Download interlude album by glenn travis

It's still the most wonderful time of the year: @DavidJCriblez recounts in @Newsday how "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town" — "everything you want from the #EStreetBand," one fan said — rose from NY's Long Island in Coming back to FM radio near you! www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

— Backstreets Magazine (@backstreetsmag) December 2,

LETTER TO YOU VINYL GIVEAWAY SWEEPSTAKES
Bruce Springsteen has autographed a Letter to You record jacket, quite handsomely, which is being given away in an official sweepstakes. It's open to U.S. residents only — sweepstakes regulations being what they are, mysterious beyond the ken of mere mortals — but if you're 15 or older and live in the U.S. (and don't mind being added to Springsteen's email list), you can enter here by Thursday, December 4 for a chance at the prize.
- December 2,

ICYMI: Two more days to save on Live Archive releases from @nugsnet … collect ‘em all! #springsteenwww.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

— Backstreets Magazine (@backstreetsmag) November 30,

SHE'S WAITIN' TONIGHT AT THE BACKSTREET RECORDS SHOP…
Our '69 Chevy bumperstickers are back! After being sold out for a few years, we've overhauled this classic with a new 8" x " redesign — based on Springsteen’s actual '69 Chevelle — for a new reprint. For this holiday weekend only, get one FREE with any order from Backstreet Records!

No minimum purchase required, no coupon code necessary, we'll be inserting one with all orders that come in through Monday night.

Start shopping with Backstreet Records here— we appreciate your support!

- Updated November 30,

THANKSGIVING PAST: IT'S ME AND YOU, FRANK!
Thanksgiving Day, November 27, That's nine-year-old Bruce Springsteen (second standing child from the right) and his family, as recently seen in Thom Zimny's Letter to You film, first published in the late Chuck Yopp’s book Greetings From Asbury Park: A Look at the Local Scene. Watch for a close-up in Letter to You beginning at the mark. Cousin Frank Bruno, who also features in Letter to You and taught Bruce his first guitar chords, is the first man standing on the left.

Backstreets wishes all of our readers a happy, safe, and healthy Thanksgiving Day !

- November 26,

RECAP: VOLUME 15, "WE'RE A WINNER"
Less elation about elections, more music about music.
With a new album, a flood of media appearances, and some election closure in recent weeks, it might seem like the year is looking up for Springsteen fans.

isn't quite done with us yet, though, as it reminded us with a SiriusXM outage this morning that kept many fans from listening live to Bruce's latest installment of From My Home to Yours.

Fortunately, I was one of the seemingly few who were able to get the signal in real time; for anyone who missed the initial broadcast, SiriusXM On Demand and E Street Radio replays (starting today at 6pm) will be your friends for Volume "We're a Winner."

Leading in with this episode's title track, the Black Pride anthem and Top 20 hit by Curtis Mayfield and The Impressions, Bruce sounded jubilant: "Joe Biden is the 46th president of the United States, and democracy has squeaked by one more time!" He called this a "post-Election Day special," but, he promised, "We're not gonna sit here and gloat at least not too much."

Wishing his Trump fans "better luck next time," Bruce officially opened the show with a special dedication, wishing President 45 "better luck and maybe a little insight" before spinning his own brilliant but underrated political metaphor "Your Own Worst Enemy." The Magic track has what I've previously described as "devastating, penetrating, accusatory lyrics that operate perfectly on two levels at once."

"We can all learn something from that one," Bruce remarked afterwards. "I certainly have."
And then the DJ threw us a curve ball: "That's it for our politics today. I'm not gonna drum on that. Today I wanna do a set that's… music about music."

The theme was likely inspired by his own Letter to You; as he said in a previous interview about the album, "The subject is the music itself… It's the first time I chose that as my subject. It's about rock 'n' roll, it's about being in a band." No surprise that two of its songs appear on this playlist, and with Letter to You's  "Ghosts" switching the gears, the rest of Volume 15 was exclusively "great rock 'n' roll made about rock 'n' roll."

Springsteen fans have long known about Bruce's love for The Raspberries, and today he shared one of his favorites, their Top 40 hit, "Overnight Sensation." He called it "one of my favorite all-time records about rock 'n' roll. What a fabulous production, great sound… The Raspberries had at least one full album of stone cold classics. At the time, they were not considered cool because they had hit after hit after hit after hit, but they were damn good."

