YIpee! Yipee! Yipee!

A New Tour

Bruce's last tour ended in Buffalo on 22nd November 2009.

I started this blog on 9th January 2010 so it doesn't take a genius to figure out that I haven't written about a tour as it happens.  Not that it is actually happening yet but you know what I mean.

I thought this week's post would be easy, but at the moment, my head is so full of hotel bookings, flight times, dates and times of tickets sales etc that I'm not sure I can write coherently!

I ended last weeks post about 9.00pm on Sunday night with a link to a forum discussing The Isle of Wight Festival in 2012.  A poster was predicting that Bruce would be the headline act but I, along with most of you who read my musings, took this with a pinch of salt.

Monday morning at 6.00am is not normally a time I would go onto the internet but I had a bit of time to kill so I nipped onto Facebook to see whether anything was happening and there it was ... a link to brucespringsteen.net giving a short statement and a few dates.  The same few dates that are there now even though dozens more have been added to the itinerary!!   (but that's another story).

Now - do we think that Bruce's management was forced into some sort of announcement because the UK festivals wanted to announce their lineups this week?  It's a possibility but then why didn't they just confirm he would be at Hard Rock Calling and Isle of Wight then announce all the other dates when they had them all.  I don't know the answer of course but anyway it meant that my newly purchased iPhone was buzzing all day as fresh information came to light - Facebook alerts and texts together with emails from Mike kept me rather too busy all day and perhaps my work suffered a little.

We have been going to Springsteen gigs since 1993.  In the early days organising ourselves was easy - just one show a tour and only the two of us. As the years have gone on more shows have been added,  more friends have been made and more countries have been visited.  This time there is absolutely no question of only one show or one country and as well as seeing Bruce we want to catch up with friends. It became a logistical nightmare at one point especially when we weren't sure whether all the dates had been announced.  In fact we are still not sure as there are still strong rumours that there will be extra dates in Barcelona and Dublin.

Anyway I'm not sure whether all our little Tramp Troupe are going to get together at one gig.  I think there is at least someone missing from every night.  Manchester might be nearly a full house but family and work commitments means that we are all attending different gigs around Europe.  Perhaps we can all get together in New York City again and I am hoping for some shows here in the fall.

It goes without saying that I am really excited about this tour - or does it?  Not everyone is so thrilled.  There are already negative threads on Greasy Lake : - no signs this tour: songs you don't want to hear etc.  Come on guys just be grateful for a tour.  He can sing what he bloody well likes as far as I am concerned and as for the signs - well I can see they may be annoying if they block your view but we will be sitting 50 yards away!  I am not complaining about this you understand - if you choose to sit you accept you will not be near the stage.

...and what about the album??????  Are there fans of many other artists who, given the announcement of a new album and tour, barely care about the album?  Does this happen to all bands/artists who have been around a long time? The Rolling Stones for instance or Bob Dylan.

Rolling Stone have a few questions here about the album and tour.

Finally I understand that Nils is just as surprised as we were  - here's a quote from Backstreets

Up until a couple of days ago I could honestly say there were no plans that I knew of. Rumors are just that — I learned that as a kid working with Neil Young. Everyone talks about ideas, but they are just ideas until they are made a reality; until then you have to ignore them and get on with your own life. At the end of every tour, inlcuding two years ago, you think is this the last show I'm ever going to play with this great band.... At least I know by summer I'll be playing with some dear friends and as great a band as has ever been. That is a blessing. The fact that I've got a good record out now, thank God I did it when I did.

 Good old Bruce - keeping us all on out toes as usual.