Baver Talks OSU vs. Maryland & Dead Schembechlers Announce New Single: "Harbuagh to Hell"

Before diving into this week's Baver Bag, we just received a press release from the Dead Schembechlers announcing a new single - "Harbaugh to Hell" - to be available Halloween on I-Tunes. Click here for details.

 

Colin: Cardale taking that long coverage sack right before the half was again shades of Kent Graham. He is obviously talented, but how to do you feel he is progressing as a QB and a team leader?

Baver: I like Cardale, and as long as he is under center, I am pulling for him. But he’s not progressing well, and leadership probably isn’t his strongest trait. That said, you can’t dump all of OSU’s offensive woes on him. The game-day coaching isn’t doing Cardale any favors and the wrong routes that the WR’s continue to run have made Cardale look worse. The coaches shrunk the playbook for Cardale during last year’s so-called trilogy, and the results were, of course, better than fine. The opponents weren’t prepared for Cardale nine months ago, but they are now, while the playbook remains scaled back. The limited playbook is designed to protect Cardale and to reduce mistakes. If OSU minimizes mistakes, there is no one on the schedule that can beat them until late November. Unfortunately though, the Buckeye offense is still making mistakes at an alarming rate (117th in the nation out of 127 teams in turnovers committed), with 13 TO’s in 5 games.

Colin: With the loss of Corey Smith, the WR receiving core takes another hit. Overall, what grade would you give the WR's, and are they the weakest position group on the team?

Baver: Grading by Ohio State’s standards, I’d probably say a “D.” I mentioned the wrong routes above; it’s frustrating beyond belief, with Curtis Samuel being the biggest offender. I guess what saves them from an “F” is the mounting injuries, as you mentioned. Smith and Noah Brown are gone for the year, and injuries seem to have derailed the careers of James Clark and Johnny Dixon. Weakest position group? I think the WR group is neck and neck with (can’t believe I am saying this) the QB position right now.

Colin: Who exactly is calling the plays at this point?

Baver: It’s my understanding that co-OC Tim Beck took over the primary play-calling duties from Ed Warriner after the Northern Illinois game. Warriner is on the sidelines during games, while Beck is calling the plays from upstairs.

Colin: If the playoff were today and you could choose the four teams, who do you think are the best four right now regardless of current ranking?

Baver: Alabama, Baylor, TCU and I really don’t know. I had Ole Miss in there a week ago, and was surprised Florida ransacked them last Saturday. I think Alabama is clearly the best team in the country right now, despite having a loss, and after that Baylor and TCU are neck and neck. After those three, there are probably 8 or so teams bunched up, with Ohio State being one of those teams.

Colin: Give us an update on your picks to date and games and lines you will be watching this week.

Baver: 9-5-1 against the spread on the year, a good start. As bad as Maryland is, I think you take the 33 pts against the Bucks. I see a 42-13 type of score. I’ll say take the Illini catching 11 at Iowa. Iowa is definitely an improved team and may win the B10 West, but I see a letdown after their big win in Madison. Tempted to say take Sparty with their spread down to 14 right now at Rutgers, but with Michigan State having Michigan on deck, I’d say stay away from that game. Instead, take Georgia in a bounce-back game, giving 3 at Tennessee. Must win game for Georgia and they are better than they played against Bama.

An Open Letter to Columbus Musicians - by Pete Vogel

Five years ago this month I began work on a documentary film about the Columbus music scene.  The film – “Indie” – took six months to shoot and it was screened in various theaters in 2011.   I’d been reintroduced to the original music scene in 2009 – after taking a few years off to recharge my batteries – and was blown away by what I saw and heard.  I felt it was time for somebody to capture this magic and thought I might possess the skill-set to actually pull it off.  

I focused the documentary on two businesses – Guitar House Workshop and Espresso Yourself Music Café – as well as ten singer/songwriters and their respective bands.  The film was intended to be a great big “group hug” for the Columbus music scene, and it’s been my proudest contribution to local arts.

A lot has changed since 2010 - some for better, some for worse.  Since I’m probably considered an “elder statesman” at this stage in the game – I’m going to be 51 in November – I think it’s time for an honest assessment of the state of our scene and what is great – and not so great – about it.

