Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band are as engaged, vital and important as ever

BRUCE Springsteen has mixed things up in his latest show in tune with the fluid political environments in Australia and the US.

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band rocking at AAMI Park in Melbourne. Picture: Supplied

REVERED rocker Bruce Springsteen didn’t start his first show in Melbourne tonight with one of the many hits from his long and glittering career.

Rather, with a huge grin on his face and his tongue firmly in cheek he bounded on to the AAMI Park stage with the words: “We stand before you as embarrassed Americans.”

He then launched into Don’t Hang Up, a 1962 pop gem by mostly forgotten band The Orlons.

He's on it! @springsteen starts first Melbourne show "sending a message home" covering Don't Hang Up for Trump v Turnbull pic.twitter.com/dV38VBXFaQ

— cameron adams (@cameron_adams) February 2, 2017

Hastily rehearsed that afternoon, it was clearly a jab at his new president Donald Trump and the reportedly abrupt ending to his recent phone conversation with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, which came to light today.

Recent events in his homeland clearly have the 67-year-old rock great and long-time activist fired up.

While tonight’s effort was lighter on rhetoric than some of his earlier Australian shows, he followed up with a string of songs big on defiance and unity, from working man’s anthem American Land to The Ties That Bind and a blistering version of No Surrender, from his biggest album Born In the USA.

Bruce Springsteen couldn’t resist a jibe at reports of a highly charged phone call between US President Donald Trump and Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. Picture: Supplied

But for any of his politics — and he maintained the rage with stomping versions of Wrecking Ball and Murder Incorporated — Springsteen is first and foremost a consummate entertainer and the biggest cheers of the night came for his many timeless hits, such as a rumpshaking Glory Days, a rousing Born To Run, joyous Dancing In the Dark (this time all the band members got their Courteney Cox moment) and the more subdued I’m On Fire.

So fervent was the singalong for Hungry Heart, that he didn’t even bother with the first verse, instead venturing out into the crowd to high five fans, read their signs and even chugged a beer.

On his third visit to these shores in four years, Springsteen – and behind him the peerless E Street Band – prove again and again they are one of the most potent combinations in the world. Whether it’s the full tilt rock of Johnny 99 and the party of Mary’s Place to the more sombre classic The River and the jazzy New York City Serenade, Springsteen is as engaged, vital and important as ever.

And despite his protestations of being “so depressed”, the joy from the stage and in the audience continued to shine, never more than in the Land of Hope and Dreams, the song played at the end of outgoing US president Barack Obama’s farewell address.

Springsteen plays AAMI Park again on Saturday night and Hanging Rock, Macedon, on February 11.

He also plays Quodos Bank Arena in Sydney on February 7 and 9; Hope Estate in the Hunter Valley on February 18; and Brisbane Entertainment Centre on February 14 and 16.

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band are as engaged, vital and important as ever. Picture: Supplied

Originally published as Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band are as engaged, vital and important as ever