Boss Seeger & the B-Street Band (The "B" Stands for Bourbon)

Man, I'm I behind on my Blogging. Seriously ... it gets to the point where you realize maybe this is all you got. You cover a few quaint childhood memories, a couple stream of consciousness poems, a tale or two of debauchery and you think ... "Yep, that pretty much takes care of my life ... see ya."

But, then, one night you go to a concert that rejuvenates your spirit and you think, uh, maybe one more Blog. So you're so pumped up you wait or a week or two and realize you still haven't written a damn thing.

I had plans to write 2 Super-size Blogs this month, you know, the ones where you keep scrolling & scrolling wondering "Is this Mofo ever gonna take this Baby home or what?"

One was going to be called ...

"I'm Not the Biggest Springsteen Fan But I Own All His Albums On Vinyl Up to Tunnel of Love (Except for Born to Run), and the Same Batch on CD PLUS Born to Run and Everything Else With the Exception of Tracks, 18 Tracks, Hammersmith Odeon London '75, the Born to Run 30th Anniversary Edition (though I did pick up a bootleg of outtakes from Pastor Paul's Garage Sale) nor the "The Essential Bruce Springsteen" Which I Bought a Cassette Version of From a Holiday Station in Two Harbors When I Was Jonesing for Some Springtunes on a Road Trip ... and Also I've Seen him in Concert 4 Times Which Isn't That Much for a Dedicated Fan But Kind of a Lot for a Casual Fan Such as Myself)."

And the other one was going to be called ...

"Confessions of a Hardcore Alice Cooper Fanatic, Yet, Who's Never Seen him in Concert ... Until He Hits the Taste of Minnesota this July 30th"

The goals for these 2 blogs were so lofty that I kept putting them off, waiting for that 2-4 hour block of time to attack the keyboard. You think, okay, do I start this Blog about Bruce in 11th grade Study Hall, October '75 when I grabbed those Time & Newsweek issues and loped back to my desk thinking "I wonder if this guy's as good as Rush?" or do I start with ... then I took my seat at the Excel Center only to discover that the Boss (like some bosses in the real world) meanders in to his desk 70 minutes late.

Okay, maybe I'll start there since I've already exhausted myself writing that long title (above).

But, unlike other bosses, this boss doesn't have a desk like the other bosses we all know and, umm, love. This Boss doesn't have a Newton's Cradle, a Blackberry and a collection of cliche phrases backing up a 3% raise, this Boss has a stable of acoustic Takamine guitars (okay, I gotta speak up here, "Bruce, those guitars aren't naturally worn out are they? I mean, how long has Takamine been around, I've seen Gibsons from the 30's with a better shine than those, you have an assistant who smacks those things with a bicycle chain right?) and ... shoot ... the momentum has been broken by parenthetical ramblings again ... let me try it again ...

This Boss doesn't have a Newton's Cradle, a Blackberry and a collection of cliche phrases backing up a 3% raise, this Boss has a stable of acoustic Takamine guitars, a 19-piece band and an extraordinary ability to pull a hockey arena full of strangers into one tight-knit community all singing "I danced with a gal with a hole in her stockin', And her heel kep' a-rockin' and her toe kep' a-knockin', I danced with a gal with a hole in her stockin', And we danced by the light of the moon." For one night at least, but for many people, a much longer experience, maybe even a lifetime for the willing.

It's hard not to like Bruce Springsteen though I know a few who say they don't. But, maybe like the great humorist and everybody's fantasy girlfriend Mary Lucia once said (and I'm paraphrasing), "There are 2 kinds of people in the world, those who love Neil Diamond, and those who pretend they don't."

Last time I saw Bruce at the Excel, I had, by some fluke and enough knowledge of graphics software lingo, ended up in a corporate suite, which turned into a drunken party. Picture yourself dangling from the balcony suite, wine bottle in hand, pumping your fist, hollering in your hoarsest rock & roll party voice "RENO---REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEENO" toward the lone introspective artist with an acoustic guitar who has requested no beer sales 20 minutes prior to showtime. Then, as he plays "Part Man, Part Monkey" one of your suitepartymates gets oddly offended and walks out of the concert ... knuckles dragging along the carpet as he leaves the confines of the suite.

Many light years ago I wound up at a Sarah Lawrence College summer art program in the South of France that was largely attended by Ivy League students from wealthy families. I'm pretty sure I was the only one who had scrubbed toilets, emptied Kotex refuse containers and swung a mop to get there (actually, my Dad was a millionaire and that was just a weird hobby of mine).

Anyway, above the bed I ended up with in the dorm, was a picture of Bruce Springsteen rocking out onstage with a Tele (or Esquire or whatever). It was like a mini-poster from some rock & roll magazine. About halfway through the semester, I noticed it was a double-sided poster so I flipped it over for variety. On the other side was a modern band of the day, Siouxsie & the Banshees.

One of my roommates went by the name of "N", he was named after his father who was named after his father who was named after his father and so on but I can't remember what the "N" stood for. He grew up in the Park Avenue area of Manhattan and spoke slowly and carefully, he sounded very much like John Malkovich. He had long, straight, dark brown hair that rested on his shoulders and often dressed in tweed suits and wore a Fedora hat, which looked a little warm for the South of France in the summer. He was the only guy I've ever known under the age of 50 who smoked a pipe (for tobacco) and if you listened closely, the dude was absolutely hilarious.

We became good friends that summer and he always seemed amazed by my stories from, what he called, "Out West." He considered anything on the other side of 9th Avenue as "Out West."

