(Photo courtesy of Jo Lopez and BruceSpringsteen.net)
Wow. Just wow. That was an amazing show. Definitely one of, if not the best, concerts I’ve ever been to.
We had great seats, eleven rows behind the pit.
You can kind of see how far back I was here. The arrow is the general area I was in (in the dark area).
The band played for over three hours, playing the classics with a handful of newer songs and a bunch of great sign requests sprinkled throughout the night, including Bruce pulling two brothers on stage to sing “No Surrender” after spotting their sign in the crowd.
The setlist:
- Seeds
- High Hopes
- Badlands
- Adam Raised a Cain (sign request)
- She’s the One (sign request)
- One Step Up (sign request) (first live performance since 1988)
- Jesse James
- How Can a Poor Man Stand Such Times and Live?
- Wrecking Ball
- Death to My Hometown
- Night (sign request)
- No Surrender (sign request)
- Backstreets/Drive All Night/Backstreets (sign request)
- Because the Night
- Downbound Train (sign request)
- I’m on Fire
- All or Nothing At All
- Shackled and Drawn
- The Ghost of Tom Joad
- The Rising
- Light of Day
- Great Balls of Fire (with guest Joe Ely)
- Lucille (with guest Joe Ely)
- Born to Run
- Rosalita (sign request)
- Dancing In the Dark
- Tenth Avenue Freeze Out
- Shout
- Thunder Road (solo acoustic)
(Setlist courtesy of Houston Press)
(Photo courtesy of Jo Lopez and BruceSpringsteen.net)
Early on the band played “Jesse James” in the style of a New Orleans jazz band. The show prior to this one was the New Orleans Jazz Fest, and Bruce said he and the band picked up a few things from there that they wanted to share with us.
This video is from the Jazz Fest and not the Houston show, but it is pretty awesome (although I think it was better in Houston).
I thought the horn jam session at the end was going to be the highlight of the night, that is until “The Ghost of Tom Joad”.
Bruce and Tom Morello trading off solos was awesome, but then Morello went off and did an amazing solo.
The crowd was electric during the song.
(Photo courtesy of Jo Lopez and BruceSpringsteen.net)
We got an amazing setlist in Houston. Bruce loves Houston, it’s an important city for the band. Both times I saw him in concert he told the story of the band’s first trip to the Bayou City playing two shows a night at Houston’s historic Liberty Hall.
He played almost every song off of Born to Run except for “Meeting Across the River” and “Jungleland”.
“Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out”, the song about the formation of the E Street Band was an experience. This show was the first show the band has done in Houston since Clarence Clemons, The Big Man, passed away in 2011. Bruce has been showing a video montage of Clemons and Danny Federici right when the line “…and the Big Man joined the band” comes up. Jake Clemons, Clarence’s nephew has been performing with the E Street Band since Clarence’s death, and he has been making his uncle proud. Dude can play.
(Photo courtesy of Jo Lopez and BruceSpringsteen.net)
Unfortunately I don’t have a video for “Tenth Avenue Freeze Out”, but here is “Dancing in the Dark” with a wicked sax solo from Jake.
Bruce and the band played for over 3 hours, well past the 11pm curfew for noise and concerts in The Woodlands (which brings a pretty mighty fine). I had such a blast, singing and dancing the whole night. It’s been five years since Bruce and the band came to Houston. I hope the next tour is much sooner than that.
Bruce closed out the show with a solo acoustic version of “Thunder Road”, my favorite song. When I saw him come back out on stage with a harmonica around his neck I knew what we were going to hear, and getting an acoustic version sure was a treat. I got chills. It was the perfect ending to the night.
Here are some other video highlights from the show.
“High Hopes”
“One Step Up”
(Thanks to Dave Meek for these great videos.)