Bruuuuuuuuuuce

Thanks to the spectacular generosity of a friend, I was able to attend a Springsteen concert yesterday at Gillette Stadium.

It was a 28-song, three hour extravaganza. After a monsoon delay (I have rarely seen rain fall that hard, that fast) that lasted an hour and a half, Bruce opened with "Summertime Blues" and did not look back. He has a pretty innovative conceit these days, where he collects signs with song requests from the audience. Then he flips through them, chooses an appropriate one, shows it to the band, and off they go. They played something last night called "Little Latin Lupe Lu," a Righteous Brothers song no one had ever heard of before. Fact, the band had only played it once, back in 1977.

Later, he hammed it up for "Spirit in the Night," singing
while sitting down and leaning back against the microphone stand, a feat whose physical possibility baffles me. Then Bruce played a very weather-appropriate cover of CCR's "Who'll Stop the Rain." Nils Lofgren absolutely nailed his guitar solo at the end of "Youngstown." (Note: These clips aren't from the Boston show, but what the hell, since they are pretty good reproductions of what we heard at Gillette).

And then I finally got to see my favorite song of all time performed live. By request, from a guy whose birthday it was (God bless your folks for birthing you this day), Bruce and the band tore into the epic that is "Jungleland," with the beautiful piano intro, the majestic Clarence Clemons sax solo in the middle, and the coda of howls to the strains of a fading violin. Glorious. I can die happy now.