Original subtitles

To me, there was always a little more pressure

when you came to Britain, just because of the influence

British music had had on my life and my work.

CHEERING

You always wanted to be at your best,

and that continues to this day.

We just came out of playing Sunderland.

Hellacious weather.

Driving rainstorm...

..wind blowing.

But standing in front of me, in the rain,

I realised, these are my people.

Those are my people here in the UK.

And it was a pleasure playing all night in the rain to that crowd.

MUSIC: Backstreets by Bruce Springsteen

1975, it was a long flight from New Jersey to the UK.

We were visitors in the land of our musical giants -

the Beatles, the Stones, the Animals.

And for a young New Jersey rock and roller,

the UK was Mecca.

All I was wondering was...

..what do I have that I could conceivably give back...

..to those people who gave me so much?

CHEERING

And theanswer is...

..everything I've got.

One, two, three, four!

And he knew that if he conquered London,

that would buzz round everywhere around the world.

Was this one of those concerts

which fathers tell their sons about in years to come?

But the hype, you know, rather rebounded on him.

I had PTSD from it.

I said I ain't going back to Britain until I am fully confident

that I can blow the roof off wherever I'm going to play.

He's a sort of whirling dervish of benevolent male energy.

It's quite extraordinary.

He's a soul-bearing performer.

I was looking in his eyes and he just looked into mine

and that was, like, a moment to treasure.

He's the essence of rock and roll, isn't he?

The essence of rock and roll.

# Hiding on the backstreets Hiding on the backstreets

# Hiding on... #

That era was insane.

Wembley felt likethe top of the world. King of the world.

He's a hero to us and he will be a hero forever in my eyes.

# We're all hiding on the backstreets tonight... #

You have not lived unless you've seen Bruce live.

Springsteen is bigger in the UK and the rest of Europe

than he is in the United States now.

# Hey

# Hey... #

There's something about the way he does it

with such passion.

It's irresistible.

I want to thank you...

..for taking my music into your hearts.

Once it was only a dream I had...

..today it's real.

I first heard the name Bruce Springsteen in 1973.

I was in New York.

I bumped into a journalist called Chris Charlesworth.

He said, "If you've got time,

"go down to the Village...

"..the Bottom Line, forget about the headliner,

"just go and see the opening act."

# Her brains, they rattle, and her bones, they shake

# Oh, she's an angel from the Innerlake

# Her brains, they rattle, and her bones, they shake

# Oh, she's an angel from the Inner... #

There were about 20 people in the audience,

and I stood there for 35 minutes, just completely blown away.

# Thundercrack

# Baby's back

# This time she'll tell me how she really feels... #

I went backstage and I said, "I'm a promoter from England.

"You've got to come to England."

He just looked at me and he said,

"This is the first time we've played New York."

HE LAUGHS And that was the start of it.

# And she was blinded by the light

# Oh, cut loose like a deuce Another runner in the night... #

His first two records did not succeed at all,

and Bruce's career was just, like, almost over before it began.

As far as Columbia was concerned, it was his last chance saloon.

He really had a different album than the first and the second one.

More rock and roll, which is what he ended up doing.

MUSIC: Born To Run by Bruce Springsteen

I think he never fulfilled his potential until Born To Run.

What I just remember is the euphoria.

This great Phil Spector wall of sound

that hadn't really been used in rock music.

MUSIC: Tiger Feet by Mud

It was a pretty awful time, in the mid-'70s,

to be a rock music fan, to be a teenager.

You felt like you'd missed the party.

And there was a desperate feeling that this music needed to

reinvent itself and just get back to those kind of roots

of youth and rebellion and having the best time of your life.

And, for me, Born To Run captured that.

I felt that rock music had come home.

# The highway's jammed with broken heroes on a... #

I was a teenager. I had a Saturday job at Harrods,

in the record department, and there was a guy

who worked at Harrods with me, and he said,

"Have you ever listened to any Bruce Springsteen?"

And he pulled out Born To Run, and the first thing I saw

was here was a white guy and a black guy

on the same album, and as soon as I saw that, I was intrigued.

What you got immediately from Born To Run

was someone speaking his own truth.

It was someone who was pouring their heart out.

And that was it - that was the moment.

# Baby, we were born to run

# Oh, honey, tramps like us

# Baby, we were born to run... #

We had finished what I call a normal American tour,

and I said, "You know, it'd be nice to put in

"a few more dates somewhere.

"Where could we go?"

And so I called Harvey Goldsmith in London.

I asked him, "Is there a chance that, you know,

"you could fit Bruce Springsteen in before the end of the year?"

