Review: Glory night with Springsteen
Megan Cameron is wowed by the Boss and the E Street band in a three hour show.
Today the sound of Bruce Springsteen’s album was playing through my car speakers. Not quite the same as the experience had on Saturday night as I sat in the stand at Mt Smart Stadium looking across in awe at the Boss himself centre stage.
Accompanied by the E Street band, Springsteen played a solid, entertainingly epic show, for just over three hours.
An acoustic cover of our very own Lorde’s hit Royals to begin sent the crowd into a massive applause of approval.
He then went on to play a few tracks I wasn’t so familiar with, but I was captivated all the same.
The first song I was able to sing along to was eight tracks in, the title single to his most recently released album High Hopes.
It was during this song that I truly appreciated the talent of the E Street band, especially in watching the late member Clarence Clemon’s nephew Jake play the saxophone. Can only imagine how much of an honour that must be.
It’s evident from their combined performance that they’re one happy, tight-knit music family unit.
Springsteen thanked Auckland for coming out to see them, and followed by saying that they were going to play Born in the USA top to bottom.
The response from the crowd was that of huge excitement and appreciation. After all, we don’t get to see the Boss often, and it had been 11 years since his last visit.
So the 40 odd thousand people sang and danced along to his best known tracks from the 80s, and thoroughly enjoyed watching Springsteen run along the front of the crowd pulling people out to join him on stage.
His grin was contagious as one girl sang along to Glory Days with him, even though it was clear she was star-struck in disbelief of being up there with him.
“Unbelievable!” he exclaimed to the crowd.
It might not have been me up there dancing on stage, but from a couple of hundred metres away where I was seated at the stand, I couldn’t help but catch the joy from the crowd pulsing across the stadium in waves as I danced in the dark.
All time favourite slow jams such as I’m on fire and My hometown had me swaying from where I sat, almost closing my eyes as Springsteen’s harmonising voice passed through my ears.
A total contrast to the outright fantastic rocking of Rage Against the Machine’s Tom Morello who impressed the crowd with his phenomenal electric guitar playing alongside Springsteen in newer track The Ghost of Tom Joad.
An overall mind-blowing live show, which saw the king of rock n roll with his beloved E Street Band play the most audience-interactive show I’ve ever been witness to.
