Seville 13th May 2012 - show 21

Seville by : 2008-09spanish3.pbworks.com

So first Spanish show Seville 

Thanks to John Wainwright - one of our little group of tramps - for this review

Sound in the pit was top drawer (well, it certainly was right of centre. By no means a sell-out (how many out of work in Spain?!?), but thought the crowd were great. Band came out of the traps and were close to the top of their game (Jake, in particular, is becoming mor & more assured - hitting the notes, not hurrying them & holding them longer). Horn section just fab. Chorus great. Bruce delivered in spades. Gutted cant do Barca. Roll on San Seb!!


There's a piece in today's Telegraph giving the show 5 stars and including these couple of paragraphs:-



...but Springsteen is also one of the greatest showmen in rock and roll. The sound is big, but the feeling is intimate even when, as in Seville last night, there are upwards of 20,000 guests at the party, plus quite a crowd on stage, too: the E Street Band, who have backed Springsteen since the early days, have been augmented for this tour by an array of backing singers, accordion-, fiddle- and horn-players to the point where there are now 17 musicians on stage.
So there was a lot going on, yet, throughout, Springsteen strove to get as close as he could to the audience. He didn't attempt any crowd-surfing, as he had during recent American dates, but he repeatedly leapt from the stage to venture into the seething, sweating melee of bodies.


So to the set list.  I would have been happy with this.  Very happy with I'm Goin' Down.  This is one of my favourites from 'Born In The USA' and the only track from the album that we haven't heard live.

	Seville 13/05/12 Time 9.20 to 12.20
1	Badlands (16)
2	We Take Care Of Our Own (21)
3	Wrecking Ball (21)
4	The Ties That Bind (5)
5	Death To My Home Town (21)
6	My City Of Ruins (21)
7	Trapped (7)
8	Out In The Street (10)
9	Jack Of All Trades (21)
10	Candy’s Room (5)
11	She’s The One (8)
12	Darlington County (2)
13	Shackled And Drawn (9)
14	Waitin’ On A Sunny Day (21)
15	The Promised Land (19)
16	The Way You Do The Things You Do (20)
17	634- 5789 (20)
18	Because The Night (7)
19	The Rising (21)
20	Lonesome Day (11)
21	We Are Alive (21)
22	Land Of Hope And Dreams (16)
23	Rocky Ground (21)
24	I’m Goin’ Down (1)
25	Born To Run (21)
26	Dancing In The Dark (21)
27	Bobby Jean (2)
28	Tenth Avenue Freeze Out (21)

Mike suggested, out of interest, I checked out the set list for the 2009 Seville show.  I was surprised to find 11 songs in both sets.

Badlands

Out In The Street

She's The One

Darlington County

Watin' On A Sunny Day

The Promised Land 

The Rising

Lonesome Day

Born The Run

Dancing In The Dark

Bobby Jean

Europe - The Boss Is Here

So the first European show tonight at Seville in Spain.  There was a soundcheck yesterday.

We have photos

We have a soundcheck set list


1.We Take Care Of Our Own
2.Death To My Hometown
3.Rocky Ground
4.Thunder Road
5.Waiting On A Sunny Day
6.I’m Goin’ Down
7.The Promise
8.Shackled and Drawn
9.Apollo Medley
10.We Are Alive

...and a very short You Tube clip




Yes - the excitement is certainly building over here !!

There are some worries about the size of tonight's crowd I understand.  According to a couple of tourist sites the last time he played here there were 30,000 in the crowd.

The stage has been set up in the middle of the pitch and a thread on Greasy Lake seems to be estimating tonight's crowd to be only 20,000. I don't know how anyone gets to know this stuff.

Perhaps not such a good start to the European leg then. Let's hope the people who turn up have enough enthusiasm to make up for the smaller numbers. I remember during the last tour there was some evidence that Bruce often puts his all into shows when there are smaller crowds - we shall see.  I suppose from a publicity point of view it would be a good idea to make this a stand out show. With tickets still available for some of the later European shows it might boost sales.

I'm watching Football (soccer to some of you) on TV at the moment.  It's from The Etihad Stadium in Manchester UK.  Some of us will be there in a few weeks time.  It has 48,000 seats for football games - don't know how that translates into a concert crowd - some seats lost but lots of folks standing.  It isn't sold out.  There are pitch tickets and seats at the back still available.

Just checked the seating plan again and we are quite happy with our lot - high up but fairly near the stage.

We made a lot of friends on the Working on a Dream tour. Before 2009 it was just the two of us.  We made our own plans and had no idea what anyone else was doing. This time around we are sharing plans with loads of other fans. This has pros and cons.