Of course, no-one had seen him play outside America at that point,

but everybody was talking about him

and so we had no difficulty selling out.

Everybody thought, "Hey, yeah, England,

"that would be a fun thing to do."

MUISC: Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out by Bruce Springsteen

I was only 26 years old.

And the only places I'd been was to California in the back of a truck.

We were not particularly well-travelled, you know.

Certainly not outside the United States, we'd never been anywhere.

Well, then we knew they were auspicious gigs.

There was a lot expected.

But we knew we were going to the land of our gods and saviours.

So just being in London was just so thrilling.

At that point, things were still happening.

You know, going to Carnaby Street, even King's Road,

the flea markets and all that stuff.

I mean, Britain was really British. HE LAUGHS

They were a lot less Americanised, I guess.

And so, you know, we came out and we were like,

"Hey, can you get a cheeseburger anywhere around here?"

There was no McDonald's yet or anything.

It was really shocking to us.

America lives on this stuff, you know?

I remember asking for iced tea...

..and people looked at me like I had two heads.

HE LAUGHS

"What?!

"You mean, you put ice in the tea?!" HE LAUGHS

Anyway, yeah, the food was just appalling and, you know, still is.

HE LAUGHS

I mean, raw bacon.

Oh, my God.

Anyway, so we ended up playing Hammersmith Odeon,

which was, I think, the first theatre we ever played.

Hammersmith was the premier concert hall in England,

and it was important that it was a big success

because it opened the doors to outside America.

And he knew that if he conquered London particularly,

that would buzz round everywhere around the world.

18th of November, 1975,

I came here because of all the hype about Bruce.

Because this was the first concert in the UK,

and heavily, heavily, heavily promoted,

so everyone in the music business was there.

Everyone had to be there.

It's still exciting.

It's a very exciting space there, the big...

..the big stage.

And in those days you could smoke in a place like this,

so there was a sort of fug of smoke.

And the usual - people getting in your way.

"Sorry." "Ouch! You trod on my foot!"

The usual stuff. "You're in the wrong seat!"

I've kept a diary for a long, long time,

and, of course, that night was mentioned.

"This is the first show outside the US for a 26-year-old New Jersey boy

"who's been likened as the new Dylan, Lennon,

"Van Morrison, and so on.

"So, was this the new Messiah?

"Was this one of those concerts

"which fathers tell their sons about in years to come?"

For some reason, they put up posters saying,

"London is finally ready for Bruce Springsteen",

or something like that.

I mean, finally ready for what?

So I was like, "Oh, my God!

"That's not the way I want to introduce myself."

What a way to start a relationship, right?

You know, thinking there was an arrogant, you know,

power coming from America to conquer England, you now.

CBS, of all the record labels, had a habit of doing things

the expensive, flashy way.

Going over the top on new artists.

London doesn't like that kind of thing.

Londoners, as a breed,

pride themselves on not being impressed by anything at all.

"Hype" was a very bad word in those days.

You know, promotion, marketing.

It literally ended careers.

I went into the theatre, there was stuff all over the seats,

there were posters everywhere, and I just went crazy.

I felt it was an insult to my audience

and I ran around and I tore as much shit down as I could.

I had people pull everything off the seats.

You know, I was in a frenzy before that show.

It put an enormous pressure on me, you know?

There was a lot of tension.

The music press were really quite hostile.

But I think he felt he had something to prove.

MUSIC: Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen

The journalists were sitting in the front row

with their arms crossed, saying,

"OK, show me what you got here," you know?

Of course, by the end of the show, we did show them.

HARMONICA PLAYS

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

# The screen door slams

# Mary's dress sways

# Like a vision she dances across the porch

# As the radio plays

# Roy Orbison singing for the lonely

# Hey, that's me, and I want you only

# Don't turn me home again

# I just can't face myself alone again

# Don't you run back inside

# Darling, you know just what I'm here for

# So you're scared and you're thinking that maybe

# We ain't that young anymore

# Well, show a little faith, there's magic in the night

# You ain't a beauty but, hey, you're all right

# Oh, and that's all right with me... #

Bruce looks different from, you know, the sort of glossy singers

with hairstyles and all that.

He was someone who looks like they've come off the shop floor,

been sort of servicing a car before he came on,

that kind of feel to it.

How's things going over here in England and stuff, huh?

All right?

CHEERING

HE LAUGHS

Thisis the first time... I've never been here before. It's just...

We don't know why it was filmed,

but it's wonderful that they did because it captures us

in between a bar band and the concert band we're about to become.

It's transitional.

# She's the one... # Hey!

MUSIC: She's The One by Bruce Springsteen

"The band went off at such a lick that one could sense the relief."