First and foremost, I want to say how impressed I am with the singers, songwriters, musicians, venues and performances of this esteemed city.  We are all extremely lucky to be part of this wonderful scene at this wonderful time in history.  There is a plethora of talent in every genre and every age group.  I’m constantly blown away by the musical abilities of my peers and colleagues.  Technology has made it possible for anyone with talent to get their music to the masses - we are no longer at the mercy of recording companies, agents, A&R reps and stifling bureaucracies.  We can write and play what we want and there’s no one to tell us what we can and cannot do.  This is a wonderful time for the arts, and I’m glad I’ve gotten a chance to be a part of this movement.

Since the field has been leveled, and there are more and more creative types getting into the scene, we are sharing stages with an increasing number of artists every single month.  And every artist is looking for the same thing: an audience.  We have a choice to make on how we’re going to regard our “competition.”  We could wage war against them and try and outflank them by coming up with creative ways to exploit the system in our favor.  I’ve seen this done time and time again and there are many who are quite good at it.  But what happens is audiences (and fellow artists) eventually catch wind of this manipulation and interest level fades.  I see this constantly: talented performers try and manipulate their audiences (and/or fellow performers) and eventually destroy their credibility in the process.

The other option we have is to welcome this “competition” as a community and work to collaborate within it.  I’ve seen this done time and time again and I think the benefits outweigh the costs.  Of course it takes time, energy and initiative to build a community but the outcome is almost always “win-win.”  Everybody benefits from collaboration.  Let me give an example.

For the past three years Billy Zenn has hosted an Open Mic at King Avenue 5 on Thursday nights.  It was pretty slow going at first, but over time this weekly event snowballed into one of the finest musical communities this town has ever produced.  Under the quiet tutelage of Mr. Zenn, he’s created a warm, open atmosphere of collaboration, cooperation, community and friendship that I’ve ever experienced in the local scene.  I’ve attended this Open Mic for nearly two years and can’t tell you the number of contacts – and friendships – I’ve made during this time.  I’ve seen a whole network of artists meet one another, work together, form bands, make CD's, create videos, do photo shoots, perform live - and all from attending this Open Mic.  A prime example is the band Ghost Town Railroad.  Four of its five members are songwriters who met at Open Mic - they eventually formed a band, perform around town and are in the process of recording their debut album.  What’s amazing is that all four songwriters contribute songs to the band: they collaborate on each others’ songs, find the “Ghost Town Sound” and share the songwriting duties between themselves.  It’s a perfect example of how a community can be created through collaboration and cooperation, rather than self-serving manipulation.
 
I’ve seen the selfish, exploitative side long enough to know it doesn’t work.  It works for a while, but in time resentments build and bitter breakups ensue.  If I have any wisdom to impart it’s this:  I’ve been in dozens of bands since high school, and some were exceptional, but all failed due to the exploitative nature of at least one of its band members.  Until egos are sublimated for the greater good, bands will always fail.  We don’t live in an era of managers, lackeys and tour managers, whose main responsibility is to keep egos in check.  The DIY cause requires that we do that work ourselves.  And if that work is ignored, small fissures become large cracks and the vision is destroyed.  

I used to play in a power trio – guitar, bass and drums – about fifteen years ago and we were really good.  Our guitarist was the principal songwriter, but he was only coming up with guitar parts and lyrics.  He’d present an idea to us and we’d finish the song as a band: we’d contribute bass lines, drum hooks, backing vocals and counter melodies to the original ideas.  Sometimes the songs would change dramatically when all the pieces fit together - sometimes they barely changed at all.  But when it came time to record the album, the guitarist wanted full credit for writing the songs, even though we finished them as a trio.  He was unwilling to share the writing credits with his bandmates and the band dissolved shortly after the album was completed.  Lose-lose.     

This kind of “me first” mentality is especially damaging in the creative world because it’s an illusion.  The energy within a band is symbiotic - the sum is always greater than its parts.  It’s the chemistry and/or imagination nurtured between musicians that makes a band so special.  This notion of “looking out for number one” is a recipe for disaster every time - I’ve seen this countless times in my career and it’s usually the reason why most bands fail.

Another dark shadow on the scene is the double standard of people wanting you to attend their shows but won’t return the favor.  This happens all the time.  I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve attended the show of a colleague only to have them blow me off when I invited them to one of my own.  In fact, one former bandmate even said to me: “Take me off your list…I have no interest in seeing your band.”  

Guess what?  I don’t attend his shows anymore.  Lose-lose.

