Bruce Springsteen has admitted he ‘screwed up’ playing longer shows than literally everyone else in the world.
The Boss of New Jersey is also – officially – The Boss of long performances. Springsteen played a show in Helsinki in 2012 which lasted for a quite incredible four hours and six minutes.
His commitment to playing huge sets has become legendary but now Springsteen has admitted that he set the bar too high and regrets playing for so long.
Speaking on the Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend podcast about The Beatles’ short gigs, Springsteen said: “That wasn’t so bad. We screwed the whole thing up by playing too f***** long. Now I have to do it.”
To be fair to The Beatles, their pop songs were barely two minutes sometimes – even if they played for one hour, they could probably smash through 30 songs. It certainly kept the U.S. happy in the 60’s.
Springsteen has actually been caught out on several occasions when playing past a venue’s curfew. In 2012, his performance alongside Sir Paul McCartney of ‘I Saw Her Standing There’ and ‘Twist And Shout’ at Hard Rock Calling in London was cut short by festival organisers.
The ageing rocker is not inclined to retirement though.
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Last year, he said: “You may be tired, want to go to sleep.
“But that walk from dressing room to stage … something turns on between those two points.”
Springsteen released his 20th studio album, Letter to You, on October 23rd. It was his first studio album accompanied by his longtime backing band the E Street Band since 2014.
He recently revealed that the material for Letter to You was recorded in less than a week, with all the vocals being “first takes”. Now he’s just showing off.
“We actually recorded the record in four days and on the fifth we listened and told stories,” Springsteen revealed. “The band played entirely live, all the vocals are first takes. So it was just a unique and wonderful experience.”
Check out ‘Letter to You’ by Bruce Springsteen:
