the best Pogues gigs – without the technicolour yawns.
It’s carnivalesque stuff, equal parts Greek wedding, New Orleans funeral and Irish wake. Imagine a Depression era vaudeville revue that could encompass dustbowl ballads, Bolshevik calls to arms, zydeco, Big Easy marching jazz and ceilidh house. That said, it also incorporates elaborate reworkings of back catalogue nuggets like ‘Atlantic City’ (which, transposed to a railroad rhythm, made for a devastating opener), ‘Growin’ Up’ and ‘Open All Night’, the latter transformed from its starkly nocturnal Nebraska incarnation into big band pantomime, replete with hammy theatrics, slide trombones, muted trumpets, sax and violins.
You know you’ve been to a bloody good Bruce gig when he can omit ‘Born To Run’ or ‘Thunder Road’ and nobody notices. Most of these young whippersnapper acts regard touring as a PR chore. Bruce, on the other hand, treats his job like a vocation.
I’m (still) a believer.