This lack of civility hurts us all, and is especially damaging since we’re all essentially in the same boat.  Many of us sabotage our own careers – and our relationships with fellow musicians – because we won’t participate in the give-and-take that is part-and-parcel of the music scene.  Many people complain that nobody comes to their shows, yet I’m thinking: “I don’t see YOU at THEIR shows either, so why are you surprised?”  When it comes to karma, we’re all feeding at the same trough.

[Of course, I’m not immune to this either—there are many musicians who’ve attended my performances and I’ve not taken time to see theirs.  I’m just as guilty as the rest of them.  I imagine there are a few dozen performers who’d love an 8x10 of my portrait to throw darts at, and I don’t blame them.  I’m at fault as well and want to take this opportunity to apologize to those I’ve ignored over the years.  I promise to do better in the future.] 

Since we’re all in the same boat it’s time we adopt the same standards.  If you want people to attend your shows, attend theirs.  If you want people to buy your CDs, buy theirs.  If you want people to listen to your songs, read your posts, like your videos, buy your merch and treat you with respect, then do the same in return.   

We could all learn a valuable lesson from emerging talent Kelly Vaughn.  She’s only been playing in town for about two years, but during this short stint she’s quit her day job and has been a full-time musician for over a year.  After her one-year anniversary of releasing her debut album, she hosted a party at her house, paid for all the food and drinks, and invited forty of her fans/colleagues to celebrate her first year of being a full-time musician.  That’s right: she threw a party to show her gratitude to those who supported her.  And she paid for it.  It’s no surprise she’s already made TV appearances and has opened up for some national acts in town.  She’s had more success in one year than I’ve had in twenty.  She’s truly figured it out.  

I hope that all musicians in town – and elsewhere – will take time to assist others in rising to the top.  There is plenty of work to go around.  And we have enough of the opposite: Facebook is littered with self-serving artists trying to woo fans to their shows.  It’s boring.  And predictable.  It’s so much better if we take time to lift up other artists, and perhaps some day they’ll return the favor.  [I find that most are so grateful that they’re happy to return the favor.]  If we can learn to treat our fellow musicians as colleagues rather than competitors, we will all benefit.  The waters will rise for all of us.  

Win-win.

                              Pete Vogel    October 6, 2015

"Indie" a film produced by Pete Vogel, is an inside look at the Columbus music scene in 2010, early 2011. Matt Monta & The Hot Coal Band, The Shaw Brothers, Joey Hebdo, Donna Mogavero Band, Phillip Fox Band, Salty Caramels, Throat Culture, Angela Perley & The Howlin' Moons, Oswald & The Herringbones and many more bands/artists are featured!


Lydia Brownfield is an Anomaly - by Pete Vogel

You can catch Lydia and her band this Saturday, October 3rd, at King Avenue 5.  They will debut her new tune and video: “All Of Us Here.”  The event starts at 9pm and costs $5.  Ghost Town Railroad will be sharing the bill. Click here for details and her website.


Lydia Brownfield is an Anomaly.

With piercing brown eyes, high cheekbones and a quiet self-confidence that’s often obscured by self-deprecating whimsy, Lydia Brownfield might strike you as a woman who’d be more comfortable on a runway in Paris, London or New York than onstage with a Les Paul slung across her neck.  

Until you hear her.

You’d think she’d be more comfortable in a glamorous photo shoot with world-famous photographers, traveling the world to exotic places like Barbados and Bermuda, rather than schlepping her guitar around town from one Open Mic to the next in search of her next fix.

Until you hear her.

Following in the footsteps of her artsy, avant garde father, Lydia traversed the country looking for the right place and/or opportunity to hone her craft.  This journey took her to the backwoods of Virginia, deeper south (Atlanta), East Coast (New York) and back to the Midwest (Columbus).  Back home she’s taken on a triple role: mother, corporate employee and rock star.  At times, you’d think she’d be better off if she simply ditched her music career and focused on work and family.  

Until you hear her.

Iconic Columbus musician/producer Billy Zenn says of Lydia: “She’s got the best voice in town.”  Personally, I’d have to agree with him.  I’d go one step further: She’s one of the best songwriters in town as well.  Her voice and songwriting skills are top notch; one could easily tell she’s suffered long and hard to perfect her craft.  Her songwriting is complicated and complex; she paints pictures with words and harmonies in the same way her father paints pictures with colors and brushes.  Lydia comes across as insecure and unsure of her talent until she straps on a guitar and steps in front of a microphone.  Then you see a transformation take place: She goes from a shy, almost frightened person to a rock diva that feels totally at home onstage.  Her talent is frighteningly good.  

