That-my maiden voyage-was during the waning summer days of the year 1999. Four years and 19 concerts later, the magic still remains for me, as it does, ostensibly, for Bruce. At the final show of the 1999-2000 Reunion Tour-the last of a record-setting 10-night stand at Madison Square Garden-Springsteen, regaining composure after a teary finale, assured the audience, "We'll be seein' ya." And just a breath over two years later, he fulfilled his promise.
"The Rising," which hit stores in the glum and shadowy wake of 9/11, marked Springsteen's first full-length album with the E-Street Band since his colossal 1984-release "Born in the U.S.A." A 15-song, 75-minute marathon of a record, interweaving stark solo-acoustic dirges amongst soulful, fist-pumping anthems, it debuted at number one on the Billboard charts in 11 countries across the globe. Weeks after its release, Springsteen embarked upon a barn-burning world tour, culminating in a record-setting ten-show run at Giants Stadium in New Jersey, his home state and stronghold, where he sold well over a half-million tickets in all.
The new DVD, "Live in Barcelona," captures one historic night at the Palau Sant Jordi on Oct. 16, 2002 during the short European leg of the tour. The show marks Springsteen's first ever full-concert release, which includes noteworthy extras-clips from the legendary concerts at Fenway Park this fall and the opening rehearsals in Asbury Park, New Jersey last summer. The DVD also includes an exclusive featurette entitled "Drop the Needle and Pray: The Rising on Tour," a host of interviews and a number of previously unreleased photos of the E Street Band. The sound and picture quality, as well, reflect the high standards that have characterized Springsteen's long career in the recording industry. In fact, a partial release, broadcast on CBS this past winter, won several awards, including the Emmy for best multi-camera picture editing. Springsteen himself recently won the Les Paul award at the Annual Technical Excellence and Creativity awards.
Yet, in the end, it is neither the special features nor the production that mitigates the DVD's success. Instead, it is, as always with Springsteen, the unique apex of awe, liberation and reflection that he alone reaches in concert.
Springsteen himself may be 54 years of age, but his concerts are neither for the feeble nor the old. As one pale and emasculated music critic once remarked, "… it was a truly frightening and intimidating experience, all the fists pumping, and hands waving. It's more like a cult meeting than a concert." And indeed, this depiction is most decidedly accurate. Yet what's frightening is not, as the critic lamented, the quasi-religious devotion of the thousands of Springsteen fans that pump their fists each night at the show, but rather the few dejected and forlorn souls who manage to leave the venue unmoved. For if they are unmoved by Springsteen-the leather-clad John Steinbeck, the Telecaster toting Woody Guthrie-what will move them? If they cannot absorb the passion and transcendence at the Palau Sant Jordi that wistful night in October, what will they absorb? What enigmatic winds will bear them onward through the harshest currents of defeat and the narrowest straits of despair? What divine light will allay their darkest fears?
Perhaps the answer for some is not music. Perhaps some have grown disillusioned after years spent listening to meaning-starved pop tunes promulgated by MTV and Top 40 radio. I can hardly find fault with them, and further, I would be hard pressed to convince them of Springsteen's merit and potential amidst today's vacant corridors of pop blather. But perhaps if they watch the DVD, an artist who bestirs twenty-thousand people to chant "God is singing" in Spanish will do it. Perhaps just the singular unremitting devotion of one man to his music will do it. Perhaps his passion and his zeal will become theirs-perhaps even his faith and his hope.
In any case, the new DVD lends credence to a promise that Springsteen made one summer night in New York City, one which he has never failed to fulfill. Drenched in sweat and splendor, to a crowd looking almost as spent and disheveled as himself, he yelled, "I cannot promise you life everlasting. But I can promise you life tonight."