Hello Dolly

It's been a bit of a Brucey week for me this week considering the man himself seems to have gone to ground.  Lets hope he is working on a new album and sorting out the itinerary for a new tour.

On Monday we nipped to our local retail park and whilst we were there I thought I might as well visit HMV. A chap was hovering around the Springsteen DVDs but I knew just what I wanted so pushed in front of him, picked up The Promise and headed off back to the car. Knew I wouldn't have time to watch it.  In fact I forgot all about it for a couple of days. Trouble was I also forgot we now have a Blu Ray player and I had bought the bog standard DVD.

So Wednesday evening after work I'm at HMV in town doing the swap.
 'Is this the one that was on the telly' asks the chap serving me
'Yep it was in the box set too'
'Can't get that any more wanted to buy it at the time but couldn't afford it.  Awesome documentary'.
Assistant next to him buts in 'Is that the box set that cost about £90? I've never known anything so expensive sell so fast'

Me - well I'm feeling quite smug and proud of our man at this moment. Lets face it most people think Bruce is a has been. In our circle of friends we have a large proportion of Springsteen fans but in the wider world we are part of an increasingly small minority. I know there are new fans all the time and I don't have the stats, but I suspect the fan base decreases year on year. So I'm chuffed to know that Bruce can still draw the attention of young HMV staff.

Cupcake salt and pepper set

Went into Urban Outfitters after this to buy these. Saw them in a magazine and knew they were just the thing for our kitchen. Whilst I was there I saw album frames. I bought BITUSA for a couple of quid from Ebay a few years ago. It isn't my favourite album but it was the first Springsteen album we bought although we had the cassette. I talk about this in my earlier post.

I actually bought the album to frame and put on the kitchen wall - this is also just the thing for our kitchen. If you want to know more about our kitchen the Ideal Home Magazine article is here. Anyway it's in the frame but not yet on the wall.





Wednesday night in the absence of anything else we had The Sopranos on the TV in the background. This sort of passed us by when it was on originally but I started to buy the box sets.  I was hoping for another West Wing but it didn't grab me in the same way.  Now we know the characters, though, it's easy enough to watch the odd episode.  Of course the Bruce connection makes it watchable.  Well we haven't watched it for weeks but the very episode we happen upon there's a bit of Bruce dialogue.  Copied from Entertainment Weekly:-


Early on in the episode, the script calls for Tony to make a Boss wisecrack. A Fed whose unit has been taping Tony's associates tells him, ''There's something we want you to hear.'' Tony shoots back: ''The Springsteen box set? I already got it.'' But that's just nervous bravado — by this time, he's been shaken by the ultimate betrayal: He's pretty sure that his mother (Nancy Marchand), and his uncle Junior (Dominic Chianese) have ordered his death. Why? Because the anxiety-attacked Tony's been seeing a therapist (Lorraine Bracco's Dr. Melfi), and they're afraid he's blabbed too much family business to an outsider.


They play State Trooper over the end credits too. Might mean nothing to some folk but it's the sort of coincidence I like.

As far Soprano quotes go though this has to be the best:-

Anthony 'Tony' Soprano Sr.: Where the fuck have you been? You're late! 
Christopher: Sorry, the highway was jammed with broken heroes on a last-chance power drive. 


Another chance happening yesterday - getting back to the car and turning the radio on in the middle of  Danny and the Champions' version of Tougher Than The Rest. It's the first time I have heard it but can't find it anywhere on You Tube to share it with you.  Think it's only available on vinyl on the Record Store Day EP and I don't have a record player any more.  Anyway if you want to listen Dermot O'Leary played it yesterday on his Radio 2 show.

This weekend I've spent most of my time trying to finish the Bruce doll.  It's taken me longer than I thought. I was having to make it up as I went along so there were a few false starts. I really enjoyed making it though. I see rag dolls sell for anything from £16.00 to £69.00 on some online shopping sites. Can't see me ever making enough to earn my fortune though.

Anyway here he is - not quite finished.  He needs a guitar strap and some boots.

Not the best likeness. I hope my next one (if I make one) will be better.  I think it's one up from this though!  Scary!

If Bruce Likes It...