# With thatthunder in your heart at night

# When you're kneeling in the dark

# It says you're never going to leave her... #

"Springsteen leapt into action,

"twitching and leaping and throwing himself about

"in strange spasms as he urged the band on."

# Oh, she's the one

# Oh, she's the one... #

Clarence Clemons undoubtedly stole the show.

He's just an amazing saxophone player.

It just builds and builds.

And, by the end, people are up and shouting and cheering.

It was pretty magical by that time.

# Oh, she's the one

# Mm, mm-mm, mm-mm-mm, mm-mm... #

There was a sense at the end of the gig for sure

that we'd just seen something quite remarkable,

so it was the conversion moment for many people.

# Oh!

# Oh!

# Whoa! #

Bruce said, "Did they like the show?"

I said, "Why?" He said, "I couldn't feel any reaction at all."

I said to him, "You should have been out front

"and seen it the other way around because that was unbelievable."

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

I went to a party that was supposed to celebrate my triumph,

but I felt I'd been terrible,

and so I was embarrassed to even go into the party,

ran back to the hotel, sat in my lonely room

under a big black cloud,

ate whatever I had and, like, miserably went to bed.

That was my night after the Hammersmith show.

HE CHUCKLES

MUSIC: Racing In The Street by Bruce Springsteen

I had PTSD from it, you know? HE LAUGHS

I was suffering post-traumatic stress disorder

from the first Hammersmith show.

I didn't look at the tape for 30 years.

That might give you an idea of how impactful...

HE LAUGHS

..that night was.

"Blinded by the hype", I remember the NME saying,

and I think he was just sold wrong.

You know, he was sold as the next Dylan, and he was something else.

He was something special, something unique in his own right.

The hype, you know, rather rebounded on him.

He allowed things to get out of his control,

and I think that was very significant

because the rest of his career

was marked by an utter determination to have control -

that he had to be in charge of absolutely everything.

# Spread out now, Rosie

# Doctor, come cut loose her mama's reins... #

I said I ain't going back to Britain

until I've got a friggin' war chest of songs

and arrangements.

I'm not going back until I am fully confident that I can,

you know, blow the roof off wherever I'm going to play.

# Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey... #

I guess we're going to come over to Europe

and England and stuff, you know? Any idea when that'll be?

I don't know exactly when that'll be, you know?

He was a kind of mysterious, invisible figure

to people in Britain during the late '70s,

which is the time that his reputation

in the States was growing -

around Darkness On The Edge Of Town.

And so his reputation in Britain kind of grew in his absence.

To me, there was always a little more pressure

when you came to London and Britain,

just because of the influence that that music had had

on my life and my work.

The British culture of music - I mean, it changed my life.

SCREAMING

# Oh, yeah, I'll tell you somethin'

# I think you'll understand

# When I say that somethin'... #

Do you remember the first time you heard the Beatles?

I'll always remember.

I was on South Street in Freehold.

I was a young, young teenager.

My mother was at the wheel.

I heard I Want to Hold your Hand.

I went, "What the hell is that?"

# Let me be your man

# And please, say to me... #

Therewas something in the harmonies,

the voices, the way their voices blended.

# I want to hold your haaand! #

You know? It was that "hand", you know?

So I ran into the phone booth,

I dialled my girlfriend's number

and the first thing I said was, "Have you heard the Beatles?"

It was just a revolutionary day.

Earth-rocking moment.

I'll never forget it, you know, for the rest of my life.

# I can't hide

# I can't hide... #

I just bought the record and went home,

and picked up a guitar almost immediately.

I learned to play the guitar from those Beatles singles.

BRUCE RIFFS

I still...

You know, I can still remember most of the riffs.

Yeah!

I haven't played that in, I don't know, 40 years,

but it's still in my brain.

# Baby, I... #

You talk about the Beatles' influence.

There it is.

BRUCE LAUGHS

There it is! The Castiles.

Man, we... Let me tell you, it wasn't easy

to get your hair to look like that in those days, either.

I had an Italian afro by nature.

I used to have to steal my mother's bobby pins

and put them in my hair at night

and then sleep on it just perfectly

to get my hair to be anywhere nearly as straight as that.

I was into anything and everything British.

We ran around speaking in British accents for quite a while

to the shop girls

to see if we could fool them into believing

we were from London or something.

At first, it was just the Beatles.

# I'm gonna tell you how it's gonna be... #

Four months later, the Stones came.

# You're gonna give your love to me... #

Then Dave Davies - you know, with the Kinks.

The Kinks had the riffs.

Quite a hard rock thing at the time.