"Time to Pretend" continued the theme: "a great, great song about making it… and what comes with it." It's also a song that Bruce and his son Evan were able to catch live when they saw MGMT play their hit single at Bonnaroo in

From Bonnaroo, we took a trip across the pond to the U.K. to check out a couple of great English bands. First up: Oasis, with their hit, "Champagne Supernova." Bruce noted that the Gallagher brothers "were known for fighting each other, but when they weren't fighting they were fabulous."

Lingering in Manchester, Bruce introduced "I Wanna Be Adored," which he called "every rock star's dream." The Stone Roses track opened their self-titled debut album, a Britpop classic, and it was a Top 20 hit — fittingly, today's show is hit-heavy and light on the obscurities. "Before Oasis there was The Stone Roses… they started it all." Who knew Bruce had an eye on the Madchester scene?

Back in the U.S.A., Bruce took us deep down in Louisiana (close to New Orleans), reciting the entire lyrics to "Johnny B. Goode" before playing the seminal rock 'n' roll single by "the Mark Twain of rock and roll, the never-to-be-equaled Chuck Berry."

Returning back to , where we started today's show, Bruce reminded us that "The Byrds had a good  question for us: So you wanna be a rock and roll star?" Bruce's answer? "I heard this record and said, 'Fuck yes!''"

After The Byrds, Bread. Bruce sounded a bit sheepish about including their hit, "The Guitar Man," admitting, "I am generally not a huge fan of Bread, but I love that song. It does kinda say a lot about what it's like to be a guitar player, and I just love the general sound of it."

Joe Strummer's "Coma Girl" evoked another music festival: Bruce performed the song at Glastonbury eleven years ago, and he noted that the song was inspired by the festival, a favorite of Strummer.

Another Friend of Bruce, Robert Gordon, was in the late's punk band Tuff Darts, and Bruce played their greatest hit. "I've thought about covering this song many times," he said of "All For the Love of Rock and Roll." "It's one of my favorite records from an early CBGB compilation."

Les Fradkin's tribute to the jangle-rock greats, "Jangleholic," was "for all you twelve-string guitar, Tom Petty- Byrds-lovers out there — Les Fradkin wrote your anthem."

Bruce recited the lyrics to Jeffrey Foskett's "Cool and Gone," written by Bill Lloyd, "one of my very favorite songs about the arc of a rock and roll career":

A hundred million years ago
Running to the record store
All out of breath for you
I caught my death for you
That was me inside your song
But now it feels like something's wrong
Like somehow you let me down
No queen left to wear that crown
Cool and gone
Cool and gone
Nothing stays the same for long
How can anything so strong be so cool and then be gone?

Springsteen brought us home with "Last Man Standing," one of his favorite tracks off his new album. "I enjoyed writing this song because I had a chance to relive going back to all the little bars we played when we first started it just reminded me of those pretty innocent moments, playing for five, ten, 15 dollars with local guys from your high school."

Bruce wrote the song after the death of his Castiles bandmate George Theiss, when he realized he was truly the last man standing: "I was surprised at how very much I missed them all."

Wrapping up around the hour mark, our host circled back to how he began: "Shoutin' out a congratulations to Joe Biden and the American people!" But in keeping with the episode's major theme, he left us with "perhaps the most beautiful song ever written about the essence of rock and roll," The Lovin' Spoonful's, "Do You Believe in Magic?"

Volume 15 of My Home to Yours didn't turn out to be the political victory lap fans had either hoped for or feared; instead, Springsteen gave us a wonderful companion piece to Letter to You — a winning tribute to the power and glory of rock 'n' roll.

Playlist:

1. The Impressions - "We're a Winner"
2. Bruce Springsteen - "Your Own Worst Enemy"
3. Bruce Springsteen - "Ghosts"
4. The Raspberries - "Overnight Sensation"
5. MGMT - "Time to Pretend"
6. Oasis - "Champagne Supernova"
7. The Stone Roses - "I Wanna Be Adored"
8. Lyric reading: Chuck Berry's "Johnny B. Goode"
9. Chuck Berry - "Johnny B. Goode"
10. The Byrds - "So You Want to Be a Rock 'n' Roll Star"
11. Bread - "The Guitar Man"
12. Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros - "Coma Girl"
13. Tuff Darts - "All For the Love of Rock and Roll"
14. Les Fradkin - "Jangleholic"
15. Lyric reading: Jeffrey Foskett's "Cool and Gone"
16. Bruce Springsteen - "Last Man Standing"
17. The Lovin' Spoonful - "Do You Believe in Magic"

