Bruce Springsteen, a new archival live album

Like every first Friday of the month, Bruce Springsteen releases a new archive live performance: the March one is taken from the concert on June 22, 2000 at Madison Square Garden in New York, in the midst of the Reunion Tour with the E Street Band. The album is part of the official series of historical recordings and arrives close to the next tour, which will start on March 31st – with each evening which will in turn become an official recording that can be listened to or purchased on Nugs.net. Traditionally, when the Boss is on tour, the publication of the live archives is suspended to make room for the current ones.

The concert published is the fifth of ten consecutive evenings at MSG in the summer of 2000, a residency remembered for the large space given to new songs and rarities. As Erik Flanagan writes in the presentation notes:

What makes a Springsteen concert exciting is perhaps more definable. An element of unpredictability plays a significant role and, for those who see many concerts and tours, it is important to find songs in the setlist that we have never seen performed before. Part of the excitement lies in the risk the artist takes by playing untested material; we feel rewarded by the opportunities he has decided to grant us. The concert on June 22, 2000 satisfies every requirement of enthusiasm.

The evening opens with the world premiere of “Another Thin Line”, co-written with Joe Grushecky and never before played live. During the show there are also other novelties of the period such as “Further On (Up the Road)” (unreleased at the time, and included in “The rising” two years later) and “American Skin (41 Shots)” – which at the time caused a sensation by telling the story of a boy killed by the police with 41 shots because he was mistaken for a threat, so much so that it led to a boycott of the NYPD – together with recoveries such as “Don’t Look Back” and “Secret Garden”, the latter at its first real concert performance after its release on “Greatest Hits” in 1995. Also on the set list is “Incident On 57th Street”, very rarely played by the vuco in that period. During the evening, Ali Weinberg, daughter of Max Weinberg, appears on keyboards on “Ramrod”. Jay Weinberg, the other son, would replace his father on drums for several concerts a few years later.