I'm a little sad that we are not going to many shows compared with some of our friends.  Particularly so because our gigs are all in the space of a couple of weeks. It's just worked out that way. We knew we would go to both UK shows. Paris is easy to get to from the UK and back to back shows made it a no brainer for us.  It would have been good to have spread the shows out a bit more though.  Our European tour will be over in a heartbeat.

BUT

I'm so excited for all our Bruce buddies who will be on their way shortly. We will be able to live the tour with them and that's going to make each show more personal for us.

SO

Here we go everyone. Have a great time and don't forget to keep in touch!

Resting

'I Play the album all the way through every day and life is better somehow'

Quote from Simon Mayo (British DJ) about Wrecking Ball

So Bruce is (presumably) resting up in preparation for coming to Europe and I've decided to take a leaf out of his book and rest up too.

No musings from me today instead a plea to you - my loyal readers.

Help needed

I would love to have your contributions, to include in my blog, now the Europe leg of the tour is upon us.

If you are going to a show how about letting me have a line or two about your experiences. Could be a review of the show anything from a three word description - an "it was awesome" sort of review- to a two page essay. You can tell me how many shows you have been to and how it rates amongst them all. What about your favourite song of the show. Where you are going next.   

I'm thinking about the unusual too. Perhaps the people you met in the pit queue or how crap your hotel was! 

Anything at all

It would be fab to have photos too. Photos of Bruce and the band (although you can't take your camera into the show of course). A pic of you outside the stadium or in the bar just having a good time - you know the sort of thing.

We are only going to four shows and I need you to give me the lowdown on the others.

My email address is at the side of this page or message me on FB.

Newark 2nd May 2012 - show 20

Despite my best efforts I couldn't find a map of the USA showing Newark so here's two. The first points out Atlantic City and the second is New Jersey showing Atlantic City and Newark so you can get your bearings.  

For the last show of the USA spring tour we travel from New Orleans to Newark. It's about 1300 miles 

 2 hours 30 minutes flight time. 

Total miles 3295.

There are loads of stats on NJ.com if you are interested. How many songs have been played and from which albums, the albums which have featured the most and the least, the songs that have been played every night etc etc etc.  

Well an unusual set list.  I'm sure many of you would have given your right arm to be there but I'm not keen on some of the really early stuff.  Much as I have tried I don't particularly care for Its Hard To Be A Saint In The City. Bishop Danced would certainly have been a surprise but as surprises go I would probably have chosen something else (don't ask me what at the moment though!).  I don't dislike the song but it's not up there with my favourites and if we are talking about songs from Tracks  I'd choose Where The Bands Are or Loose Ends.  Mike? well no contest there - Back In Your Arms every time.

Anyway back to last night's set list. Oh dear ! Candy's Room too. It's not so bad live but I wouldn't choose to play this one at home.  Not such a good set list for me then but you can't please all the folks all the time.

A final note - I thought my musical knowledge had let me down again but actually, now I've heard it, I find I know The Weight.  I might be at odds with a lot of fans again on this point but I like to hear Bruce sing a good cover and this is good.

	Atlanta 18/03/12 Time 8.10 to 10.44	Newark 02/05/2010  Time 8.28 to 11.29
1	We Take Care Of Our Own	No Surrender (2)
2	Wrecking Ball	We Take Care Of Our Own (20)
3	Badlands	Wrecking Ball (20)
4	Death To My Hometown	Badlands (15)
5	My City Of Ruins	Death To my Home Town (20)
6	The E Street Shuffle	My City Of Ruins (20)
7	Jack Of All Trades	Bishop Danced (1)
8	Seeds	It’s Hard To Be A Saint In The City (1)
9	Easy Money	Jack Of All Trades (20)
10	Waitin' On A Sunny Day	Candy’s Room (4)
11	The Promised Land	She’s The One (7)
12	The Way You Do The Things You Do	Shackled And Drawn (8)
13	634 -5789	Waitin’ On A Sunny Day (20)
14	Shackled And Drawn	The Promised Land (18)
15	Lonesome Day	Talk To Me (2)
16	The Rising	634-5789 (19)
17	We Are Alive	The Way You Do The Things You Do (19)
18	Thunder Road	The Rising (20)
19	Rocky Ground	Lonesome Day (10)
20	Land Of Hope And Dreams	We Are Alive (20)
21	Born To Run	Land Of Hope And Dreams (15)
22	Dancing In The Dark	The Weight (1)
23	American Land	Rocky Ground (20)
24	Tenth Avenue Freeze Out	Born To Run (20)
25		Dancing In The Dark (20)
26		Rosalita (4)
27		Tenth Avenue Freeze Out (20)
28

Two YouTube clips to round off the US leg.