Orel Family

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band: Long Walk Home. Washington, DC, May 27, 2026. Photo: Matthew Orel You know that flag flying over the courthouse It means certain things are set in stone Who we are, what we'll do and what we won't --Bruce Springsteen, Long Walk Home Bruce Springsteen has performed in front of the American flag before. Most famously, the "Born in the U.S.A" tour stadium shows opened with Bruce and the E Street Band in front of a giant flag ; after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in 2001m Bruce played benefit shows in New Jersey in front of a giant flag as well. It's not subtle. This is my country and this is my flag. Bruce Springsteen, Max Weinberg Land of Hope and Dreams. Washington, DC, May 27, 2026. Photo: Matthew Orel On Wednesday, Bruce took his case to the nation's capital city, in the only stadium show of the Land of Hope and Dreams American Tour. It'd be easy enough to interpret - or, arguably, misinterpret - that flag as an ass...

Bruce Springsteen, Phoenix, April 16, 2026. All pictures and video by Matthew Orel. Bruce Springsteen is angry. And boy, oh, boy, is he holding on to his anger. Last night, through a bit of clever planning with a family trip, I managed to be in Phoenix for the "Land of Hope and Dreams - No Kings" tour.  It's also, for the most part,  a "no surprises" tour. Last night was the third consecutive show with the same setlist. To some fans, setlist variation still matters. To them, I'd say this: Get over it. Going in, even those of us in "blackout" mode basically knew what to expect. Bruce has been very vocal about his rage over the current administration, culminating in his sudden January release of "Streets of Minneapolis"  and the subsequent announcement of this 20-date E Street Band tour. The show is positioned as a rhetorical call to arms, with Bruce directly stating the purpose multiple times during the show: "This American tragedy ca...

Today was "The Main Event" of the Born to Run 50th Anniversary weekend at Monmouth University, and it was the most thrillingly unique day I've ever experienced as a Springsteen fan. Walking in to the Pollak Theater in the morning, I was immediately struck by how happy everyone seemed. Then I noticed how many in the capacity 750-seat room I've known for decades. Today was to document the anniversary, but in a way it was also for us. Consisting mostly as panel discussions and interviews, the day started with a Boom. Boom Carter, that is, the drummer that most Springsteen fans have never seen, who recorded exactly one song as a member of the E Street Band: Born to Run. Boom was joined by Garry Tallent and David Sancious for the first panel of the day, moderated by radio personality Tom Cunningham on the band as it existed from February through August 1974. Sancious was eloquent recalling events from long ago, though he also noted that in 1974 he was busy focusing on the ...

Over the years, an expectation has occasionally been built in the Bruce fan community that a tour finale will be a spectacle.  There is certainly precedent for that: In 2000, the Reunion Tour ended with a blowout at Madison Square Garden, including rarities and even a world debut. In 2009, the Working on a Dream tour ended in Buffalo with a once-ever performance of the entire Greetings from Asbury Park  album, and also other rarely and never-played songs. So for this final Milano show in the extreme heat, this final rescheduled show from 2024 and the last go-round for this 20-day tour's E Street Band, it could hardly be a surprise that fans arriving at San Siro thought maybe there'd be a bit of that once-in-a-lifetime experience at a building that has produced so many prior memories. This was not that  show. If you saw Monday's show, you pretty much saw this one. This isn't a bad  thing: Bruce was in great spirits, playing with audience members again and egging on t...

Sab Siro isn't like other locations where I've seen Brue Springsteen play. Here, the attitude is, "he's one of ours. " People came from around town, from around Italy, from around Europe, and from the United States as well, to take it in. Walking around Milan Monday afternoon, I spotted Springsteen shirts of all sorts. Then Bruce came on and smashed any expectations. There are a few differences in setup between San Siro and the typical US experience: For one thing, there's an extensive midway outside the stadium with food sellers, mostly selling variations of the same wretched sandwiches as if to prove that yes, you can  get bad food in Italy. Also, smoking -- at least tobacco smoking -- was permitted inside the stadium. The crowd mostly got to their seats early, and by 15 minutes to showtime, a loud singalong to the familiar "Badlands" theme was going through the stadium. The E Street Band took the stage 5 minutes before the scheduled start time o...

Imagine the scene: Barefoot on the beach, a perfect cool breeze coming in off the water, and there in front of tens of thousands of celebrants, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. That was last night, for a unique performance to conclude the 2024 Sea Hear Now Music Festival . The festival was spearheaded by rock photographer Danny Clinch  in 2018; this was the first performance of the E Street Band. In order to be able to see Bruce and the band without the aid of giant video monitors, there were two basic options: either procure very limited and pricey "VIP" and "Platinum" tickets, or arrive many hours early to the 7th Avenue Beach where the Surf Stage was located. I arrived at the Surf Stage around 1:15pm; many had lined up before sunrise and no doubt would have done so earlier had it been permitted by event staff. Getting to the stage early also meant catching three preliminary acts: Joy Oladokun , Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees Kool & the Gang , an...

Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band was originally scheduled to play Camden Yard s in Baltimore on September 9th, 2023. The show was postponed for a year due to Bruce's peptic ulcer disease. Friday night, he and the band made up for it. Springsteen has a big show coming up Sunday evening on the beach in Asbury Park as the headliner of the SeaHearNow Music Festival . For this sweltering Friday evening, though, he gave full attention to Baltimore. The band came on stage almost exactly at the stated show time of 7:30. Given that Bruce's first top ten single "Hungry Heart " mentioned Baltimore in the first line, it was no surprise that Bruce opened with it, followed by another River fan favorite, "Sherry Darling." The audience took the first line of "Hungry Heart," and Bruce was down to the front of the stage and in to the crowd even before beginning his own singing. The two openers also gave opportunities for members of the band to shine, in par...

