Bruce Springsteen

As I ssaid, some time ago, I'd bought Mrs Greybeard 2 tickets to see Bruce Springsteen at the Olympiastadion in Munich. The venue is fantastic - it's the stadium where they held the '72 Olympics and where Bayern München played their games until they got the "doughnut". One side has that famous roof and the other is open. They built a huge stage on the open side, covered the grass with boarding and sat those who didn't want to stand under the roof.

For those who have seen the Glastonbury footage, the setup was the same, with 2 huge screens at either side of the stage and a runway at the front.

The show lasted 2 3/4 hours and Springsteen was on the move from start to finish - amazing energy and a great affinity for his audience. He spent a lot of time on the piers, built onto the runway, in amongst the audience. At one point, he had a young lad (10-12 years old) sing into the mike - Springsteen sang a line, then the lad repeated it. Later Springsteen went back, handed the kid the mike and stood there whilst the lad sang the song (all the while with it being played on the big screens). The lad's going to have a fantastic memory of that concert!

His set list was a mix of old and new - the real favourites coming at the end (basically a longer version of his Glastonbury set). Fantastic pace, interspersed with the odd slow number and, more often than not, without a break between numbers. He'd be playing the outro, come up to the mike - shout "1 - 2 - 3" and into the next song.

The sound was just about right - no-one was going to go deaf, but no-one was going to say it was too quiet, either. The only quibble would be that the sound engineers seemed unable to get individual instruments to stand out in a solo, it was almost impossible to hear Steve van Zandt's solos, for example. Bummer.

For the gear heads, they all, apparently, played straight into the board. There were no amps on stage at all, just monitors. Springsteen rotated 3 or 4 Teles and an acoustic. Steve van Zandt spent most of the evening with his black Strat, but also played a Rickenbacker, a Gretsch and an Ovation Mandolin. The other guitarist, whose name is temporarily blanked from memory (Alzheimer's moment, sorry) played what looked like a mahogany Strat, a Jazzmaster and a lap steel, on a guitar strap.

All-in-all a fantastic evening even if I didn't get home until just before 1 in the morning.