Springsteen Summary

Were those really the last two times Bruce Springsteen will ever play the Spectrum? The concrete donut of a building is "slated for demolition" later this year, but when is it actually going down, down, down?  There's a credit crunch going on, in case you haven't heard, and no announcement has been made as to when Ed Snider and company are actually going to start building the Philly Live complex that's supposed to go up in its place.

Meantime Springsteen & the E Street Band are clearly going to be on the road for the rest of the year, and they have no dates scheduled after an Aug. 2 show in Santiago, Spain. And last night, the Boss again made plain his affection for the venue that he's played 32 times. "These old venues build up a certain degree of soul," he said, calling it "a kind of shame" that it's supposed to be torn down. So buy it, Bruce! You and the E Streeters can be the house band.

If this week's shows do indeed turn out to be the last times he plays the Spectrum, he certainly went out in typically sweaty, Springsteenian, leave-it-all-on-the-stage style. (The photos here are by Inky photographer David Swanson.) And there were enough out-of-the-blue moments to make any Bossophile kick her or himself for missing either evening.

Tuesday it was "Fire" - inspired by a handmade sign made up of four giant yellow letters with flames atop them that the star of the show called "a great f--- sign." Plus, "The Fever," "Mountain Of Love," and "You Can't Sit Down." Wednesday it was The Clash's "London Calling," which was spotted on a tiny cardboard homemade sign ("London Calling! Did I stump E Street?") on Tuesday, then worked up in soundcheck. Not to mention a Harry Kalas call of a Springsteen grand slam before "Thunder Road.

Both nights benefitted from the presence of Jay Weinberg, the 18 year powerhouse who plays with a lot more freewheeling pizzazz than his Dad. (And also less discipline, but then, who's a more disciplined drummer than Max Weinberg? Charlie Watts?) Weinberg fils played the second half of the main two hour set on Tuesday, and then came on a bit later on Wednesday and played through the entire encore. Did I mention this kid is 18? How cool must that be? The hug shared between he and his Dad - who's got to go work for his other boss, Conan O'Brien, on June 1 - at the end of the show on Wednesday was one of the great moments of the two-night stand.

The entrance of the young Weinberg on the scene also adds to the vibe of the E Street Band as a living, breathing, evolving family band. (And thanks to young Jay, and new '70s style Afro-sporting back-up singer Cindy Mizelle, the return of Patti Scialfa to the stage, blonde tressed Soozie Tyrell, and pony-tailed singer Curtis King, it's also suddenly become a band with really good hair.) The special thing about a Springsteen show is the way the musical commuinity on stage connects with the community in their seats, or more aptly, on their feet. There was a great call and response exchange going on Tuesday with Springsteen shouting "Philly!" and the crowd coming back with "Bruce!"

And one of the unexpected highlights of both shows was "Outlaw Pete," the unjustly dissed Ennio Morricone-influenced horse opera from Working On A Dream that refuses to take itself seriously -- haters, save your venom for "Queen of the Supermarket" -- that, whatever you think of the WOAD version, was an unqualified success on the Spectrum stage. That's partly because Springsteen sang it so well and worked so hard to sell it, but it's also because it he turned it into a clarion question that repeated the key line over and over: "Can you hear me? Can you hear me?" Yep, we could.

"Outlaw Pete" worked so well, and "Kingdom Of Days," which was dedicated to Scialfa the first night, and sung with her the second, rang out so sweetly and clearly, it made me wish that Springsteen had worked more Workin' material into the set. It may not be one of his strongest albums, and old fans always want to hear the old songs, but doing only three or four from a new album indicates a lack of faith in it. It would be nice to hear the Boss make his case passionately for the new material.

The reason he's not doing more, I think, is that while the WOAD songs chime with Obama era optimism, and put aside the bitter Bush era rage of 2006's Magic, the new songs don't speak clearly to the doubt and desperation that Americans are feeling in 2009. (Except for "The Wrestler," which he did Tuesday.) And Springsteen's got a whole horse trailer full of songs to trot out and address the unease in the land, and people's need to feel they can regain control over their lives. That's why the show starts out with "Badlands," and includes "Seeds," "Johnny 99," and "Ghost of Tom Joad" (or on Wednesday, "Youngstown," with Nils Lofgren ripping it up, in both cases).

So which show was better? Sorry, Wednesday-only concert goers, buit I'm going with opening night. The first-night-back-at-the-Spectrum anticipation from the crowd fed Springsteen and the band all night, and it was truly one of those rare almost-three-hour shows that never flagged in intensity, and could hold up energy-wise with early '80s Bruce. Wednesday might have seemed that way too, and believe me, I'm not complaining. But Tuesday was just that much more over-the-top. One measure was the way Springsteen tore up the set list on Tuesday, which was supposed to include "Thundercrack" and "Kitty's Back," and neither "Fire" nor "Mountain of Love" nor "You Can't Sit Down" nor "Rosalita." But he kept calling out audibles, Peyon Manning-style, searching for a higher level of putting-the-hard-times-aside catharsis.

As balls-out as Wednesday seemed, and as excellent of a show as it was, it was mellower, and more musicianly, with Bruce and the band stretching out, and with him in particular showing off his bluesy and slightly jazzy chops as a guitarist on "Thundercrack" and "Kitty's Back," which had their day after all. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't have missed it for the world. But - and maybe it's just because I'm a nut for "Mountain Of Love," as Main Point throwbacks go - if I had to pick one, it would have been Tuesday. And that's despite the historic and hard-driving Joe Strummer nod on "London Calling" (whose apocalyptic freak-out is tailor made  for these times), and the sweetest moment of the two nights, when Springsteen dropped "Waiting On A Sunny Day" from the set list, and instead tried to get his octogenarian Italian mother Adele to sing along to "Hungry Heart." You should have told her it was coming, Bruce, and then she might have known the words by heart.

And here's "London Calling."