Springsteen in Columbus, April 21, 2024 There are times when words and pictures really can't do justice to the thing just witnessed. For example, a total eclipse of the sun . Or when Bruce Springsteen gets really good.  And now, within an easy drive to Ohio, I've been blessed to experience both of these in a span of less than two weeks. Bruce was originally scheduled to play Columbus on March 9, 2023, but it was postponed to September 21st due to an undisclosed illness. All three of the March shows rescheduled to September were then rescheduled again when Bruce's peptic ulcer disease forced postponement of all 2023 shows after September 3rd. The Columbus show last night was the final make-up date. Solo all night. Columbus, April 21, 2024 Nothing against last year's shows: I went to three of them consecutively, and I had a great time. But the setlists were static, the ticket prices were high, and despite the high  performance  quality, the shows seemed somehow less than ...

Bruce Springsteen with Robert Santelli, October 28, 2023 On Saturday, The Bruce Springsteen Archives and Center for American Music held an all day symposium to celebrate the 50th Anniversary of Springsteen's 2nd album, " The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle," at the  Pollak Theater on the campus of Monmouth College . Previously this year, the Center held a successful event to commemorate Springsteen's first Columbia record, "Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J." Released in November, 1973, "The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle" moved sharply away from the "singer-songwriter" approach that had been championed by John Hammond at Columbia, and to showcase Springsteen as a rock and soul songwriter, instrumentalist and band leader. The album was not a commercial success at the time, but it remains at or near the top of many fans' favorites. The main body of the program consisted of nine panel sessions, progressing...

No Surrender. April 3, 2023 It's been nearly 20 years since I've seen three consecutive Springsteen shows, and given the current dynamics of a) high prices and b) lack of shows near where I live, I'm unlikely to see 3 consecutive shows ever again. But there I was, last night, in the corner of the exalted GA pit at Brooklyn's Barclay's Arena, at my 3rd consecutive show, with my 5th family member. I took some pains not to immerse myself in the current set prior to last Wednesday's show in Detroit, but by the time we got to Brooklyn the basic structure was pretty well memorized: There'd be a core of 25 songs, in a specific order, and then a couple of "wild card" slots -- one after "Nightshift" and the other at the beginning of the encores. With the exception of those two songs, every moment, every move, pretty much, was tightly choreographed. To be clear, this isn't a bad  thing, but if you saw the show in Detroit or at the Garden, you p...

Bruce Springsteen salutes the crowd - April 1, 2023 Inevitably, someone might ask me, approximately: "you just saw him in Detroit on Wednesday, why would you fly to New York to see more? Especially when it's so  expensive?"  As the hours slipped away on my weather-delayed flight yesterday, I could even entertain a rational point to those questions. Hell, just looking at a setlist that had only 2 changes from the Detroit show 3 days prior, it still might seem fair to ask. Jungleland Trapped. April 1, 2023 But, you see, there was this show. If you were there, you know. You experienced the crowd. You experienced what seemed to be an extra bounce in everyone's step -- in Bruce's case, literally skipping across the stage at times. You experienced "Jungleland," in which Bruce seemed to conjure up a version of himself not seen or heard in decades, and in which, if you closed your eyes, you heard the ghost of Jake Clemons's uncle, too. You heard and saw Max ...

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, March 29, 2023, Detroit It wasn't so long ago that Bruce Springsteen coming to Michigan to play was pretty much an annual event. Every year from 2002 through 2009, Bruce made at least one appearance in the Great Lakes State. But after Bruce infamously forgot where he was during that 2009 show at The Palace of Auburn Hills , his appearances here have been rare. Last night's appearance with the E Street Band at Little Caesar's Arena in Detroit marked just his 2nd appearance in Michigan in the past decade, and was his first in the city of Detroit since 2005. Which is to say, it's been a moment. Things have happened. But more to the point: Springsteen & E Street Band -- the graphics for this tour can't be bothered with first names or definite articles -- were in town last night for a show, and this is what I witnessed. Smile for the camera! Ezra (and the hat) with Bruce in Detroit Just before 7:45pm the lights dimmed. I was s...

May 15, 2005, a nice spring Sunday afternoon. I was helping to lead my son's Cub Scout troop on a hike on a local trail network. My cell phone buzzed. "Matt, this is Bobby, I have front row on my screen. Do you want them?" YES!!! 5 hours later we were at Wolstein Center in Cleveland, in the front row, for Springsteen's performance there that night. I've never met Bobby in person. He lives a couple thousand miles away. But he was part of my community. He also had my Ticketmaster account, and when that ticket was spotted, he was me and I was on my way. After the hike was over, anyway. Other times, I bought prime tickets for friends to use, to shows I wasn't going to myself. Bruce Springsteen has never had a formal fan club or ticketing service. No Grateful Dead Ticket Service, no Ten Club, nothing like that. So, various circles of fans grouped amongst themselves. This extended from sharing "backdoor" phone numbers before internet sales became the thing...

Tickets went on sale this morning for several Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band shows for their next USA tour, starting next February. By the time of the first scheduled show at Tampa Bay's Amalie Arena on February 1st, it will have been more than 6 full years since his last US shows in September 2016. Since then, he's released an autobiography, gone on a book tour, made a western album, produced a film that was exhibited at a major film festival, played a few charity gigs, made an album with the E Street Band, sold his catalogue to the record company for a half billion dollars, had one planned E Street Band tour scuttled at the last minute due to COVID concerns, and had two stints of his one man show, "Springsteen on Broadway." Profitably busy, one might say, and now it's time to hit the road. Prices for "platinum" tickets in Tampa. Yes, those are real. Springsteen's ticketing policy has varied over the years: In 1999, for example, virtually e...