A bit off the wall this.  On Radio 2 this week they have been trailing a program about George Formby - that’s the British entertainer - not to be confused with George Forman the American boxer and champion of the grill.

He died when I was very young but my dad used to sing ‘Leaning on a Lamp Post’ and ‘When I’m Cleaning Windows’ and most British people of a certain age will know, at least, a few lines from a Formby song.

During the trailer Stuart Maconie mentions that maybe Springsteen would have approved of his (Formby’s) portrayal of the average man.  Well I’m not sure about that, but perhaps George would have appreciated the innuendo of ‘Pink Cadillac’ or the comedy in ‘Sherry Darling’.  Could Bruce have been leaning on his very own lamp post when Cynthia passed by? 

I see from HMV that the new Dropkick Murphys album is released over here on 14th March.  Now although the name rang a bell I can honestly say I had never listened to anything they had done prior to my quick listen to ‘Peg O’ My Heart’.  I must say I really liked it so I’m considering going out to buy the album next Monday.  The Question is do I really like Celtic Punk?

This is one of the less obvious benefits of being a Bruce fan.  He seems happy to let us know who he likes by endorsing them in some fashion (couldn’t resist that!).*  The songs played over the P.A. before a concert for instance, or as in this case, a collaboration. My policy veers towards the if-Bruce-likes-it-it-must-be-good philosophy so our CD racks have quite a selection of Springsteen approved music.  Still trying to come around to Arcade Fire though.  They are obviously popular but I’m not so sure.

The latest rumours on a tour suggest 2012.  I’ve settled myself to this now so we are planning our 2011 without Bruce.  We are going to see Nils in Bradford on 3rd June (full list of dates here) but other than that nothing planned yet.  

Anyway Clarence is apparently in no shape to go on tour judging by this interview.  He's still at the forefront of someone's mind though. According to this blog Julian Casablancas of The Strokes cites Clarence's 1985 hit with Jackson Browne as an influence. Blimey I'd never seen this before!  It's very eighties.

And lastly this week to make up for that which, to be honest, I didn't really like I offer you this fabulous post about 'Jungleland'.

* For you non Springsteen fans out there he has a particular way of phrasing his words during interviews.  In some fashion is a favourite phrase.

Well I Got This Guitar

By the time I was 19 I had moved away from home but still returned every weekend to go out with my school friends to the local disco.

Around about this time my sister in law - Irene - and I decided we wanted to learn to play the acoustic guitar.  My first guitar had been bought many years before with Green Shield Stamps.  For those of you who are too young to remember, these were the equivalent of today's Tesco Reward card and the like.  In the olden days you were given stamps which you stuck in a book.  Along with this you had a catalogue, out of which you chose gifts, which were bought with the stamps.  I can't imagine how many books my mum and dad had to fill to buy a guitar but it must have been at least a sack full.  I don't know how old I was but my hand was too small to reach around the neck and the guitar soon ended up in the garage damp, warped and unplayable.  Not quite Bruce's guitar story but then he has a lot more determination than I will ever have.



Anyway I had my second guitar by the time my brother - Ian - rather rashly agreed to teach us.  He and Irene lived just down the road from my mum so my guitar travelled back and forth with me each weekend.

In a previous blog I mentioned how Ian had taught himself to play and told you how proud we all were of him.  I would watch his fingers form the chords and pluck the strings and itched to be able to do it myself. You will often find me at gigs concentrating on the guitarist's hands - yes ladies even at a Springsteen gig but then I watch his hands a lot because I love the way he does that kind of pointy thing and the way he conducts the band.  I digress but it gives me an excuse to include this



Ian is a teacher - not a guitar teacher but teaching is teaching I suppose - unless your wife and sister are the (rather unruly) pupils. We each had an exercise book in which we wrote the words and the chord changes for the songs we learnt.  'Sloop John B' was the first.  I also remember 'Singing The Blues' 'The Streets of Toledo' and a song which I am ashamed to say I didn't know at the time but which has since become a favourite - Roy Orbison's 'In Dreams'.

