Playing a second show in the same city is usually a guarantee for special moments from Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band.
And that was certainly the case on Sunday night as the New Jersey rock icon and his heart-stoppin’, house-rockin’, booty-shakin’ – you know the drill – ensemble played the second night of its latest North American tour leg at the PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh.
Following up on its Thursday (Aug. 15) performance, Springsteen and company, 18 members strong, played with its usual earth-quaking exuberance, delivering 29 songs over the course of three hours and 10 minutes, making some significant changes to the set, tossing in a warm memorial to a fallen colleague and welcoming a guest to the proceedings.
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The group was nicely rested after a nearly three-week break following its spring/summer European trek but still sharp and hot from being on the road since February of 2023 – with, of course, one notable break.
The Pittsburgh shows kicked off a kind of make-up leg for the E Streeters, coming back for shows that were postponed in the spring and fall of 2023 due to illnesses, including a peptic ulcer that Springsteen described as “a mother***er” at the opening show.
On Sunday, before closing with the solo acoustic “I’ll See You in My Dreams,” he told the capacity PPG crowd, “I hope we didn’t inconvenience with you too much with our postponements. It’s just great to be back here. You’re just a fabulous audience for us. Thank you so much.”
The Pittsburgh stand was a rare two-nighter in North American arenas for Springsteen on this tour, though he’ll do the same in Philadelphia on Aug. 21 and 23 and Toronto on Nov. 3 and 6.
This leg wraps up Nov. 22 in Vancouver, while some European make-up dates are slated for next May, June and July – with enough space between them to fuel anticipation for more shows to be added.
And E Streeter Steven Van Zandt only stoked those hopes when he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette before the shows that,” Just between you and me….I don’t see any end in sight. We’re better than ever; you’re gonna see what I mean this week. These five-year farewell tours people are doing are really hilarious. We’re not gonna start our first farewell tour for another 10 years.”
And if Springsteen and crew can keep delivering magic moments like this, who would want to see them stop any time through…
Shakin’ It Up
After some fans criticized the first leg of the tour for its unusually similar set lists, Springsteen has loosened things up – particularly during the European dates.
That spirit was reflected during night two in Pittsburgh, which featured nine different selections, including seven of the night’s first nine songs. The night opened with a pair of Darkness on the Edge of Town songs. – “Candy’s Room” and “Adam Raised a Cain,” and later the title song.
Particularly welcome, meanwhile, were a riotous, revival-flavored “Spirit in the Night,” with Springsteen and saxophonist Jake Clemons mugging at the front of the stage, and “If I Was a Priest,” in only its sixth performance of the tour. “Death to My Hometown,” meanwhile, was an astute nod to the Steel City’s rust belt history and renaissance. “I’m on Fire” was another surprise late-show inclusion, but seemingly came at the expense of “Rosalita,” which has been a staple of the encores.
Speaking Of Which…
Springsteen and the band did not walk off after “Thunder Road,” choosing instead to go straight into the usual encore lineup of “Born to Run,” “Glory Days” (note the high school baseball layer friend now throws a “spitball” rather than a “speedball”), “Dancing in the Dark” and “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out” before…
A Special Guest
Pittsburgh rocker and longtime Springsteen friend Joe Grushecky was in the house on Sunday with his family and then on the stage with the E Street Band during an encore rendition of the Isley Brothers’ “Twist & Shout,” playing acoustic guitar and singing backing vocals into the same microphone as Van Zandt and bassist Garry Tallent.
During part of the song’s schtick Springsteen told the crowd it looked “a little bushed” and ready to go home.
He asked Grushecky, “Is this the way a Pittsburgh crowd looks when they’re wiped out, or when they’re ready to rock their asses off all night?,” to which the Iron City’s own houserocker replied, “I don’t think they’re ready to go home yet. I think they’re ready to rock!”
Among their many collaborations Springsteen produced Grushecky and his band the Houserocker’s 1995 album American Babylon and made a guest appearance on Grushecky’s 2006 solo album, A Good Life.
A Moving Tribute
After posting a social media message addressing the Aug. 9 passing of journalist and author Charles Cross – co-founder of the Backstreets fan magazine, Springsteen dedicated that song to him, telling the crowd that, “This is for a friend of ours, Charles Cross, the founder of Backstreets magazine and his great writing and his influence and his help in communicating between our band and our fans will be sorely missed. This is for Charles.”
Springsteen held his guitar high above his head, towards the heavens, in salute.
Party Favors
Springsteen was in a giving mood, materially as well as musically, on Sunday. He played his closing harmonica solo during “The Promised Land” directly to a young fan sitting on her father’s shoulders near the front of the stage, then gave her the harp.
He handed two other harmonicas to fans after “She’s the One” and “Thunder Road” and distributed a selection of guitar picks towards the end of “Darlington County.”
E Street Guitar Army
Springsteen, per usual, handled most of the guitar solos during the show, but also tossed the ball to the able axemen who flanked him on stage. Van Zandt scorched some earth at the end of “If I Was the Priest,” while Nils Lofgren tore it up with epic six-string excursions during “Youngstown” and “Because the Night.”
Out in the Seats
Springsteen made one sojourn into the crowd on Sunday, walking to a platform near the middle of the house during “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out”, where he pressed flesh and accepted a drink while performing the song.
It also served as a tribute to departed E Street members Clarence Clemons and Danny Federici, with footage of both shown on the video screens.
We Are But Mortal
Springsteen has been doing it since the beginning of the tour, but his speech before “Last Man Standing” – about the death of his longtime friend and ’60s bandmate George Theiss and being, literally, the last surviving member still alive from the Castiles – was still moving and inspiring, even tear-jerking: “As you get older, death brings with it a certain sort of clarity. Its lasting gift to us is an expanded vision of living this life, every day…And the grief, the grief that we feel when our loved ones leave us, it’s just the price that we pay for having loved well. “
By the Numbers
For those counting, the Born to Run and Darkness on the Edge of Town albums were the most represented with five songs each, followed by Born in the U.S.A. and Letter to You with four each.
In all Springsteen played songs from 11 of his 21 albums, including his cover of the Commodores’ “Nightshift” from the most recent, 2022’s Only the Strong Survive.