A dropout of CCAD after 3 years, Lydia followed her muse by following her artist father, a man who eked out a meager living creating paintings and sculptures.  She followed him to Virginia - where she worked as a waitress in tiny Winchester, VA - and then moved to Atlanta when pop decided to relocate there.  She came back to Columbus for a spell (her father’s Atlanta move kept getting delayed) and she actually lived at the YMCA in downtown Columbus for 6 months.  She finally moved back to Atlanta when things got settled with her father and remained there for 10 years.  

It was in Midtown Atlanta where she devoted more time and effort to her craft of songwriting.  She started a band called Long Flat Red, who was courted by several record labels including Ardent Records, based out of Memphis.  The band played esteemed venues like The Roxy, The Cotton Club, Smiths Old Bar and The Point, and at the same time Lydia played solo shows at The Variety Playhouse and Eddie’s Attic, opening up for acts like Shawn Mullins, Peter Case, Indigo Girls and Loudon Wainwright III.  The band broke up after six years so Lydia decided to take her talents to New York City since she had some musician contacts who’d already settled there.

She took a flat in Queens for a while, but kept moving from place to place while trying to find temp work to assist with expenses.  “Everybody took pity on me: It’s how I got jobs, gigs, boyfriends, places to live, food to eat—everything!” she sighs.  But there was one event that changed things dramatically for her—and the rest of the world.  She was on a subway the morning of September 11th, 2001, heading towards her office a few blocks from the World Trade Center.

“I was on the subway going to work that morning.  I was running late, so it was a little after 9am.  An announcement came over the intercom that the train was stopping—it was going no further.  We didn’t know why—” she muses.  When Lydia ascended to street level, she saw thousands of people running and screaming and she followed the crowd, not sure what was going on.  

“Everybody was running in a certain direction and I followed them.  It was surreal.  I had no idea what was going on.  I just kept running uptown.  I finally looked back from around midtown and saw the World Trade Center falling down.  I thought to myself: That’s not right.”  

Of course, this had a profound affect on her soul, which affected her songwriting in a deep way.  Had she been on time for work that morning, Lord knows what would’ve happened?  She could’ve easily been one of the 3000 souls that perished that morning.  She wrote her seminal piece “Fiery Crash,” a song inspired by the events of 9/11.  To some, this is her best work to date.  

She left NYC immediately after the attacks and moved back to Columbus.  On Monday, September 16th – less than a week after the attacks – she was at home, enrolled in school at Columbus State.  

“It was weird.  One week I’m in NYC watching buildings crash to the ground—the next week I’m a college student again.”  

Lydia took a break from music while she devoted time to school and love.  She married the following September, had a child the summer after that, and tried to live a “normal life” and put music on the backburner.

“I sold my guitars and quit music altogether,” she says.  “I left because it was taking up all my time.  The music was getting me nowhere.  There was nothing but heartbreak.”

Unfortunately, the pipe dream of being the consummate wife, mother and corporate employee came to its own fiery crash when she divorced her husband in 2006.  That disillusionment brought the muse back into her world, and she began writing again.  “This is what I wanted to do; this is what I am here to do,” she says, reflecting upon this troubled time.  

Lydia recorded “Fiery Crash” and started penning other songs, including “Prentiss Song,” “Wanting’s for Sinners” and “Trouble.”  These songs eventually became featured tracks off her debut EP “Wanting’s for Sinners.”  The years of disillusionment – first in the music industry and second with “normal” life – brought a new frontier to her songwriting.  “Buddhism is a philosophy of not wanting…not desiring…and it occurred to me that desire and want is for the sinful life.  So wanting is for sinners…I strive to not want, but to be content with what I already have.”  

She laughs at the irony of her good fortune.  All her journeys have taken her back to a place of yearning for calm simplicity.  “I’m still learning how to deal with myself.  I need to follow my universe.”  

Lydia released “Wanting’s for Sinners” in 2011 and has been playing with her current band, The Jagged Hearts, for the past couple of years.  The band features Lydia on guitar/vocals, Jeff Dalrymple on guitar/backing vocals, Joy Hall on vocals, Billy Zenn on bass/vocals and Frank Lapinski on drums/vocals.  That’s right: a band with five vocalists.  Almost hard to imagine.  

Until you hear them.  

