Bruce rocked Houston

Left the house this morning
Bells ringing filled the air
Wearing the cross of my calling
On wheels of fire I come rollin down here… Bruce Sringsteen

Bruce Springsteen is one of those names that has been in my life for as long as I can remember. My first memory of him was riding in my dad’s truck and looking at the cassette case of Born in the USA while the tunes were blaring out of the old brown Ford’s little 5″ speakers. And here I am… 24 years later and reeling from my first Bruce Springsteen concert.

I really didn’t know what to expect going into last night as I’m not that a fan of big stadium type shows. So I prepared myself as best I could… I didn’t want to look bad in front of 15,000 people so I went to Google and looked for the set list to memorize the songs he’s playing. As I looked over the previous set lists on this tour I realized that there was no standard setlist and my meager knowledge of The Boss’s music was not going to cut it! I was a bit nervous to be among all the hardcore fans and only knowing about half the songs he’d sing. Which turned out to be about spot on… but it didn’t matter one little bit. What I experienced last night was the best large stadium show I’ve ever been to and one of the coolest shows overall.

I expected Bruce to get on stage and play with a little intensity in his soulful style… but what I got was a full on fire raging on the stage. He brought the full 9 piece E-Street band complete with 4 guitars, 2 sets of keys, big Clarence on the Horns, Max Wineberg on the drums and a bass player. Bruce took the Toyota Center’s crowd and pushed our emotions all over the place. He took us from deep engaging lyrics and harmonica solos… all the way to turn it up loud, stand on top of the seat, yell at the top of your lungs energy! He had perfect command of the crowd and only used the band, a small set (in relation to other big name acts), a few lights and the magic only few possess to take a song and drive it into your heart.

I stood amazed at how he engaged the crowd and brought us into the show. He was shaking hands with the folks down on the front row, telling people “Hi”, pointing at signs, laughing and joking with people, throwing his own harmonica’s to fans… he even took a request. Some guy had a little sign that said “Play E-Street Shuffle… Please!” Bruce leans out into the crowd, grabs the sign and turns to the band and goes “Remember this one?” and away they went!

This was not the show I expected. Bruce took 40+years of playing music and brought it to the stage last night. And not only that.. he played music he wanted to play… and he played it for the crowd that showed up. The artists in our genre could learn a thing or two by watching this man play. He is an artist in every sense of the word. If you ever get the chance to see him… just go.