- November 25, - Ken Rosen reporting

Hungerthon is on! Auction items include this signed Tele: www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar But you don’t need $10K to aid @whyhunger in their crucial work (even more necessary due to COVID) — please visit www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar and consider a donation. #Hungerthon#www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

— Backstreets Magazine (@backstreetsmag) November 24,

'THIS LIFE': JAMMED WITH CHROME INVADERS AND SO MUCH MORE
We keep noticing new things in Steve Szynal's 'This Life' — you will, too, from that giant Exxon sign to a Tucson train from Bruce's childhood tree in Freehold to Springsteen on Broadway's Walter Kerr Theatre. It took us a while to pay attention to the cars: there's a pink Cadillac, a '69 Chevy, Bruce's own black Corvette, his first car (a '57 Bel Air), even Tinker West's Woody. And it just hit me: the semi truck from that Born in the USA tour poster!

In all there are hundreds references to Springsteen songs and E Street history in Szynal's colorful 30"x22" illustration. Moving geographically from the Jersey Shore to NYC, Philly, and way out west, the New Jersey artist packs Boss in-jokes and Easter eggs galore into to his depiction of Springsteen's American Land.

'This Life' [Detail] by Steve Szynal

"My original hand drawing took more than hours to create," says Szynal. "It's intended as a somewhat humorous visual tribute to Bruce, his band, and his work throughout his illustrious career."

Just in at Backstreet Records is a fine art quality print of 'This Life,' printed with archival inks on acid-free paper, that sure looks pretty hanging on the wall. Signed and numbered by the artist for $, in an edition capped at 1,

See 'This Life' in our online shop
for more details, close-ups, and to order

Also available directly from the artist: in a more limited edition of , Steve has taken this work a few steps further, making it truly pop by creating 7-layered, multi-dimensional, collages from his print, framed shadowbox-style. Take a look at the video below to get an idea of the effect (as well as the amount of work inolved). If you're a bigger spender (framed collages are $3, each plus shipping) learn more about these 3D collages at www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar or email Steve at sszynal31@www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar Be sure to tell him Backstreets sent you!

- November 24,

New episode of #FromMyHomeToYours this week! Volume “We’re a Winner” will air Wednesday 11/25 at 10am and 6pm, with @Springsteen spinning @ChuckBerry@whoisMGMT@oasis@thestoneroses@The_Byrds and more, on @SIRIUSXM ch 20 E Street Radio. #www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

— Backstreets Magazine (@backstreetsmag) November 23,

BABY THAT'S THE "POWER OF PRAYER" VIDEO
Following "Letter to You" and "Ghosts," the third track from Letter to You to get a lyric video is "The Power of Prayer," out today. It's again crafted by Thom Zimny, combining his E Street album sessions footage with additional archival film. (It also, unfortunately, propogates the "Benny King" typo from the album's lyric sheet it'll be a magic moment when someone makes that small correction in the master doc. Do it for Ben E.!)
- November 23,

AIR MAIL: LETTER TO YOU RECEIVED ACROSS THE POND
Springsteen delivers Letter to U.K. and Ireland, continues conversation, tops chart, makes history
One year ago, Bruce Springsteen spent five days in his home studio with the E Street Band, recording the songs that became Letter to You. As the first anniversary of those sessions approached, he probably spent an equivalent amount of time in that same studio, his own house of a thousand guitars, giving an extensive series of interviews (including Apple exclusives, TV talk show appearances, radio interviews, and podcasts) to promote the album and its Thom Zimny-directed documentary companion piece, for broadcast, online, and print media.

Following the well-documented U.S. blitz, we now turn our attention to international affairs.

In the U.K. and Ireland, Springsteen's broadcast media appearances were aired on release day, Friday October 23, and continued into Saturday morning. They included a return to BBC One TV's The Graham Norton Show and, as if by magic, at approximately the same time, an interview with host Ryan Tubridy on The Late Late Show on RTE One TV (recorded the previous day and on October 16, respectively).

Unlike his in-person GNS debut last year, during his brief London promo blitz for Western Stars, Springsteen's remote appearance with Norton was restricted to just seven minutes; they focused on now-familiar stories about the album's back-to-basics, tequila-toasted recording method and the guitar on which he wrote the new material. 