He hadn't been introduced to the concept of "kidding" till we met. For example, every once in a while, I'll tell a story where I'm, like, pulling your leg or whatever, seriously, I have done that a few times in my life, I don't know why but I've seen other people do that too. So, one day, we're chatting and I say something totally absurd that I assume will not be believed, like, I studied life drawing under Pablo Picasso. He'd casually puff on his pipe and say, yes, Pablo was an excellent mentor to him also, when he was a child the Picassos would often visit them at the Hamptons and he was very good about giving away a trade secret or two.

At this point I thought he was pulling my leg but one evening, Picasso's daughter and her entourage came up to the school to see the student art show. When she saw N, she came over and gave him the peck on each cheek and they began to reminisce about their childhood memories out on the Hamptons then they went out to dinner.

A couple quick more memories about N and I'll get back on track with this tale. N went to camp as a child just like all of us ... only his camp was in the Swiss Alps. No member of N's family had ever learned to drive an automobile. It just wasn't ever seen as necessary. N told me once that he had always wanted to try LSD but could never seem to block that much time out in his schedule. I often think about that comment, I think it's the most pragmatic anti-drug message I've ever heard. I could almost picture N on one of those NBC public service announcements ...

(Zoom-in shot on N, sitting in a Chippendale wingback puffing on his pipe)

"Remember kids, drugs are for miscreants who don't have their Day Runner filled."

(Dissolve as chirpy music plays)

-----

(Zoom-in shot on Gather T. Swanson sitting in a lime-green Red Foreman chair puffing on his pipe)

"Remember kids, a schedule is only a schedule if you stick to it."

(Dissolve as Hendrix's Purple Haze plays.)

-----

Okay, okay, it's time to get back on track here.

So one day, N does a double-take (in slow motion) as he looks at the Siouxsie poster on the wall.

"Ahhhh, Siouxsie, she's such an exquisite vamp wouldn't you say? Where did you get that faboo poster, was it when we were Aix-en-Provence?"

"No, I just flipped the Springsteen poster over."

"Oh? Where did you get that poster?"

"It was on the wall the day I got here."

"Oh thank God, oh thank God, oh thank God, GT I wasn't sure what to say all this time. I thought your were some type of, you know, huge fan of Monsieur Springsteen."

"Oh, I wouldn't say I'm a huge fan but I have some of his albums, I guess "Asbury Park" is probably my favorite. Why, do you not like him or something?"

"Oh I don't know how to say this but ... ummm ... well ... he's just so ... so .... so ..."

"So what?"

It was like he was scanning the air above him looking for the right adjective to describe his less than stellar feelings for the Boss, his hands were talking but they had nothing to say. Then he just lost it a little, he stood up and yelled ...

"SO NEW JERSEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

"Is that bad?"

"I don't know GT, I don't know, I'm just not into the whole Wild West thing."

He asked to be excused and he spent the rest of the day in solitude near the lion fountain up in the shaded oak grove near the ancient Chateau where the Marquis De Sade had once resided.

By dinner he seemed to have come around and while we were all enjoying our first glass of wine for the evening, he put on one of the 2 LPs he had brought with, "Blood On the Tracks" on the Mattel Close "N" Play that was provided by the school. The other was actually a triple album, the Grateful Dead's "Europe '72."

----

So, way back when I'd heard that Springsteen was releasing on album of songs made famous by Pete Seeger, I have to admit, it just shot past me like an incidental breeze. In these modern days of Internet irony I just thought it was some type of joke that I didn't have time to delve into. I felt like if I brought it up to any Boss-fanatic friends they would just tell me, "Oh that's a just a joke from the Onion." Then, with a twinkle in their eye they would say "THEY WERE JUST KIDDING, you know, PULLING YOUR LEG, like you used to before you went to that fancy art school in France."

But, as time went on ... I slowly began to realize it was real. I still hadn't connected the dots yet, frankly, I was still thinking about the Devils & Dust show. That show sat in the storage locker of my head for a long time. I didn't hate it ... I love when artists play their songs stripped down to the acoustic format ... LOVE IT!!!!! And Nebraska may be my favorite record by Bruce so this approach is my thing and all but for some reason I was wary of this upcoming Pete Seeger thing.

Maybe it was because I got rip roaring drunk that night ... maybe it was because I was feeling guilty being an old married guy and flirting with a young girl in the suite and my opening line was ...

"Sho, what'ya sink of the new version of Quark XPress?"

Maybe it's because that line worked and made me wonder if young girls across the globe were lowering their standards.

Anyway, I just never really listened to Devils & Dust again. I never even popped the Dual Layer disc into my DVD player and checked out the video footage. But, no big deal, I'd rather see an artist taking a chance than working the same routine for life.

So somebody asked me if I was going and I firmly said "No". Next thing you know I start giving my spiel about how I've had it with high-priced arena shows citing a recent Van Morrison show I'd seen as evidence. I was going to Blog about that show but if your not gonna Blog something nice about somebody, maybe you shouldn't Blog at all.

If anyone's interested drop me a line and I'll try and give a fair account of the Van Morrison experience but for now I think I have my hands full trying to get to this Springsteen show review(?)

I have to admit, since I've started particular post, I've just cooked dinner for 2 kids (1 of them a vegetarian) and done a soccer practice drop-off and a pick-up. No wonder I don't do LSD anymore.

Okay, I hate to do this but I think I'm going to have to make this one of those lame 2-parters .... I didn't know that writing could be so strenuous.

I'll be back in a couple days, hang tight, I'm sure YOUR boss can find something for you to do in the meantime.