Thanks a lot mate. I'll take a look at some YouTube videos and probably order them both in about an hour. :)

Some of the performances from Hyde Park give me chills. 'Youngstown', 'Racing In The Street', 'Badlands' and 'Outlaw Pete' are great.

Wait till you see Youngstown from Live in New York..it goes so well...the long sax ( :( ) end to The River into an explosive Youngstown and then into a equally explosive Murder Inc.


Btw, the five set acoustic is immense. How long was that before the show started? How many people were there? I don't really understand these pit things, I turned up to Old Trafford a few years ago, got a number (112?) written on me and then ended up about three 'rows' back by just powering past people. Were there special people already in there? Someone explain heh



Also, I must be physic re: Jungleland...Jake really nailed it.

I'm with Goose here - go get Live from NYC. It's cheap on Amazon and you can even buy it used if you need to. I saw several of those shows in NYC but even when I watch them now I am blown away.

I got all the DVD's. I love the Houston 78 one, I really like the NYC one and I do listen/watch Live at Dublin a lot as well.
The NYC one is from their reunion tour so a lot of passion is coming right of your screen and has a better sound then the newer, barcalona, one. The Barcalona one has a better crowd and Bruce's enthousiasm captured once more. This DVD though is my least favorite of all the DVD's that been released. Much of the songs feel like fillers to me, like The Rising and Lonesome Day, those songs never did it for me. Also the sound, sometimes it sounds as if it is recorded in the bathroom (echo and not all instruments sound properly mix). Luckily for me as saxplayer, the sax is mixed very good! Ofcorse some wonderful performances are also on this DVD. Land of Hope and Dreams followed up by Thunder Road is incredible to watch after each other. Although I don't like the setlist/tracklist of the Barca-show that much. I really like the follow-up of LOHAP and Thunder Road.
I got the bluray of Live in Dublin but there's no difference with the DVD as far as I can see but I am quite a fan of the Seeger Sessions Band and it is the DVD/Bluray with the best sound of all concerts. (Except for Hyde Park). I also think that Dublin is easier to mix properly; other instruments, smaller venues but you can hear every instrument they play just over the 5 channels which I like a lot, the finesse.

However the Dolby Digital 5.1-audiotracks sound alright to good most of the time, I am still hoping for the next released show to have a DTS 5.1-audiotrack that might finish it off just slightly more.

I ripped all the audio of all the DVD's I mentioned. So if you fancy listening to that first before you buy a DVD I can put them in Dropbox if you like (MP3 320, can rip them again in wave if preferred). But I am sure you won't regret buying any of the DVD's as they all have something else, something special going for them.

1. Hyde Park
2. NYC
3. Live in Dublin
4. Houston 78
5. Barcalona

Something like that for me :)

I salute you,
TS

Helsinki was absolutely incredible- I took my mum with me, it was her first Springsteen gig and now she's afraid she'll be spoiled for any further ones :p Unfortunately we were in the seated stands (my mum has arthritis and fibromyalgia in her feet/legs, so standing for 5+ hours plus the wait wasn't really an option), but out seats were practically on pitch level and near the stage so the atmosphere was good. Couldn't believe it when Bruce came on and did his acoustic set before the main show, and when he did For You and Blinded By The Light (2 of my mum's favourite songs) I thought she was going to cry!

I really thought that he wouldn't be able to top the (only) last show of his that I saw - Glasgow 2009- but Helsinki was just something else. Great setlist, great crowd, and Bruce and the band were on top form. I was originally slightly apprehensive about seeing the band without Clarence, but the E Street horns and Jake did a great job, and the tribute to Clarence was really touching- it had practically the whole stadium in silence, even a wee five-year-old boy who had been dancing around the whole night :)

My only regret is that I couldn't do more shows (stupid uni!), but at the end of the day, it all worked out- if my final exams/graduation hadn't been when they were, I would have just stuck to the shows in the UK and maybe one of the Spanish shows, and I wouldn't have even considered going to the Finnish show. And I got to spend 5 days in Helsinki, which is hands-down one of the nicest cities I have ever been to. A perfect graduation present :)

It's funny, the night before the gig, my mum was making her usual pre-show predictions, and she was adamant that the band would come onstage at around 8, and that the show would go onto midnight- I think that she could have a new career ahead of her as a psychic ;)

Nice to see you ended your schoolyear with Bruce and a 5 day stay in Helsinki. I finished my 3 week holliday with Bruce. So we both ended something with a Bruce-concert and boy, are we able now to face all what's coming now again, with new energy, gained through Bruce ;-)

I salute you,
TS

Sounds like a great trip and congrats on finishing uni.

No, I can't. My account was suspended a few years ago when they did some sort of cleaning, and now it seems to have been deleted...

Ice

The pit (about 1000 people) was let in at about 4pm, and for some odd reason the security forced us all to stand a little after 5pm. By then the arena doors were open and people were coming in, but the seats were mostly empty.

Bruce walked on at about 6pm and played the five songs and then spent a good 15 minutes with the crowd. He left at about 6.30pm and the show started at about 7:50pm. And went on until midnight... :)

Most of the people weren't there when Bruce played the acoustic set, they came in at about seven. There were complaints after the show that people didn't know he was gonna do that and came in late... Suits them, says I. :)


Ice

I can put the bootleg in 2 parts in my dropbox for you if that helps Ice.
Though I promised KeepTheFaith to put the audiorips I have of the Bruce DVD's in dropbox first for him so it can take to a week before I am able to upload the bootleg in 2 parts to dropbox. I have 4,4GB of Dropbox space and the bootleg is well over 5gb. Let me know if this would work for you. If anyone else has a faster solution, I am happy to hear it.

I salute you,
TS