# Got a feeling inside Can't explain. #

The Who started to be a bit heavier with their chord changes.

And of course now the wild drumming was beginning with Keith Moon.

# Can't explain I think it's love... #

The British Invasion -

you were introduced to, like, this Jurassic Park

of the minds, you know?

We became Anglophiles.

We were in love with you, you know, before we even met.

I'll be staggered if this makes the cut.

This is my Bruce scrapbook.

1981.

So I'm 16.

# All day you've been working that hard line... #

In those days, no internet,

so you'd have to just scan the NME,

the Mirror.

This article appeared during the time

of Bruce's visit to Britain.

ROB LAUGHS

"The king of American rock whose shows

"send his friends into a frenzy."

This is an ad for the tour dates of the River tour,

and I treasured this.

# I'm home, I'm out of my work clothes... #

I bought The River at Woolworths in Porthcawl.

It was the first album I ever had with a lyric insert.

And I remember showing it to my grandmother and saying,

"Oh, look at this! This is like poetry!"

And that was the beginning of me

kind of falling in love with him.

And here I am, I'm 59 now,

and I listen to him all the time.

# New Jersey turnpike

# Riding on a wet night

# 'Neath the refinery's glow

# Out where the great black rivers flow... #

Part of the connection is,

when he writes about the New Jersey turnpike,

driving on a wet night,

'neath the refinery's glow -

where I grew up in South Wales,

we had oil refineries near us

and there was a kind of steel town feel.

# Mr State Trooper

# Please don't stop me

# Please don't stop me

# Please don't stop me... #

You know, when I was young

and Paul Weller talked about down in the tube station

at midnight,

what the hell is a tube station?

I was from Port Talbot.

I felt much closer to New Jersey than I did to London.

With the River tour, it was a range of venues.

So he would start in relatively small theatres,

just a couple of thousand capacity,

going right up to the size

of somewhere like the NEC in Birmingham,

about 15,000.

# You been hurt and you're all cried out, you say

# You walk down the street pushing people outta your way... #

Itwas huge for us to go to Newcastle.

All I knew was Newcastle, the Animals!

I was one of the biggest Animals fans,

and to this day still am.

You know? And we played a gorgeous little hall.

There was a picture of us at Newcastle

with Clarence in his cowboy hat and the rest of the guys,

which we took outside the hall at that time

that I always remember.

# The ties that b-i-n-d... #

Brighton I remember very, very well because it was seaside.

And we said, "Oh, man this is a little bit

"like Asbury Park!"

We were firing on all cylinders.

We really were loaded with great material.

A-one! A-two! A-one, two, three, four!

1981 was the year that Bruce Springsteen

finally made it to Britain.

And after so many years of expectation,

most people felt that he did live up to his once hyped reputation.

MUSIC: Cadillac Ranch by Bruce Springsteen

# Well, there she sits, buddy

# Just a gleaming in the sun

# There to greet a working man when his day is done... #

I think the people who went in 1981

saw just what an astonishing live performer he was.

As he said, a show should be a little bit of dance party,

a little of political meeting,

a little bit of comedy show.

Nobody else tries to do that.

Nobody else even tries!

He's a sort of whirling dervish of benevolent male energy.

The interesting thing about Bruce is,

as soon as he's offstage,

he's completely the opposite.

He's very shy almost.

And then the lights come on, and then he's this...thing.

It's quiet extraordinary.

He's a sort of fearless and generous soul.

It's very easy to hold back, and he doesn't.

He's a soul-bearing performer.

# I got a wife and kids in Baltimore, Jack

# I went out for a ride and I never went back... #

Any time you have a hit, it broadens your audience.

I always say Hungry Heart brought women to our shows

in significant numbers for the first time.

# Everybody's got a hungry heart

# Everybody's got a hungry heart... #

We heard Bruce was going to be coming to Manchester

and we knew there was going to be a massive demand for tickets.

Thankfully, my brother decided with a few of his mates

to just come and camp outside.

He got his sleeping bag and he camped out in the cold,

and he managed to get front row tickets.

So this is where it happened.

It looks so small now, but it felt really big at the time.

When I was 17 years old, I was kind of standing here.

It was about halfway through the show,

and Bruce played the song Sherry Darling.

# Well, I got some beer and the highway's free

# And I got you, and baby, you've got me... #

At the instrumental break,

he looked down, looked at me and said,

"Do you want to come and dance with me?"

And I was like...

And then two bouncers, one at each side,

picked me up, put me on the stage.

Bruce took me in his arms in a dance hold

and we tangoed across the stage

and turned round and danced all the way back.

And then we did a bit of a dance, a bit of a boogie.

