Bruce Springsteen returned to the OceanFirst Bank Center in Monmouth, New Jersey, on Friday for the second and final night of the ‘Music America: The Songs that Shaped Us’ concert, a celebration of 250 years of American music, and the opening of the Bruce Springsteen Center for American Music. The first evening focused on American music pioneers like Robert Johnson, Hank Williams and Woody Guthrie, and this one moved the clock towards latter acts like Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Dion DiMucci, and Public Enemy.
Dion and Public Enemy were part of the stacked bill, which also included Jon Bon Jovi, Nils Lofgren, Darlene Love, Jackson Browne, Gary Clark Jr., Darlene Love, and Sheryl Crow. Once again, Little Steven’s Disciples of Souls served as the house band, and Bob Santelli, Director of the Bruce Springsteen Center for American Music, served as the host. Just like the first show, Springsteen watched the performances from the audience, and came onstage throughout the night for a series of once-in-a-lifetime duets.
Springsteen first took the stage to honor Elvis Presley, his original musical hero, with high-energy takes on “Jailhouse Rock” and “Burnin’ Love.” “Elvis Presley creates a sound and a moment that will forever change not only rock and roll history, because there wasn’t any yet,” Santelli told the crowd, “but American culture and American music history.”
Later in the night, Springsteen joined Sheryl Crow for Bob Dylan’s “I Shall Be Released.” They were backed by guitarist Larry Campbell, who performed that song quite a few times with Dylan when he played in his backing band between 1997 and 2004. This was Springsteen’s first time singing the most famous tune from Dylan’s 1967 Basement Tapes sessions. By coincidence, it came just one night after Dylan kicked off his summer tour by breaking out one of the most obscure Basement Tapes songs, “Baby Won’t You Be My Baby,” for the first time since recording it nearly 60 years ago.
Dylan’s current live set also includes Bobby “Blue” Bland’s “Share Your Love With Me.” At Music America, Springsteen also dipped into the “Blue” Bland catalog for “Further Up The Road,” which he sang with Gary Clark Jr. They had the difficult task of following Public Enemy. “Man, you can’t come on after Public Enemy,” Springsteen joked. “Forget it. Jesus is coming back, he ain’t coming back after Public Enemy.”
Near the end of the night, many of the artists, including Jon Bon Jovi, Jackson Browne, and Public Enemy, came back out to join Springsteen and the Disciples of Souls for a jam on Eddie Floyd’s “Raise Your Hand,” which has been part of Springsteen’s live repertoire since the 1970s. It’s unclear if Flavor Flav was familiar with this song, but he still hyped the crowd up, sang directly into Springsteen mic, gave him a huge hug at the end, and asked the fans to “make some noise for the E Street Band.” (Nils Lofgren and Steve Van Zandt were onstage, so he was close enough.)
Everyone stuck around the stage for Southside Johnny’s “I Don’t Want to Go Home,” with Springsteen, Jon Bon Jovi, and Steve Van Zandt sharing lead vocals. The Holy Trinity of New Jersey rock even got around a single mic at one point, and Flav couldn’t resist joining along. (If you put that man near a stage, he’s going to take it over. It’s basically his purpose on the planet. No other hype man in hip-hop history comes even close to his skillset in this field.)
The evening wrapped with Springsteen playing “Land of Hope and Dreams” by himself. It was the only time across the two evenings where he performed an original song as opposed to a cover. “My God,” he told the crowd beforehand. “At 19, I was on this campus…not going to school. But played here on the steps over at the big building they have over there. If you had told me then, in 1969, that anything like this would ever, ever occur I would said, ‘You are out of your fuckin’ mind, my friend.’ I don’t know what to say, really.”
