The Boss himself, Bruce Springsteen, has a lot of hidden secrets that happen on stage. One of them is a very simple rule: should one member of the E Street Band not know how to play a specific song, Springsteen would fire them. Sounds harsh, right? Well, not really, and it stems from a long-time relationship with gigging and bars.
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Bruce Springsteen talked about his song-selecting chops with Stephen Colbert during a 2016 interview. Colbert asked him how his band managed to keep up with him, who would often tell them which song to play next while he counted them in.
"The entire band are bar band veterans," Springsteen said. "So, they played hundreds of nights before we'd ever stood out in front of an audience after we had a record deal. So, there's a common well that we all draw from." There, he revealed his golden rule. "I mean, if we played 'Wild Thing,' you'll be fired from the E Street Band if you don't know how to play that," he said.
A Little Man
Of course, this "rule" is more of a compliment to his band, as Springsteen is very confident that his experienced bandmates have surely played a plethora of songs in bars and smaller gigs. However, Springsteen does have a "secret" under his sleeve that helps him with lyrics and song selection.
"There's a little man under the stage, and he has a teleprompter," Springsteen revealed. "So, if I decide we're gonna play 'Friday On My Mind,' We're gonna play Katy Perry's 'Teenage Dream,' whatever we're gonna play, within seconds, he'll have the lyrics up in front of you."
Having a teleprompter sounds like it works wonders for 75-year-old Springsteen. On top of his "secret," his on-stage ethic also shines, as he didn't allow his bandmates to perform while drugged.
"Drugs were not uncommon in the E Street Band, you know," Springsteen told The Telegraph in a 2024 interview. "There was a boundary, however - I stayed out of your business, but if I was on stage and I saw that you were not your complete self, there was going to be a problem." This boundary, while limited to being "relatively sober," worked. For Springsteen, one of his proudest achievements is that, whenever a member of the E Street Band passed, it was of natural causes.
Bruce Springsteen will continue his World Tour in 2025, as he will travel across Europe from May to July. His biopic, Deliver Me From Nowhere, which features The Bear actor, Jeremy Allen White, as The Boss, is scheduled to release in 2025 too.