Now I can't sing!  I mean I really can't sing!!  I trill along to the radio and CDs all the time.  Mike remarks with much surprise if I am in tune but mostly he just asks me, not always jokingly, to be quiet.  My best mate Jacquie, who is a great singer, admitted in a truthful moment that my singing is really out of tune but at least I will never turn up on X Factor with false hope.

I sound OK to me but even I have to confess that my 'Born To Run' is awful.  My 'In Dreams' was bad too and therein lies the rub.  When you are strumming chords nobody knows what you are playing unless you sing the melody.  In my case nobody knows what I'm playing even when I do sing along!

Irene really wanted to play Bob Dylan: specifically a song called 'Visions Of Johanna'.  I had to buy Blonde on Blonde to learn it but because of this I gained an appreciation of Dylan which had escaped me before.  I assume Ian simplified the arrangement for us and removed the difficult chords and we could do a passable version in the end.

I am ashamed to say our lessons were short lived.  Frustration set in and that guitar went the same way as the first.

The grounding was there, though, and many years later when I decided to try again I could still play those first few chords.  Must be like riding a bike - you never forget.  I decided to make a concerted effort about ten years ago.  I bought a new guitar and new how to play book, worked up some nice hard skin on my finger ends and, although I say so myself, I progressed a little.

Mike bought his own guitar and together we could manage a few tunes.  'Blowing in the Wind' was our party piece and I could do a passable strum along of 'The River'.  

I didn't crack it then and haven't played for ages although we still have the guitars hanging on the wall.

The dream hasn't died though so one day when we are all at some get together I hope to be able to whip out my guitar and lead a sing-a-long!


Now other snippets:-

Firstly -  Tim Rice has been presenting a Radio 2 show in which he looks at the music of each of the American States.  This week: New Jersey.  All the usual suspects were mentioned - Franki Valli, Frank Sinatra, Bon Jovi.  Had to wait until about three quarters through to get Bruce.  They played 'Tougher Than The Rest' - a good choice I thought.  Didn't get the impression Tim is a fan but he couldn't do a piece about musicians from NJ without mentioning him.

I was surprised to hear a song from Mary Chapin Carpenter.  I mention this especially for Elaine who isn't a fan of the country music genre.  Mary is one of my faves and I didn't know she was from NJ.  She has covered 'Dancing In The Dark' but luckily for you I couldn't find a YouTube clip.  There's this audio clip though.  I have to say not sure myself - a bit dreary maybe.

Secondly - I browse around the internet all the time hunting out stuff for this blog.  News is hard to find some weeks so clutching at straws comes to mind with this house for sale here?   I don't know why Springsteen Avenue is odd.  We name streets and even airports after people all the time.  We live near Asquith Avenue named after the Prime Minister but I don't think of him when I see the street.   Perhaps it's because Springsteen brings such a strong, immediate image to mind that it's hard to picture it as a bit of tarmac and some houses.

And finally kind of back to where we started with gifts  What a fab Christmas Present.  Thing is, as many of you know, I love my handy crafts - hmmmmm - do I feel a quilt coming on?

My Bruce Journey - Part 49

'I tried to change, I got a job in sales.  I bought a shirt uptown in Bloomingdales'



So I am still listening to The Promise.

I copied the CDs from the box onto blanks so we didn’t have to keep taking the originals out.  These have been on in the kitchen pretty much on a loop for two weeks - even the cat looks a bit fed up when I switch on now! 

My resolve over the stand alone CDs crumbled when a friend of ours asked if we wanted to buy their spare copy.  Only £5.99 - a bargain. It’s a great little package on it’s own. This is now the kitchen copy complete with lyric booklet - ahhh bliss - and the other copy is in the car.  The Promise wherever we go.

I understand from Badlands that you can’t buy the box anywhere on the High Street in the UK.  They don’t anticipate more stocks until February.  Someone on GL said they thought it was a limited edition but I haven’t heard anything.  Mike’s boss’s partner (who you might remember is a manager at HMV) said they didn’t get any promotional material which is a shame as I was hoping for a poster.  Of course this time around Bruce did the promoting himself but I won’t mention The Promise Premier in London (sob!)

‘Aint Good Enough For You’ is the new single off the albums - if you still refer to them as singles these days. It’s straight onto Radio Two’s A play list which roughly translates to around three plays a day.  Good old BBC - they seem to really love Bruce.