I was glued to him. I did quite fancy him.

You know, I was looking in his eyes a lot of the time

and he just looked into mine.

And then Bruce took my hand, kissed it,

and led me gently back to the bouncers,

who put me down on the ground.

Stood there and thought,

"What just happened? Did that really happen? Was I imagining it?"

It was just really special because, as a 17-year-old,

I was just finding my way.

I wasn't that kind of popular or confident.

It was just that moment of being seen, being noticed,

being picked out by this guy who was one of my heroes

and just having that moment with him.

And that was, like, a moment to treasure.

# Sherry Darling

# Say hey, hey, hey What you say, Sherry Darling? #

1984, Born in the USA came out.

Everyone was buying this album by then.

Everyone was into Bruce.

I mean, this is the album that propelled Bruce

into the stratosphere, really.

I mean, it's full of hits.

Dancing In The Dark, obviously -

that was Bruce's first top ten hit, I think, over here.

Born In The USA was a single.

Cover Me, I'm on Fire, My Hometown.

Glory Days was a single.

A breaker and this week's highest new entry coming in at 21.

Amazing to think that Bruce Springsteen,

until this year, had never had a top 20 British hit.

But here he is with Glory Days.

# I had a friend who was a big baseball player

# Back in high school... #

One of the appeals of Born In The USA

is it was almost the antithesis of what was going on in the UK.

The big bands would've been Culture Club,

Duran Duran,

ABC.

Anybody with a synthesiser.

Lots of dressing up.

When everybody was dressing up, Bruce was dressing down.

# Sat down, had a few drinks

# But all he kept talking about... #

You know, right from the cover.

Could be a Levi's commercial.

It's as authentically American as that.

Hello again, and welcome to another Newsround Extra.

Today, we're going to look at the latest burger boom.

And this is what you'll be buying,

whether you eat in the restaurant or take it away.

The chips - well, they're called French fries,

and even they, too, come in special packets.

People start feeling really at ease

with many aspects of American culture

that they probably hadn't felt at ease with before.

Everybody knows what a cheeseburger is.

Everybody knows what Budweiser is.

Consumer society was growing and growing,

and you had the advent of the CD.

Record shops were getting bigger and bigger,

and Bruce was probably the beneficiary of that.

MUSIC: Dancing In The Dark by Bruce Springsteen

You could hardly imagine at that point

that Bruce could be bigger.

He was on the cover of magazines,

he was virtually a household name.

Bruce was everywhere.

# I get up in the evenin'

# And I ain't got nothin' to say

# I come home in the mornin'

# I go to bed feelin' the same way... #

And suddenly it just went crazy, you know?

We went from The River -

I think it sold three million albums,

which was amazing,

to 20 million.

That era was insane.

# You can't start a fire

# You can't start a fire without a spark

# This gun's for hire

# Even if we're just dancin' in the dark... #

People will tell you that we like Bruce Springsteen

because he can sing about decay and the rust belt

of the United States,

but they also like Bruce Springsteen because he sang Dancing In The Dark

with Courteney Cox.

# Hey, baby! #

He's pop music!

INSTRUMENTAL

The momentum had been building up in the US

because of the hugeness of the Born In The USA tour.

Is there an educated man on the premises?

He's the Boss, you know?

We call him the Boss, and he is the Boss.

You've just got to go see him.

I am told we can expect him sometime before the summer.

He will do a national tour

and he may well play a couple of big venues

like an open air concert at Wembley Stadium.

One, two, three, four!

MUSIC: My Hometown by Bruce Springsteen

1984 was a crucial year in British history.

We have the 12-month miners' strike, which is pitting communities

against communities.

The two strike breakers waited while the colliery entrance was cleared.

Men from Ellington and other North East pits

were involved in some of the most violent clashes with police

that Northumberland has seen, and five arrests were made.

The closure of coal mines, the rundown of steelworks,

high levels of unemployment.

And I think Springsteen's music is speaking

to some of those people who are going through that process

of economic change.

# They're closing down the textile mill across the railroad tracks

# Foreman says these jobs are going, boys

# And they ain't coming back

# To your hometown... #

Bruce Springsteen has clocked up the 100th date

of his Born In The USA world tour.

Now, that tour should open in Britain in Newcastle

on the 4th and 5th of June.

# To your hometown... #

Springsteen arrives in Britain in 1985,

and then playing some of these areas that had been hit by coal closures.

Coffee?

Tea, please.

Take one.

My name is Juliana Heron.

During the strike, I was a member of

the Eppleton Miners Wives support group.

I'm Bob Heron, and I was a striking miner.

We knew our pit was an old pit.

It was on borrowed time.