The Late Late Show interview was more than twice as long and featured a Springsteen-related studio backdrop as well as a more diverse, Irish-centric line of questioning. The conversation covered Bruce's Irish/Italian background (except for a "lone Dutchman, which is how I ended up with the name"), his Catholic upbringing ("I live with it easily, I have faith but I am not religious"), his Irish fans ("One of our greatest audiences"), his admiration for Shane McGowan ("The master — years from now, Shane's music will be remembered and sung")…

…the misinterpretation of "Born in the U.S.A." ("To understand the song, you have to hold two contradictory ideas in your mind at the same time and realize that they're both true"), his belief that Donald Trump would lose the Presidential election ("If not, make some room for me in Ireland!") and the state of his soul ("Struggling as always").

Finally, to dispel doubts about exactly who his Letter is addressed to, Bruce pointed at Tubridy and said, "It's you, my friend — and whoever else is listening. It's a general letter to my fans, lovers, partners, neighbors, audience. To whom it may concern!"

View another clip of the Tubridy/Springsteen Late Late Show interview at www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

A pre-recorded, hour-long Springsteen interview special with DJ and TV presenter Dermot O'Leary aired at midnight: BBC Radio Two's From My Home to His. This replaced their weekly (edited) broadcast of Bruce's DJ series From My Home to Yours. Seven hours later, O'Leary's regular Radio Two show repeated excerpts from his midnight special plus unbroadcast material, ensuring listeners had to catch both shows to hear the entire interview (which was conducted remotely; photos used to promote it were taken in ). 

Peppered with less predictable album tracks, the Radio Two special was the most interesting of the broadcasts, likely because O'Leary is a big fan who steered the conversation in directions not explored by other presenters. He began by explaining that "The E Street Shuffle" was the first Springsteen song he ever heard, and he asked about its horn arrangement. 

"That's a quirky tune," said Bruce. "That Salvation Army sound was played by the E Street Band. These different guys played what they knew of horns. We played rock and soul and funk and a little bit of jazz. It was a very eclectic group of musicians. I took the main riff from ['The Monkey Time'], the Major Lance song, and wrote my own song around it. Then I took the last part, where the band jams like crazy, from a Curtis Mayfield song that I was into at the time. So it was a crazy piece of music."

Asked about the inspiration behind "Meeting Across the River," Springsteen explained, "Central Jersey in the '60s and '70s was a hotbed of the local Italian mob." He said many stories about mob activity had "floated around in our neck of the woods" back in the day, "so I put myself in some shoes and wrote a little ballad about it."

Bruce later acknowledged that "Land of Hope and Dreams" was among his very best songs. For the Reunion tour, he wanted "to have one new song to be our manifesto, for why we were back together and what we hoped to accomplish."

While covering the recording of Letter to You, O'Leary observed that the last time Springsteen recorded live in the studio with the E Street Band was for Born in the U.S.A. in the early '80s.

"The only cut that is actually live is 'Born in the U.S.A.' — maybe 'Glory Days,' I'm not sure," Bruce explained. "Everything else we cut as a track and overdubbed to it, and I would overdub a vocal. This [new] record is unique. I can't think of another record where we cut the entire band, the entire instrumentation, and kept the vocal that I sang while we were cutting the track. So it's completely live. Every vocal is a first take. It's the 'livest' recording we've ever done inside of a studio."

Springsteen then revealed that the band template he wanted was the one used to record "Darkness on the Edge of Town": "The last thing we cut for Darkness was that song, in a studio that had been ripped apart. They left only the cement walls up. The band was resonating like crazy. We cut it live. That's a live vocal." For Letter, he required only "two keyboards, guitars, bass, drums and sax. I [didn't] want any horns, any strings. I got that out of my system on Western Stars."

This interview was one of the first to reveal that Bruce recorded "Janey Needs a Shooter" with the band "a year or two [ago]" with a view to releasing it as a single for Record Store Day, but when he heard the playback, he decided to keep it for a more substantial project. This inspired him to select two other songs of similar vintage ("there was an album's worth of them") for the E Streeters to tackle. The result was "a blend of me as a young man, the band today, and me in my current voice singing those ideas."

The inclusion of these almost year-old songs among recent material that indirectly references The Castiles creates a sense of "time travel between and the E Street Band to this day," Bruce said. "It's the first record I've done where my subject is music itself, being in a rock band."