The first independent radio station in the UK didn’t go on air until 1973.  Until then if you wanted to listen to the radio it had to be The BBC, unless you were prepared to go offshore to the likes of Radio Caroline or overseas to Radio Luxemburg.  I listened to Radio North Sea International. particularly Tony Allen but the reception after 7.00pm for any station was really bad.  I lived out in the wilds of rural Lincolnshire and I don’t think there was a radio mast nearby!

Anyway those of us who were around in the sixties were brought up on the easy listening of The Light Programme (later to become Radio 2) until The Beeb decided that us youngsters should have a station of our own.  Radio 1 was born and I vowed never again to listen to Radio 2.

But there comes a time in everyone’s life when you have to give in and admit that a lot of the new music just doesn’t do it for you any more.  As an experiment I am listening to Radio 1 now - Tinie Tempah/Kelly Rowland ‘Invincible’ has just been on - I know this only because my digital radio had this information scrolling across the display!  Now it’s Coldplay ‘Christmas Lights’ which Radio 2 is also playing lately.  Being a bit of a sucker for a Christmas song I like this.

At the moment as well as Bruce the A Play list consists of

Caro Emerald- Riviera Life
Cee-Lo Green- It’s OK
Ellie Goulding- Your Song
Katherine Jenkins- Tell Me I’m Not Dreaming
KT Tunstall- Fade Like A Shadow
Kylie- Better Than Today
Manic Street Preachers- Some Kind Of Nothingness
Michael Jackson- Hold My Hand (featuring Akon)
The Plain White T’s… Rhythm Of Love

Can’t say I recognise all of these but there seems to be quite a wide range of styles here.  It might not be cutting edge but middle aged music lovers still have a big influence on the pop charts in the UK.  We still buy music and, yes, we know how to download.

I talk about this because, recently, I have been surprised to find that Aled Jones - one of the Radio 2 DJs is a Bruce fan.  Aled first came to our attention when he was a choirboy and is probably best known for ‘Walking in the Air‘ although he wasn't the choirboy who sang the on the original soundtrack..

 

He now presents Songs of Praise - a Sunday night TV programme featuring hymns and Good Morning Sunday a faith based radio show.

He played a few tracks from The Seeger Sessions on his radio show but, of course, these songs had religious overtones so no surprise there.  I fell into the trap of thinking this chap sat at home listening to classical music, went to church on Sunday and frowned upon rock and roll but a few weeks ago he mentioned that he can‘t get enough of Bruce Springsteen.  I gave myself a talking to for pigeon holing him and needless to say I give him a lot more credibility now.

Not so sure about Richard Allinson’s allegiance though.  Whilst he has never said he doesn’t like Bruce he doesn’t rave about him either - unlike Chris Evans, Simon Mayo, Dermot O’Leary and to a lesser extent Stuart Maconie and Mark Radcliffe

Richard played ‘Aint Good Enough…’ the other morning and made a remark (which I think he intended as a slur) about it sounding like Gary US Bonds ‘This Little Girl’ I am assuming he didn’t realise that this song was also written by our man.




This week saw Bruce play a gig in front of an invited audience at The Carousel in Asbury Park.

 
Oh! - where was this building then?  Having spent at least a couple of hours in AP we are, of course, experts on the place!  A bit of research reveals this bulidnig is attached to the Casino.  We scoured our photos and, yes, we have a picture depicting the top of the roof… and... yet another excuse to go again to get a photo of the full thing.


It's on the right!



Anyway there's going to be a webcast. of this show.  'Blue Christmas' was on the set list.  Possibly a Christmas present for us then?

My Bruce Journey - Part 14

'I'll be wating here until you take a chance...take a risk.  I'll take what's broken and I'll take what's fixed'  Patti Scialfa

 Never being one to do things by halves when I found Backstreets I became a super-sub.

This cost a good few dollars but I am a gullible soul and I was taken in by the list of all the extra benefits this would bring - one of which I took advantage of - the limited edition of Frank Stefanko‘s book.