“All of Us Here,” the full album is slated to be released before the year’s end.  In the meantime she’s gigging, writing, recording, working the day job, raising her son and trying to find that perfect balance that we’re all desperately in search of.  


                                                                  Pete Vogel
                                                    September 24, 2015


You can catch Lydia and her band this Saturday night, October 3rd, at King Avenue 5.  They will debut her new tune and video: “All Of Us Here.”  The event starts at 9pm and costs $5.  Ghost Town Railroad will be sharing the bill.  We hope you stop out!

www.lydiabrownfield.com

Heard it From Ryan, Who, Heard It From Taylor, Who, Heard it from Gary You've Been Messin' Around - by Colin G.

My first thought at hearing that Ryan Adams had covered Taylor Swift's album 1989 was, "Well hell, Ryan is trying to bang Taylor." Come on, you know it's true. Why does any forty-something dude suddenly pander to a hot woman half his age? I know it seems extreme but that's just how those types roll. Ryan staying up for three days covering every Taylor song and hiring a publicist is like you or me winking at somebody on Match. Besides, Ryan loves him some famous women, and it doesn't hurt his profile to attach himself to the most popular "songwriter" on the planet.  Or, put another way, when Michael Jordan bets $200,000 on an 8-foot putt it seems shocking to folks like you and me,  but that's just how the other 1% lives. 

If you want Taylor's cell #, you better cover 1989 and get it reviewed on NPR. 

Well done, Ryan. I bet he and Taylor are texting each other right now.

Speaking of NPR, suddenly all the smart people are referring to Taylor Swift as a brilliant songwriter. So much in fact that I had to go revisit the credits on 1989. This is not a commentary  on the quality of Taylor Swift or the record 1989, but Taylor Swift is NOT a great songwriter. Not in the traditional sense anyway.  For starters, the record 1989 has, and I am not bullshitting or exaggerating, TWELVE CREDITED PRODUCERS. Is that a record for a record?

And more importantly, every single song has multiple songwriters except one. Once again, I'm not arguing this Taylor isn't a talented performer worthy of her fame, but when we start tossing around the term "great songwriters" on NPR, it's not typically songs with 3 other writers. Like say: Bob Dylan, Jeff Tweedy, Bruce Springsteen, Lucinda Williams, Steve Earle, Pete Townshend, Ray Davies, Elvis Costello or every other great songwriter in the history of pop music. (And I'm not talking established songwriting partners Lieber/Stroller, Lennon/McCartney, Jagger/Richards; Taylor employs random hired guns ala Bon Jovi hiring Desmond Child.)

Or, put another way, how would credits to "Like a Rolling Stone" look if it said: Written by Bob Dylan, Larry Schmultz, Dewey Johnson and Frank Cass. Produced by Dylan, J-Swizz, Funky Free and Alan Horowitz.  Doesn't quite make Bob look like such a great songwriter, now does it? 

Or another way: When Taylor puts out a hit record written by herself, she can get credit for being a great songwriter. Until then she will just have to settle for just being the most popular entertainer on the planet. No shame in that.  (editor's note: On her earlier, ostensibly "country" records - before her current pop-tart phase - Swift often did write alone, or with one collaborator. Now that she has chosen the Nicki Minaj route to fame, however, somebody's gotta program those beats, and they want label credit.)

Do you know who wrote a bigger hit all by himself than either Ryan Adams or Taylor Swift? Yup, you guessed it, the recently deceased Gary Richrath from REO Speedwagon. 

Could you imagine if Ryan or Taylor wrote the song "Take It on the Run?" It would rule the world for months. Say what you want about REO, but this is one of the great opening lines in pop-rock history: "Heard it from a friend, who, heard it from a friend, who, heard it from another you've been messin' around." I remember being a kid and turning the FM dial and hearing it on three stations at once: 92.3, 96.3 and 97.9. Mind blowing!

RIP Gary Richrath, who wrote this massive hit all by his lonesome.

Music video by REO Speedwagon performing Take It On The Run. (C) 1980 Sony Music Entertainment Inc.



Vet's Memorial, part six, Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, September 5th, 1978 - by Ricki C.

(I should have mentioned at the end of Vet’s Memorial part 5 back in May that there would be no entries in the series for June, July or August because every year Vet’s was taken over by The Kenley Players – a kind of early traveling Broadway Series – for the summer months.  Yes, Spotify boys & girls, show tunes did indeed take precedence over the rock & roll back in the 1960’s & 70’s and now people flock to see Green Day concept albums presented on Broadway.  I cannot wholly condemn that fact, but I certainly don’t go along with it, either.)