Springsteen spoke to the subject of Covid "It's altered everybody's world entirely, that's all there is to it. My day is not radically altered, but everything around it is. It seems like all my old hangouts are either closed or only serving outside. A lot of friends who own restaurants are struggling to keep their heads above water. I've just tried to stay as busy as I could. The radio show helped me to continue to talk to my fans through music, which I've loved doing, playing my favorite records and groups. I've had the record and film to keep me busy for a while. I'm always trying to keep a project going."

Asked how he finds music for his radio show, Bruce revealed, "Like everybody else, I surf the internet. I hear one thing, it leads me to something else. I'm always digging, like some maniac record collector".

The extra material on O'Leary's Saturday show focused on the inspiration behind "The Power of Prayer." "When I was a kid, not only was my sense of fun, joy, sexuality awakened by popular music," Bruce recalled, "but so was a certain spirituality I found in the sounds of the singers that I loved. For me, these three-minute singles were tremendous meditations. This song ends at that moment where the guy's in a club and Ben E. King's voice fills the dancefloor. It sounds like a prayer to him. It's one of my favorite songs on the record. It's got a lot of great pop hooks to it, also."

In addition to his radio and TV work, Springsteen took part in a Zoom call for European press, with a number of journalists taking part. Questions were submitted in advance and channeled through intermediary Edith Bowman, who performed the same task last year at the Western Stars London press screening. Thom Zimny also made a brief appearance. Joe Breen captured much of it for The Irish Times in a piece titled "Bruce Springsteen's I swam. I kept busy. I made an album."

The national newspapers on this side of the pond weighed in with a series of unfailingly positive reviews of Letter to You. While the following is not an exhaustive list, it includes all the major pieces, some of which were included in Shawn Poole's earlier review roundup.

United Kingdom

Ireland

There were also smaller reviews in the following:

• The Daily Mirror - "Epic and intimate with several instant classics," uncredited (4 stars)
• The I - "The Boss on loss and the solace of rock" by Elisa Bray (4 stars)
• The Sunday Times Culture Magazine - "A love letter to the past, his and ours" by Dan Cairns (Album of the week).
• The Mail on Sunday (Irish version) - "'Burnin' Train' is a glorious major chord wall of sound," uncredited (4 stars).

The music monthlies were equally effusive. In addition to the December issue of Uncut magazine, which featured a major page front-cover "making of" feature and review by Peter Watts and Richard Williams [see Backstreets coverage here], its only remaining competitor (after the demise of Q) Mojo ran a two-page, four-star review by Keith Cameron [above].

"This is the record Steve Van Zandt has been wheedling away at his buddy to make for over 35 years," Cameron wrote, "There's a moment in 'Last Man Standing' when six Max Weinberg snare taps propel Springsteen up a register and Bittan down into some exultant hammering amid the three-guitar tumble, leading into Clemons' first solo of the album. Right there, the thought occurs: they could have tried this approach sooner. Both a lifetime's reflection and the latest dispatch in an ongoing conversation, these redemptive hymns to E Street's departed heroes are reasons to believe."

In the online-only NME, Leonie Cooper gave the album five stars, describing it as "triumphant," "a powerful synthesis of past and present" that "shows us the strength that can be found in sorrow." 

In Ireland's Hot Press magazine, Pat Carty observed that "Ghosts" is "a song that has you jumping out of your chair punching the air while simultaneously bursting into tears. I would follow this man into hell for the heaven that's promised here. As the world dims, and hope seems extinguished, the light of rock 'n' roll is more important than ever. Springsteen is the keeper of that flame, a holy charge that he remains more than equal to."

In addition, Hannah Vitesse reviewed both the album ("reflective rockers a mixed bag," 3 stars) and documentary ("visual accompaniment to LP gives welcome context," 4 stars) in the December issue of Record Collector; Andrew Mueller awarded the documentary 7 out of 10 in the January issue of Uncut magazine ("Springsteen possibly oversells his gruff narration, but it is a nevertheless gripping and affectionate portrait of an extraordinarily durable institution"); and Keith Cameron appraised the film in the January issue of Mojo ("Springsteen magic occurs post-credits, as he and cousin Frank jam 'Baby I.' Frank taught the teenage Bruce a few basic chords. The look on Springsteen's face says that if this letter is to anyone, it's him"). Finally, the year-end round-ups of the Top 75 albums of the year in Uncut and Mojo placed Letter to You at number 20 and number 45 respectively. 