I loved getting my ‘Backstreets’ magazines and read them from cover to cover - sometimes more than once. I felt like a true fan and flaunted my magazines in public places - the bus, the rest area at work in the hope of impressing someone: anyone.  As nobody ever mentioned it I can only assume I never came across any Springsteen fans.

My introduction to the world of bootlegs started with ‘Backstreets’ magazine but because they are sort of ‘under the counter’ there is no information about how to go about obtaining a boot.  OK OK so Crystal Cat’s boots are usually really good but who is he or she? and more to the point how do I get hold of one of these recordings??

It became obvious I couldn’t simply Google ‘Crystal Cat’ and find a list of CDs to buy!  A search for ‘Bruce boots‘ today actually brings up boots - those you wear on your feet - they look quite good actually.

‘Downloading’ wasn’t even in our vocabulary in 2005 so we ended up, after a lot of digging around on the internet, buying the 4 concerts we wanted from a website.  I can‘t remember the name of the site or how much we paid.  They came in battered old CD cases with poor artwork but Mike set to work designing new covers.  He found his previously hidden artistic talent with these and has been doing artwork for our boots ever since.

I was surprised by how good the sound quality is.  I thought they would be really awful.  I really get a sense of the concert atmosphere but I don’t think I will ever be a collector of boots in general.  We have them to remember that we were there - so apart from the odd one or two we only have copies of the concerts we have been to.

During this time we started buying music magazines - certain ones feature Bruce on a regular basis and we became ‘Uncut’ regulars.  We were introduced to a lot of new music through ‘Uncut’ magazine.  If they give a new album five stars we will consider buying it.

Radio 2 played a big part too. In 2004 Lesley Douglas became the controller of Radio 2 and I think she helped bring the play list more up to date.  What’s more I heard Terry Wogan play Bruce one day specifically for her because she is a big fan.

Unfortunately she resigned over the Russell Brand/Jonathan Ross thing.

The latest I have heard is that they (whoever they are) don‘t want Radio 2‘s audience to get any younger.  I hope this doesn‘t mean back to playing too much easy listening stuff.  Who remembers the old Light Programme?

Anyway regular readers will know I listen to Radio 2 a lot and during the noughties we bought quite a bit of stuff after hearing it on Radio 2.  It wasn’t necessarily trendy - no hip hop, grime or garage but, new, nevertheless.

I have a determination to try and keep up to date with music - one of my regular mantras is that I will never listen to any radio station that plays oldies all the time - no ‘Magic‘ for me.

I am a big fan of Johnnie Walker and when he presented the drive time show he had a good few guests doing acoustic sets.  I often went out to buy an album after hearing these - The Storys, The Thorns and The Finn Brothers being three of them.

But you can’t give up the old favourites all together so we also have some Bon Jovi, John Fogerty, Brian Adams and Rod Stewart that we bought between 2000 and 2005.

And our strangest reason for buying an album must go to Foo Fighters, which we bought because they featured in an episode of one of our favourite TV programmes - The West Wing.  We had previously bought Jeff Buckley’s ’Grace’ after hearing ’Hallelujah’ on The West Wing.

I hadn’t abandoned country either. I bought Gretchen Wilson and Keith Urban. Gretchen was one of Johnny Walker’s finds - I love ‘Redneck Woman’ just because it‘s funny. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btQOND5PGSs  Hell yeah!

 Keith Urban because ‘Days Go By’ reminds me how important it is to make the most of my life.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=76Toich-SLY

Finally honorary mentions for Patti Scialfa and Soozie Tyrell. We bought Patti’s ‘23rd Street Lullaby’ and Soozie‘s ‘White Lines’ as soon as they came out.  I really like Patti’s albums. ’Rumble Doll’ is on the list of my favourites that gets mentioned on a regular basis.  Perhaps I will discuss Patti more another week.

This takes us up to our first Southside Johnny concert in November 2005 and the release of the 30th anniversary edition of Born to Run (BTR) the day after.  Watching ’Wings for Wheels’ and the Hammersmith Odeon concert before next week's blog is a tough job but someone’s got to do it!

And as I listen to Radio 2 right now Dermot O’Leary is talking to Stephen Merchant (both Bruce fans). Stephen has chosen to play ’Thunder Road’ from the Hammersmith Odeon concert - how spooky is that?!