 

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN & THE E STREET BAND / SEPTEMBER 5TH, 1978


The first time I heard Bruce Springsteen was in the old Pearl Alley Discs record store on 13th Avenue, just off High Street, WAY back in the day, when you could still turn off High onto 13th.  From perusing my Springsteen reference materials I see that Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. was released on January 5th, 1973.  That seems about right because I was at Pearl Alley that day with my first – and best – rock & roll friend of all time, Dave Blackburn, and he moved to Boston sometime later that year (where, by the way, he got to see the original configuration of The Modern Lovers AT A HIGH SCHOOL, WEARING MATCHING CASHMERE SWEATERS, with some youngsters called Aerosmith OPENING the show).  But I digress……

“Blinded By The Light” must have just been ending when we walked into the store, because I remember looking up at the speakers as Bruce started singing, “Well, I stood stone-like at midnight / Suspended in my masquerade / I combed my hair ‘til it was just right / And commanded the night brigade.”  Then the band kicked in at “I was open to pain and crossed by the rain and I walked on a crooked crutch / I strolled all alone through a fallout zone and came out with my soul untouched” and I was SOLD, son!  

I said – out loud, without meaning to – “WHO IS THIS?” and Dave glanced over at the Now Playing station of the store, then said, “Oh, that’s Bruce Springsteen, he’s one of those New Dylan guys everybody’s writing about.”  (Dave ALWAYS knew more about rock & roll than I did, back then.)  Thus began the Bruce Springsteen chapter of my life of rock & roll.    

I covered the first time I saw Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band live pretty extensively in a Pencilstorm blog called The Perfect Age For Rock & Roll, part two, back in January 2014, you might wanna check that out.  

This 1978 show, however, was a completely different animal from that ’76 outing: gone was any lingering trace of hippie-ism in the E Street Band presentation; gone were the beards, bell-bottoms, wooly Bob Marley hats and multi-hued 3-piece suits on band members.  Everybody – including, most crucially, Springsteen himself – was clean-shaven and dressed in some combination of vests, suit jackets and straight-leg black or blue jeans (except Clarence Clemons, of course, ultra-sharp in a sparkling white suit, befitting of his Big Man status).  Also  gone were any lengthy, meandering jams of the old days.  Even when songs got expanded (“Prove It All Night,” Bruce’s take-back of “Because The Night” from fellow Jersey-ite Patti Smith) those expansions were pounding, driving fever-beat extensions of the tunes, Springsteen’s WAILING lead guitar blowing the songs open, rather than the multi-section The-Band-meets-prog-rock stylings of earlier years.  As much as I loved (and still love, to this day) "Incident On 57th Street" from The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle, watching Bruce & the band sear through "Candy's Room" on that warm September evening in 1978 was just a whole other level of rock & roll genius entirely.

The band opened with an insane, joyful take on Eddie Cochran’s “Summertime Blues,” blasted straight into “Badlands” and “Adam Raised A Cane,” didn’t really take a breath until easing into a perfect, swinging version of “Spirit In The Night,” that  served notice that this was a band who could do ANYTHING.  You want rockers?  We’ve got rockers.  You want angry rants between fathers, sons & brothers goin’ all the way back to Cain & Abel?  Yeah, we’ve got those.  You want richly overly-romanticized depictions of a boozy Saturday night excursion to some New Jersey lakeside back in the early 70’s?  Done and DONE, Jack.

Really, in my now 50th year of seeing live rock & roll shows (1965-2015), I have never witnessed a better-paced, better-sequenced set of rock & roll than that night in 1978.  I have never seen a show with the emotional & musical length and BREADTH of that show.  I have never seen a show of that INTENSITY.  I’ve often told anybody who would listen that this was the SECOND greatest rock show I ever saw.  (For a list of the Top Ten, check out The Best of Everything, part one on my old blog.)  The Who in November of 1969 was the only show that topped this Springsteen outing, but The Who accomplished that task by COMING OUT ROCKING, AND THEN ROCKING SOME MORE, AND THEN ROCKING EVEN MORE AFTER THAT, until the Vet’s Memorial crowd I was a member of was basically pummeled into submission by their Sheer Rock & Roll Command.  (Seriously, I went to high school for THREE DAYS after that show not hearing one word clearly.  I thought I was gonna have to learn to lip-read.  I don’t know how Daltrey, Townshend, Entwistle & Moon had any hearing left after 1970.)  