But what were we fighting to save was a community, not just a pit.

There was a job there for everybody.

The whole community survived on the colliery.

With no strike pay coming in, and only the basic benefit

allowed by the state,

many miners' families have rapidly reached the breadline.

Women's support groups have been set

up in the militant coalfields, where they run soup kitchens,

distribute food parcels, and give advice to worried families.

The women were the backbone of the strike,

that's what I think anyway,

because I think if we hadn't

stood side by side with our husbands,

a lot of men probably would have gone back.

It did educate a lot of women. I mean, it did educate me.

PHONE RINGS

I got a phone call off Anne Suddick,

she was the kingpin for the Durham area support group.

She says, "Juliana, do you fancy going to a concert?"

And I said, "What concert?"

She says, "It's Bruce Springsteen."

I says, "Well, who's Bruce Springsteen?"

One, two, one, two, three, four!

Tonight, some 38,000 people turned out in Newcastle to see

the man described as the greatest rock star ever.

I said it would be difficult for me to go in there as a lifelong

supporter of Sunderland Football Club.

I'll cross myself when I go in,

but I've got to say, I'll remember that day for the rest of my life.

# Born down in a dead man's town

# The first kick I took was when I hit the ground... #

We had great seats.

# That's been beat too much

# Till you spend half your life covering up... #

During the interval,

this man had tapped Anne on the shoulder and he says,

"Could you please come and meet Bruce Springsteen?"

So she went in, and she was about half an hour.

Anyway, she comes back and she sits down.

She says, "You'll never believe this."

She says, "Look," and she just hands us this cheque.

I says, "That says $20,000."

She says, "Yes, it's for the Durham Area Support Group

"in Northumberland, off Bruce Springsteen."

I says, "Wait, he doesn't know us."

She says, "Yes, but he knows what you're doing."

He's a hero to us.

He didn't do it for publicity.

He did it because he wanted to do it,

and that would have helped a great deal in the support groups.

Of course, my parents were working class people,

and I watched them struggle their whole lives.

And I'd been reading about it in the newspapers,

and so it was just something

that felt it would be a good thing to do.

It wasn't a big thing, you know?

It was just a good thing to do at the time.

I was over the moon.

I've followed him ever since.

It was absolutely life-saving.

It was life-saving.

65,000 fans came from all over Britain to hear

the man they called the Boss

rocking Wembley Stadium to its very foundations.

He's so gorgeous and he's got a beautiful voice.

He's out of this world.

Next to the hubby, that is. Yeah...

He's the essence of rock and roll, isn't he?

The essence of rock and roll!

# Well, we busted out of class

# Had to get away from those fools

# We learned more from a three-minute record, baby

# Than we ever learned in school... #

Wembley is a deeply meaningful place for me.

You've kind of made it when you get to that spot.

Wembley is magic.

It just has a certain cachet for an international artist.

And to do the three nights - and we truthfully could have done more -

it was an extraordinary moment.

It was like a day-out event, it was just full-on excitement.

I was down the front in the mosh pit.

It was one of the best nights of my life.

You have not lived unless you've seen Bruce live.

When you see the E Street Band and him working together,

there's some kind of alchemy, there's some kind magic.

# Blood brothers in the stormy night

# With a vow to defend

# No retreat, baby, no surrender... #

Er, OK.

Wembley, right there.

HE CHUCKLES

Felt like the top of the world. King of the world.

I hate to use the word, it sounds corny, but triumph.

Triumph and connection.

MUSIC: The River by Bruce Springsteen

September 1987, I'm 16 years old, I'm living in Luton.

I run into this guy, he's a mutual friend of somebody else.

He's listening to some music.

I ask him what he's listening to and he says, "It's Bruce Springsteen."

I put this cassette on.

"I lay on my bed in the darkness and listened to the story unfold.

"It was a motion picture told in words and music.

"Having stumbled in the dark for so long, that September night,

"I was blinded by the light.

"That night, Bruce Springsteen changed my life."

# We'd go down to the river

# And into the river... #

As a teenage kid growing up in '80s Luton,

the idea that you could do something that was actually fulfilling,

that was actually interesting, seemed impossible.

This is a time where the colour of one's skin

and one's ethnicity was a massive factor.

And that's before the limitations of my own family.

Because I'd grown up in a community where it was about arranged

marriages, it was about expectation, it was about duty.

I had a very typically teenage relationship with my dad.

I felt like he was an obstacle to a lot of the things that I wanted.

MUSIC: Independence Day by Bruce Springsteen

It was so astounding to me,

to hear a rock star writing so sensitively and profoundly

about such subjects as father-son relationships.

