Blinded by the Light

I bought this the other day on i-tunes.

I know that I bore you all to tears with these stories, but. I have talked about that tour for thirty years. I had always been a rocker, and I saw a lot of acts — top acts during my college years, but that September night in 1975 changed my life. It was held at the Miami Jai Alai Fronton. It was no where near sold out. They made us wait for a long time before they finally opened the gates and let the audience in.

No. Really. Not hyperbole. It. Changed. My. Life.

And this show is from that tour, just a month or so later. It's the same set list that I've remembered for the last thirty years. The opening number was "Thunder Road." There was a single blue spotlight on this skinny guy in a black touque and a denim jacket. He had his back to the audience. He started to play the harmonica and turned around. He was wearing a black wife beater under the denim jacket. He was hairy and scraggly and that harmonica cut straight into my soul.

By the third number ("Spirits in the Night") my camera was stowed under my seat, and I was standing on the arms the seat, dancing. At one point in the song (I think it was when he sang the lyrics about Crazy Davy being really hurt and crawling into the lake in just his socks and his shirt), he threw himself flat on the stage (still singing) and crawled off the edge and into the crowd. I never took a shot that night, although somewhere in my storage unit is a photo that my boyfriend took.

This CD captures all of that. I can seen the blue spot. When the first strains of the harmonica play, it still cuts straight through my soul.

This is why, people. This is why he was and is the Boss. This is why I haven't missed a tour in 31 years (except the Devils and Dust tour, and it was at the Hard Rock Cafe, and it was a solo show, and I know what those are like. He lectures the crowd and gets really, really, SERIOUS. I love you, Bruce, but not enough for that.)

Years later, I met Bruce at the wedding of The Coolest Person In The World TM, and I told him that I had moved to New York City after that show. That my boyfriend wanted me to stay in Miami and live with him, but I'd said (and I apologize to you, my readers, for this; I apologized to Bruce when I told him; but remember, I was only 20 years old when it happened) "I can't. Tramps like us, baby, we were born to run." I told Bruce that I'd never forgotten that show, and that despite the tiny venue and even tinier audience, it was as good as any sell-out show I'd seen him do at the Garden.

Bruce said that he remembered that show, too, because so few tickets were sold they almost cancelled it. They had a hard time getting Danny's piano up on the stage. He said thank you. I said, no, THANK YOU. I never would have come to New York. I never would have met The Coolest Person In The World TM.

Buy this CD, and try to remember what the world was like when Bruce first took the stage, but before he changed the world of rock and roll.

(1) Comments

#1. Posted by Miss Bliss on February 20, 2006

Don’t ever stop telling these stories because I have my own about various different songs and musicians and records and all that…and I love it.  I love knowing other people who will speak with unabashed passion about a music moment that changed their life because it does that, at least it CAN do that and there just are not that many things in this world that can truly change us the way art and music can.  When I read these stories of yours I suddenly flash through all my own moments and am filled with…well hell, with nothing less than freakin’ JOY!!

P.S. OK…I laughed outloud that you quoted the lyric, but baby that’s what being 20 years old is all about!

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