Bruce Springsteen Comes Back Home- The Pete Seeger Sessions

DVD REVIEWS

Bruce Springsteen: The Pete Seeger Sessions, 2006

Frankly, I had never been a strong fan of Bruce Springsteen’s during his more raucous Rock & Roll career. I like Rock & Roll very much but most of his work seemed, to my ear, a little off kilter. However, with an acoustic recording in 2005 (and an earlier one from from 1996 that I will review separately) and now an American tradition folk recording of some works made famous by the legendary folksinger and ardent folk traditionalist Pete Seeger Springsteen has come back home. This session produced interesting versions of some common American songs like "Eire Canal", "John Henry", Mary Don't You Weep" and "Shenendoah" that are done with so much retexturing (Springsteen’s term) that Bruce has now created a niche for himself in the folk pantheon. Who would have thought?

This is a short documentary about the making of the sessions album but it gives real insight into the way Springsteen ‘feels’ the song, gears up, and then goes out and performs it in that gravelly voice that I like in male singers. For my money his version of "Shenandoah" is one of the most hauntingly moving I have ever heard (partially as a result of great back up on instruments and vocals, including a strong performance by Bruce's wife Patty). And I do not usually even like the song. All this, plus his gang of musicians were obviously having a good time. And it shows from start to finish. I am going out to buy the album, pronto. (There are some DVD/CD reverse side combinations available on this one).

Note: The reference to Bruce coming home is from the DVD. One of the back up musicians' father was a well-known folkie in the 1960's who taught Bruce his acoustic guitar back then. What goes around comes around.