I think Independence Day is probably the best example.

I think it helped deepen my sense of empathy towards my dad.

I mean, everybody experiences the same triumphs,

heartbreak, struggles.

I was very intense on writing about what I felt were these timeless

themes that run through everyone's life,

no matter when or where you're from.

# Won't you just say goodbye? It's Independence Day

# All men must make their way come Independence Day... #

So I wrote this article in the Guardian about what it means

to be a Springsteen fan and how much he changed my life.

I got... A literary agent contacted me and said,

"Would you be interested in writing a book?"

And then as I was writing it, I was thinking,

"God, this could make an amazing film."

# I go to bed feelin' the same way

# I ain't nothin' but tired

# Man, I'm just tired and bored with myself

# Hey, there, baby... #

One of the reasons I wanted to make the film was because there was

a massive connection between Bruce's story and Sarfraz's story.

Now, as a film-maker, I had to make those connections work

and the key to that was Bruce's lyrics.

THUNDER CRASHES

# I've done my best to live the right way

# I get up every morning and go to work each day... #

The scene with the storm is the centre point for the film for me.

When he's walking around and the lyrics are, like, you know,

projected onto him, it's that epiphany moment where the first

time you hear a song that really talks to you, your mind explodes.

I just got a new-found love and respect for Bruce

in that process because I just realised that he really was

a man of the people, a poet of the people.

It was a lovely picture and the book was lovely also.

# Don't run back, inside, darling

# You know just what I'm here for... #

Blinded By The Light, one of the things that it does very well

is communicate people's devotion to Bruce.

# Show a little faith, there's magic in the night... #

My character had to sing a bit of Thunder Road,

and I was so enchanted by the idea that Bruce would have to see that.

He'd have to, at some point, sign off on the film...

# You can hide 'neath your lovers and study your pain

# Make crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rain... #

..and he would see this idiot singing in a very badly advised wig.

Long before Bruce Springsteen was anywhere near Bramall Lane,

the fans were gathering.

Those first at the fence

had travelled far and arrived early.

The Tunnel Of Love was actually really conceived as a solo album.

It was billed as Bruce Springsteen FEATURING the E Street Band,

so he was very clearly the star at this point.

CHEERING

# Well, it's Saturday night

# You're all dressed up in blue

# I've been watching you a while

# Maybe you've been watching me too... #

He ended up getting together with his backing singer, Patti.

He moved to California, he started a family.

This was always bound to change things.

And perhaps biggest of all, as far as the fans were concerned,

he basically told the E Street Band that they could take a break.

# So if you're rough enough for love

# Honey, I'm tougher than the rest... #

We don't have to go in to see him, do we?

You can hear it over t'wall.

Oh, we've enjoyed it.

The 1990s were a very different decade for Bruce.

It was Bruce either solo or with a band

that came to be known as "the other band".

# Well, my soul checked out missing

# As I sat listening

# To the hours and minutes tickin' away

# Yeah, just sittin' around... #

I went out to interview him when those two albums,

Human Touch and Lucky Town, were coming out,

and he had another band of younger musicians.

These records seem less concerned with the kind of blue-collar America

with which you are identified and more with the life of a person.

I think you write about what feels most urgent to you,

you know, at any given time.

He was thinking about things differently,

having different things to write songs about.

Now, this next tune's from a film called Philadelphia.

If you haven't been to see it, go to see it,

but take a box of tissues with you.

Also, you might learn something at the same time.

It's by Bruce Springsteen, it's called Streets Of Philadelphia.

# I was bruised and battered

# I couldn't tell what I felt

# I was unrecognisable to myself

# Saw my reflection in a window and didn't... #

Streets Of Philadelphia's a song about AIDS, calling for compassion.

He's always had that ability to strike out

and surprise you with something that sounds unforgettable.

# Ain't no angel gonna greet me

# It's just you and I, my friend

# And my clothes don't fit me no more

# I walked a thousand miles just to slip this skin... #

You know, he'd done solo stuff,

a couple of things with a different band.

Yeah, we would talk now and then.

And I just was, you know, I was encouraging the idea.

I said, you know, "Whatever you want to do musically,

"the E Street Band can do."

And I said, "You know, I feel like we have unfinished business.

"Just think about it, but I think we ought to get back together."

Having been away so long,

I would imagine the audience being a little bit concerned.

You know, "These cats are getting a little bit older now."

And I wanted to make sure we came out, you know, like a hurricane.

One, two!

# Tear drops on the city

# Bad Scooter searching for his groove... #

I love going to see Bruce live, not just for Bruce,

but also the audience.

I mean, it's an amazing experience.

