I may have given you the impression I am a fan of the music of Bruce Springsteen. That is a slight understatement. I am more of an unreasoning fanatic than a casual fan. That said, I have a quibble with "Channel 10" of Sirius radio, which, through March 2008, is devoted to all things Springsteenian 24/7. Actually it's not just them, but when it happened I was listening to them.
Live performance, perhaps ONLY when you are in the audience, is the most pleasurable way of enjoying your favorite artist. Even watching someone perform live on TV, thank you HBO, doesn't quite capture it (perhaps the 2 dimensional medium of the TV screen? Not really sure). Listening to a live performance on CD, elpee or on the radio is fine, while someone is performing. It's the 'in between' songs stuff that doesn't work when you can't see it. Back to Bruce Radio.
Sirius Ten is sharing the kickoff concert in Hartford, CT, for the "Magic" tour, in early October. Not sure why/how the decision is made to start what will be a world tour in Hartford, CT, but tours have to start someplace I suppose, and perhaps the tour bus needed new insurance and someone thought of the insurance capital of the world.
It's weird for me to realize ALL the (surviving) people whose music I still enjoy are older than I am and all of us, speaking of The Hartford, are eligible for membership in AARP. I think it's God's practical joke that, on occasion, my AARP magazine used to show up on the same day as my copy of Rolling Stone.
T-t-talking B-b-bout My G-g-generation.
It was a great show and I enjoyed it immensely until the encore-or more exactly, for the six minutes and 21 seconds, folks yelled for the band to come back out on stage to perform the encore. Ignoring the waste of time pseudo-dead air that is nothing more than the dull roar of a crowd yelling what sounds like "Bruuuuuce!" unceasingly actually is, what am I, driving along, supposed to be imagining is happening through all of the shouting?
To the folks who provide us with live music: is it too much to ask that you shorten, cross fade, or add a channel of commentary as the crowd cries out for more (where is Keith Reid when I really need him? Indeed, the room was humming harder as the ceiling flew away and KR shuffled off his mortal coil three decades ago making the reunion of Procul Harum very much 'beyond these things')?
You can play "Rosalita" in the amount of time I had to listen to people yelling for the encore and then as the cheers grow louder, I have to assume 'okay, they're back out on stage and we'll go some more.' By the time the band is back in place and we're finishing retuning the guitars, which, BTW, haven't been played since BEFORE the encore, guys (it's not like the roadies put them in the cases and the cases in the truck), we could have played "Carmelita" as well, though it'd have to have been real loud for Warren Z to hear it.
Besides, unless the set list includes "Meeting Across the River" and "Jeannie Needs a Shooter", they can play all night and still not have played enough.
-bill kenny
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