Bruce @springsteen makes Official Chart history as he scores his 12th Number 1 album with Letter To You www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

— Official Charts (@officialcharts) October 30,

Seven days after its release, it was announced that Letter to You was Number 1 in the U.K., having consistently sold more copies than the rest of the top five combined throughout the week. The Official Charts Company revealed that it was the fastest-selling album of , with 95% of its total 51, sales in physical or download format. (Only Madonna's Chromatica beat it in terms of first-week sales, amassing 53, in June).

Springsteen also made U.K. chart history by being the first solo artist to have a Number 1 album in each of the last five decades (if you count as the first year of a new decade). Similar feats were repeated in Ireland and around the world, prompting Little Steven to tweet: "The universe has voted! Letter to You! Number 1! Every fucking place!"

Also worthy of note is Springsteen's guest appearance on the Norwegian-Swedish talk show Skavlan [above], hosted by journalist Fredrik Skavlan. They discussed perspectives gained with age, absent friends, awareness of mortality, insecurities in Bruce's personal and professional lives, his mental health challenges ("I'm on drugs, which puts me in a pretty good mood most of the time!"), parental advice for his grown-up children, the effect of his isolation on the farm, the achievements he's most proud of (work came third to raising a family and overcoming illness), and how he reconciles the fact that some of his fans may be Trump supporters: "I have Trump voters in my family, I have motorcycle buddies who are Trump voters, for a wide variety of reasons, most of them wrong!"

Echoing the thoughts of fans around the world, Bruce told Dermot O'Leary: "To put this music out and to not to be able to play it is heartbreaking." When Ryan Tubridy asked him to speculate when Irish fans might be able to see him perform at Croke Park again, Bruce said, "My antenna tells me that will not happen before — and I would count ourselves lucky if it happens then, because I don't believe this virus is going to go away. We've got to find better ways to handle it: a vaccine, therapeutics. Hopefully over the next year or two we will have developed methods that will allow us to get back to some form of normalcy. I'd be very happy if we were able to tour in " 

Amen to that!

- November 23, - Mike Saunders reporting - special thanks to Tom McCormack for assistance with the Irish reviews

Happy 70th birthday, @StevieVanZandt — long may you rock!

And long HAS he rocked: this photograph is now from half a lifetime ago, Little Steven at the @UN in , captured by our dearly departed @hollycara, Disciple evermore. www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

— Backstreets Magazine (@backstreetsmag) November 22,

FURTHER UP THE ROAD SHIPS FREE FOR LIMITED TIME
Normally, free shipping might not make much of a difference but when we're talking $40 or more in savings, that's another story. Thanks to Wall of Sound Editions, who published the massive Bruce Springsteen: Further Up the Road and ships it direct to our customers from Italy, the following shipping fees are waived from now through January

• To addresses in the U.S.: Free!
• To addresses in Italy.: Free!
• Anywhere else in Europe.: Free!
• Anywhere else in the world: Free!

So if you've been eyeing this limited-edition book, for yourself or a holiday gift, now's a great time.

In this numbered Collector edition of Bruce Springsteen: Further Up the Road, each book is housed in a slipcase and personally signed by author/photographer Frank Stefanko. The book itself is a beautiful, page artist's monograph with more than 40 years of largely unseen images, all shot by Stefanko throughout Springsteen's epic career. The book features an introduction by Bruce Springsteen himself, with image captions and text by Stefanko, and forewords by fellow Springsteen photographers Eric Meola and Danny Clinch.

While that free shipping is a significant savings, some may still wonder how the book itself could be this expensive well, Wall of Sound pulled out all the stops, and the video below may give you a better sense of it. Take a look at Frank himself flipping through this treaasure trove, with all the thought and care that went into its creation — gatefolds, print quality, different paper stocks — and you'll get an idea of what's in store.

Stefanko has spent more than four decades working closely with Bruce Springsteen. He shot the iconic covers for Darkness on the Edge of Town and The River albums, as well as the cover of Springsteen's best-selling Born to Run autobiography and accompanying album Chapter and Verse. In addition to images and outtakes from those classic sessions, Further Up the Road features a never-before-published shoot with Springsteen from , at his residence in Colts Neck, NJ, and to round things out, in April Springsteen granted Stefanko a brand new, exclusive shoot at his studio in Colts Neck, specifically for inclusion here.

