When i saw him last year i felt very privileged and lucky as it seemed it may be the last full swing old style tour with the E-Street band , he was 59 after all.Sure one would expect him back doing the odd acoustic tour , which i would love as some of his older songs have more poignancy and depth of feeling as acoustic, so much so that to hearing the original rock versions seem overdressed and cluttered.
What a bonus to have the pleasure of having him in our hometown.And what a debut for Hamzah as his first concert.
It has been shaping up to be a good year for legends engaging in operation rolling swan-song.We have had Jackson Browne;Neil Young ; that old geezer that lost all the dough as his agent spent a lifetimes fortune on houses and yachts whilst he was away discovering the joys of non-material living in some Buddhist hideout , and later we have Simple Minds making a comeback , backed by OMD.
The weather turned at just the pivotal strategic moment i and Hamzah left house to walk to Hampden , we planned to have a Fish Supper from Ramsays at Victoria Rd near the entrance to Queens Park.The rain was bucketing down as my Wife offered us a lift , with a smug sheepish you-two-are-plonkers-arent-you look.We told her to hop it ,were sticking to the original plan and walking.
By the time the Fish suppers were ready time was running somewhat short , so we ate on the hoof , i was surprised at the rate Hamzah finished his portion , im sure he throw some of it behind the bushes when i wasnt looking.But anyway we completed our mobile meal in the nick of time.
There were plenty of tickets going for sale at face value price in the environs outside the Stadium , some enterprising dudes were even selling ponchos , with sales rocketing and plummeting in proportion with the on-off temperament of the precipitation.
Once inside we found our seats to be excellent,the kind you see LaPorta sitting at when watching La Liga matches away from Home alongside the rival clubs Chairman.We could not have asked for a better spot.The ground started filling up to seething point ; those poor buggers that have to climb the gantry on those rickety fluttering rope ladders with broomstick thick planks managed to sway and cascade and loop into position.We were ready.
Bruce started the show with the thunderpaced Badlands:
Thereafter we riproared ; and reflected; and thunder-roaded and come out the other side as better Human Beings.Elegiac versions were punctuated with Sublime ones , rounded up with ones too ineffable to describe , you either feel it or you are not alive, Springsteen has a loquacious style that gets right to the marrow.A blistering performance that would have silenced the most cynically fastidious crowd.
Another stand-out was Atlantic City:
Then we had a truly mellifluous rendition of Thunder Road , an uplifting controlled obstreperous rabble-rousing Radio Nowhere ; the Pathos charged reflection of The River.
Having Seen him at Old Trafford and The Emirates last year i have to admit the Glasgow crowd were several octaves higher in passion and verve.I didnt believe so much the hype that Glasgow crowds are any better than the rest.But now i know better.
