2024-09-11 15:25:30
A new documentary called Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band gives an insight into the creative process of one of the most famous rock bands of all time, as well as behind the scenes of the world tour that will culminate in Prague next year. This week it premiered at a festival in Toronto, Canada, and on October 25 it will also be released in the Czech Republic by the Disney+ video library.
Director Thom Zimny’s novel was narrated by Bruce Springsteen himself. The American singer and guitarist was supposed to come to Prague with his long-standing band E Street Band already this year, but due to problems with the vocal cords, the performance was postponed to June 15, 2025. .
The film captures his conversations with his teammates and the bond that music has strengthened between them. In front of the camera, the rocker talks openly about aging, the present and mortality.
His wife, 71-year-old singer and guitarist Patti Scialfa, admitted to the crew that doctors diagnosed her with multiple myeloma, a blood cancer.
The musician previously performed regularly with the E Street Band, but she was already absent from last year’s concerts and did not even participate in the current world premiere in Toronto. “The disease attacks the immune system, so I have to be very selective about what I do and where I go. Once in a while I’ll join the band and sing a few songs with them,” she explained to Variety.com.
Springsteen’s longtime manager Jon Landau also speaks in the film. “Someone who will celebrate his 75th birthday in a few weeks is inevitably thinking about mortality. The film captures that,” says the producer, referring to the jubilee that the musician will live to see on Monday, September 23.
Bruce Springsteen at the Toronto premiere of the new film. | Photo: Reuters
“Every night he gives his all. He stands in front of people and tries to adjust his body, mind and spirit so that he experiences it to the fullest, because then the audience will also experience it to the fullest with him,” adds the colleague.
The documentary opens with little-known photographs of the E Street Band members in their youth. This is followed by a sharp cut to the present, when the band, after a six-year hiatus and for the first time since the coronavirus pandemic, embarks on a world tour to play together for several million people. The concert series began on February 1, 2023 in the USA, the musicians will perform the last three evenings in Europe next summer. Due to the delay, Prague will be the penultimate stop.
“We have the only job in the world where at 75 you’re still working with people you went to high school with,” Bruce Springsteen remarked at the premiere.
According to Variety.com, when watching archival footage from the 1970s and 1980s, viewers will be struck by how much the frontman moved and danced while singing at concerts back then.
According to the documentary, that’s why he originally hired lead guitarist Steven Van Zandt, so that he wouldn’t have to constantly focus on playing. Today, of course, it’s calmer, but Springsteen still exudes vitality and his band still plays great, the website reminds.
However, according to him, the new documentary is sometimes too celebratory. “Springsteen talks about how much he loves the band, how great they all are, and how great the brass section or the vocalists are. They talk about how much they love Springsteen. There’s no reason to doubt that for a second, but there’s a little bit of that in a hundred minutes of footage power,” notes the magazine.
Indiewire.com appreciates the candor with which the central actor talks about getting old or how physically and mentally demanding it is to do a rock tour at this level at his age. The film also sheds some light on some of the shifts, such as why the E Street Band used to play different songs every night, but now they’re playing an almost unchanging set list.
“Sometimes the director jumps so often between the past and the present that it is not always clear what era the people in front of the camera are talking about. But that was probably the intention. After all, Springsteen and the band are mainly talking about how many ways it is still the same, even though they they themselves have changed,” the magazine sums up.
The rocker from New Jersey, USA released his first studio album called Greetings From Asbury Park in 1973. Since then he has sold over 140 million records worldwide. He won 20 Grammy Awards, two Golden Globes, an Oscar for best film song Streets of Philadelphia or a Tony Theater Award thanks to a Broadway show about his life and work.
The new film is the umpteenth on which Springsteen has collaborated with American documentarian Thom Zimny over the past quarter of a century. He won a television Emmy Award for the documentary Springsteen on Broadway, in addition to directing more than forty music videos. “The E Street Band is basically a garage band, but at the same time in the film you see how they are going to conquer the world on tour. It was exciting to be able to observe that,” adds the documentary maker.
The picture also commemorates members of the group who are no longer alive. Organist Danny Federici died first in 2008, and saxophonist Clarence Clemons left three years later.
Bruce Springsteen received several minutes of applause at the premiere in Toronto. Among other things, he told the audience that if he had to die tomorrow, he was ready for it. “It was worth it. It was quite a ride,” he remarked.
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