Bruce & the guys did essentially ALL of the Darkness On The Edge Town album in the first set that night, with detours over to the first record for “It’s Hard To Be A Saint In The City” (capped by a killer twin-guitar duet call & response coda with Miami Steve Van Zandt), the aforementioned “Spirit In The Night” and ending with truly heartbreaking performances  of “Racing In The Street,” straight into “Thunder Road,” and concluding with “Jungleland,” all from Born To Run.  Really, just that first set would have been enough to be better than 95% of all other rock concerts I’ve attended, and there was another whole set to come, announced simply by Bruce as, “We’re gonna take a 20 minute break and be back to play some more for ya.”

(For those of you scoring at home, there are ample bootlegs available of the Cleveland Agora show from August 9th, 1978 – broadcast live over Cleveland's WMMS – that is essentially the same set-list as the Columbus show I witnessed.  I have a double-CD set of that show made from cassettes I recorded when it was simulcast over Q-FM-96.  I sat mesmerized at the kitchen table of my apartment in the old Lincoln Park West complex off Georgesville Road that hot August night, staring at the radio, barely registering the sky and the room growing dark, scarcely able to believe what I was hearing coming out of that beat-up boombox.  If I could take only one CD-set to a proverbial desert island, THAT would be the one.  The Cleveland Agora show is now also available over live.brucespringsteen.net.  Send away for it, it’s a triple-disc set now and CHEAP at 20 bucks.)

Okay, fuck it, that’s already 1000 words and I’ve barely gotten to the point.  Here’s the point: I could write ANOTHER 2000 words about this show and not do it justice; I could tell you how sometime during this show the mantle of My All-Time Rock & Roll Saviour got passed from Pete Townshend to Bruce Springsteen, where it remains to this day (Keith Moon died two days later, September 7th, 1978, sealing that deal, The Who would NEVER be the same after that); I could tell you how that night Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band were the Greatest Bar Band EVER in the Universe, right before they became An Arena Band; I could tell you how Bruce has never sold a song to a commercial, has never cheapened himself to make a buck, has never lost his faith in the Power of Rock & Roll to get through hard times.  (Though, I fully admit, I have at times.)

Let me say this quite simply: I have seen at least one show of every major Bruce Springsteen tour since Born To Run - including the Human Touch/Better Days non-E Street shows and the Seeger Sessions band - right up to last year's High Hopes outings.  Many of those shows have been great, some were magnificent, most have been better than just about anybody else I've witnessed in any bar, club, theater, arena or stadium, but none of them have been as all-consuming, or as life-changing as the 1978 Darkness On The Edge Of Town tour.  

Here’s all I can ask you to do: There is a series of videos on YouTube from a show at the Passaic Theater in New Jersey on September 19th, 1978 - exactly two weeks after my beloved Columbus show - that will say more to you than any 50,000 words I could write here on Pencilstorm.  Just watch and enjoy………      

my receipt for the 1978 show (note spelling of Springsteen, nobody knew who Bruce was)

Yeah, you're readin' that right, cats & kittens, in 1978 you could purchase EIGHT Bruce Springsteen tickets for $62.20, including the service charges (a whopping $2.20).  Today the Ticketmaster fees alone for eight tickets would probably set you back more than sixty bucks.

 

Today's blog entry is dedicated to Jodie Weaver and Chris Clinton, my two best Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band friends.  I've known Jodie since high school, and we met Chris in 1984, when he wound up next to us in an overnight line for tickets to the Born In The U.S.A. tour, at the old Buzzard's Nest Records on Morse Road, where Jim Johnson worked at the time.  I think I still owe Chris upwards of $150 for tickets to Springsteen shows last year in Cincinnati and Columbus, but I do not expect this dedication to go towards repayment of that debt.

Jodie & Chris, I love ya, and thank you for always helping me to remember that it ain't no sin to be glad you're alive.  (Someday, Chris and I are gonna put our heads together and come up with our list of the Top Five Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band shows we've ever seen.)

 

Oh hell, let's go for one more stand-alone video from Passaic, 1978 (If I had to explain rock & roll to a being from outer space, I would show them 2:39 to 2:59 of this clip, Bruce & Steven moving up & back from the mics in total bad-ass harmony for verse two of "She's The One.")