For me, I've always kind of seen it as like a therapy session.

Something happens in those three to four hours

that kind of just, like, heals you.

# I got my back to the wall now

# Tenth Avenue freeze-out... #

Probably been to about 50 concerts,

and I made a handful of friends that I'd met in the pit.

I know a lot of people who have met their partners

because of Bruce Springsteen as well, and they're now married.

The Springsteen community is incredibly tight-knit.

They look out for each other.

You can go to a Springsteen gig on your own

and you'll never be on your own because you'll either bump into

someone that you know or you'll be adopted by someone.

I probably know more people in the pit at the Bruce Springsteen concert

than in my home town.

Hardcore Bruce fans, you just implicitly trust each other.

# OK, it's all right now. #

The E Street Band!

The E Street Band!

The heart-stoppin', earth-shockin',

earth-quakin', heart-breakin', air-conditioner-shakin',

history-makin', legendary E Street Band!

The audience of Bruce is hugely loyal,

cos you see some quite old people there, right?!

But you also see people bringing their kids.

Our young audiences bring with them a lot of energy, a lot of energy.

So, we were lucky enough to get tickets for Coventry

in the 2016 tour.

They opened the doors and we ran to the front,

dragging my nine-year-olds along.

So we were excited, thinking Bruce is going to be really close to us.

You sound good!

AUDIENCE: # Like a river that don't know where it's flowing

# I took a wrong turn and I just kept going... #

Bruce was singing Hungry Heart and he saw Haydn on my shoulders,

he had the iconic Bruce Springsteen T-shirt on,

and he leant over just to hold his hand, I think.

# Don't make no difference what nobody says... #

And the next thing you know, I can remember me not being on my mother's

shoulders and being onstage with him.

# Ain't nobody like to be alone

# Singin', lay down your money and you play your part

# Everybody's got a h-h-hungry heart... #

I can remember looking up at him and then him handing me the microphone,

and I can remember really panicking at that point,

but luckily I knew all the words.

# Everybody's got a Hungry heart

# Lay down your money and you play your part

# Everybody's got a h-h-hungry heart... #

Aw, and a little head rub.

I've never smiled so much.

Wow!

Ahhhh!

Woo!

Happiest moment of my life.

THEY CHUCKLE

CHEERING

Hello, London!

The Wembley shows were some of the best shows

we have ever done in England.

The greatest British audiences I've ever played to,

deeply resonant and deeply connected.

One, two, three, four!

He said to me, "Let's just stand here for a second."

# Can't see nothing in front of me... #

"Right now, we're standing on sacred ground.

"Wembley Stadium, London."

Springsteen is bigger in the UK and the rest of Europe

than he is in the United States now.

# Come on up for the rising

# Come on up, lay your hands in mine... #

He's one of the icons of music, without a doubt,

and continues to sustain that into his 70s.

That's a legacy.

To witness them being at the top of their game, actually, in 2024,

was quite moving.

It's like an Olympic sport, you know, being Bruce,

which is kind of admirable if medically inadvisable.

As much as I love the music,

I want to know what supplements he's taking.

What is he doing, Pilates?

All jokes aside, wow!

Wow.

I think what we're seeing now is him rage, rage, rage

against the dying of the light.

As long as Bruce wants to do it, I'll be standing next to him.

You know, we're 25 in our heads.

Maybe, you know.

Just time to squeeze in one more story because it's the highest

honour at the Ivor Novello Awards,

and one of the most coveted prizes in songwriting.

Bruce Springsteen is the first American musician to make the cut.

Being the first international artist to receive the award,

I was really moved by it.

Paul McCartney gave it to me.

It was a funny and wonderful moment.

Great pleasure for me to present this to Bruce.

Unlike Bruce's concerts, I'm going to keep this brief.

LAUGHTER

Ten minutes from this front door is the house I grew up in.

In that little bedroom,

I played this man's records...

..thousands of times.

I want to thank you for taking my music into your hearts

and into your souls.

When I flew on that first plane to London back in 1975,

that was my dream.

"What can I give back to these people

"that have given so much to me?"

# That maybe we ain't that

# Young any more... #

50 years later, to have them say,

"Hey, yeah, you did that..."

# You ain't a beauty, but, hey, you're all right... #

..that meant a lot to me.

A lot to me.

# And that's all right with me... #

Come on!

# You can hide 'neath your covers and study your pain

# Make crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rain

# Waste your summer praying in vain

# For a saviour to rise from these streets

# Well, now, I'm no hero, that's understood

# All the redemption I can offer, girl, is beneath this dirty hood

# With a chance to make it good somehow

# Hey, what else can we do now...? #