Bringing everything back home: Bruce Springsteen recalls San Siro

“Are you ready?”, Bruce Springsteen repeats, 4 times: he just got on stage, he has smeared his Telecaster. “Let’s go”, always scream in Italian – attacking “no surrender”.
He has never been ready to the emotional and sound wave that arrives on you when there is the and street band in San Siro. This stadium is a home for Springsteen and for his fans: it is the place of some of the most legendary concerts of his career, he is an amplifier of emotions: these songs, this band seem to resonate even stronger. The audience, already in ecstasy without a note being still played.
It is the eighth time that Springsteen sounds in San Siro, 40 years after the 1985 debut and one year after the 2024 dates postponed for a problem under the voice. In total 9 years have passed, from the two concerts of 2016, a geological era ago.
So the attack with “No Surrenter” and “My Love Will Not Let You Down” is a boxer 1-2 that spreads you: you may already leave at home happy. The beauty of music is that when it strikes you does not hurt, to put it with Bob Marley, another who had a link with this stadium.

Little Steven’s return

It is 19.56 when Springsteen climbs the stairs that bring him to the stage: he was preceded by the members of the and Street Band, by his side there is Little Steven – Opera di Appendicite a week ago, his presence was uncertain. It is the return to the return, and Bruce immediately calls him to the microphone to sing with him, on “no surrender”. For the whole evening Van Zandt shows off his collection of guitars – I counted at least 3 different rickenbackers, and two telecaster, one with the Ukrainian colors, among others, – and take some addresses; But as always, the best solos makes them with his face, with his wonderful expressions, punctually taken up by the three screens that frame the stage and who are used to tell the concert – without visual and special effects. Little Steven is an essential part of the and street band liturgy, and it is not surprising that he has done everything to be there, even if he inevitably seemed a little fatigued.

Anger and hope

What arrives at San Siro is a different concert than that of two years ago, and also to what should have passed last year. It is no longer linked to the nostalgic tones of “letter to you”, it is an almost angry tour at certain times, despite taking the title from the hope of “Land of Hope and Dreams”. Springsteen anticipates the song with the now well -known monologue in which he speaks of the authoritarian drift of his country, of the “art of rock in dangerous times”. Themes that return shortly after in “Rainmaker”, a song that tells the man who boasts that they can rain on command, falsifying reality: any reference to a certain demagogue is purely wanted.
The most political songs and the related intro are translated and subtitled on the screens: the current one is a show that lives much of writing and much less of improvisation compared to the Springsteen of 9 years ago: so much so that the lineup tonight is identical to that of 3 days ago in Germany, including “I’m on fire”, which theoretically was not included but is inserted. This more theatrical choice does not detract from the songs and the story, which after the political part slips a series of classics: the power of “Atlantic City”, the hope and joy to be singing in chorus of “Promised Land” and “Hungry Heart”.

The boss liturgy

Bruce’s voice every now and then falls, inevitably moves less than once: but it’s not the point. What matters are emotions, the exchange with the public, the liturgy: Bruce periodically goes down to the first rows, to look for contact, to be touched, in a sort of blessing.
The prevalence of the audience is an adult, but every time it strikes me how there are people of all ages and how many parents bring children and children, because the passion for the boss is something that has been handed down from generation to generation. Bring them to San Siro da Bruce is like bringing them to San Pietro Dal Pope – so much so that in the stands and in the audience you can see people who come from all over the world.
It is a liturgy that has moments of pure emotion: “The River” begins guitar and voice and ends guitar and voice, with Bruce sings in falsetto and then directs the chorus of the stadium – is perhaps the most beautiful moment of the evening. There is anger (still) of “Murder incorporated” and then again the reflections of “House of Thousand Guitars”, played in acoustic. Then the actual prayer of “My City of Ruin” – “This is a Prayer for My Country. Let’s Pray”, says Bruce before attacking it.

Bruce is human

The following part is a crescendo of classic songs: “Because the night” with Nils Lofgren protagonist on the Assolo, “The Rising” and “Badlands” sung in chorus, before “Thunder Road”, with Bruce who returns to the public.
Then the bis start, and it is another blow: for “Born in the USA” the lights of the stadium are turned on, which remain until the end. It is a sequence with “Born to Run”, “Bobby Jean”, “Dancing in the Dark”, with the presentation of the E Street Band and the inevitable “10th Avenue Freeze -Out” which tells the story – with a memory of Clarence Clemons and Danny Federici, shown on the screen.

The band – who also lost some blow here and there – goes a little to fall on the ending. Even Bruce himself – impeccable in shirt and tie despite the temperature of San Siro – takes off the vest and shows itself very sweaty and tired. It is human, it comes to think. But there is still time for the party with “Twist and Shout” – with its pantomime, false purposes and restarts – and the closure of the story with Dylan’s “Chimes of Freedom”, which Springsteen always sang on a tour of 37 years ago. There were different times, but today more than ever it is necessary to remember that the bells of freedom play and will play for everyone.

It is the final blessing, with Bruce who remembers taking home some of what he lived tonight.
The miracle has been done again. Go to San Siro to see Springsteen and it seems that a better world is possible, that music still has the power to transform yourself – at least for a few hours: with the times that run it is still a lot.
Bruce Springsteen has aged – and is above all seen in the end, by the face marked by tiredness. But at 75 he still has energy and charisma to sell and universal stories to tell. It is the great essay of rock: you can only be grateful to have seen it again in this magical place. Knowing that Thursday is replicated for the last date of the tour – with perhaps some surprises in the lineup that will make everything even more special.