"Frank's photographs were stark. His talent was he managed to strip away your celebrity, your artifice, and get to the raw you. His photos had a purity and a street poetry to them. They were lovely and true, but they weren't slick. Frank looked for your true grit and he naturally intuited the conflicts I was coming to terms with. His pictures captured the people I was writing about in my songs and showed me the part of me that was still one of them. We had other cover options but they didn't have the hungriness of Frank's pictures."
-- Bruce Springsteen (Reprinted by permission from Born to Run, Simon & Schuster, )

Order Further On Up the Road here
Signed and slipcased,
ships from Wall of Sound Editions in Italy
in time for the holidays!

- November 20,

15TH ANNUAL ALL-REQUEST SHOW TO FIGHT HUNGER
Let Springsteen on Sunday FULFILL your request
The annual all-request edition of the Springsteen on Sunday radio program is returning for its 15th year, with all proceeds benefiting FULFILL (formerly, The Foodbank of Monmouth and Ocean Counties). Hosted by Tom Cunningham on The Boss, the weekly show features the music of Bruce Springsteen and other Jersey Shore legends every Sunday morning.

Requests will be taken this Sunday, November 22 beginning 9am ET by calling , with donations being accepted via credit card payment. Requests will also be taken from Bar Anticipation in Lake Como, NJ, where Cunningham will be broadcasting this Sunday's live program.

Listeners are welcome to pick the Bruce Springsteen song of their choice and include a personal dedication as well. There’s space for 20 songs and a $25 (minimum) donation for each song, with proceeds going to FULFILL.

Says TC: "Every year that we do this it's important and, obviously, the stakes are much higher this year.  I love that we'll be live at Bar A this time around, and I'm excited that Fulfill's Kim Guadagno and team will be in the house. As always, I can't wait to see what the 20 songs will be."

After the requests are in, the special three-hour, all-request program will air on Sunday, November 29 beginning at 9am ET on FM at the Jersey Shore, and streaming online.
- November 20,

TWO MEN WALK INTO A BARN
Springsteen & Stewart ride again for military vets and families in need
Fresh off the worst Uber ride he's ever had, Jon Stewart was joined by his three-star driver Bruce Springsteen to kick off the 14th annual Stand Up For Heroes benefit from Springsteen's Stone Hill Farm barn. The barn has become a familiar setting for Springsteen fans recently, serving as the backdrop for last year's Western Stars film. 

In addition to Springsteen, the hour-long virtual event featured comedy skits and taped musical performances from Sheryl Crow, Brad Paisley, and Mickey Guyton.

While the other musical artists were filmed in Nashville, Springsteen's three acoustic performances — "House of a Thousand Guitars," "Long Walk Home," and "I'll See You in my Dreams," interspersed through the second half of the program — were recorded in the barn. Unlike in years past, there were no dirty jokes between songs, or humorous auctions of lasagna and guitars. Choosing to let the music speak for itself, with only a brief introduction from Stewart before each performance, Springsteen offered a message of optimism and hope for our veterans, military families, and country after an unprecedented and challenging year.

A half-hour into the show, Stewart introduced Bruce and Patti Scialfa for the first of Springsteen's three-song "set" — the live premiere of "House of a Thousand Guitars." With a pair of acoustic guitars, Bruce and Patti reimagined the midtempo, piano-driven ballad as an unembellished hymn.

The sparse arrangement, with Springsteen's harmonica filling the bridge, puts the focus square on the song's lyrics (including its reference to the "criminal clown") and emphasizes the song's call to shake off our troubles, wake in search of the lost chord, and rise together 'til we fire the spark. The "li, li, li's" at the end echo the similar prayerful spirit of "The Rising."

Fifteen minutes later, Stewart was back to introduce, "from 's Magic…" a solo acoustic version of "Long Walk Home." Fans are familiar with this version, slow and deliberate, with the camera tight on Springsteen's face as he sang the third verse to remind us of the meaning of "that flag flying over the courthouse."

Taken with the earlier performance of "Thousand Guitars," it's a one-two punch of modern-era Springsteen that tells of the redemptive power of community and fellowship to point the way through these difficult days.

Closing the event, Patti again joined Bruce for one of Jon Stewart's "absolute favorites" off Letter to You,"I'll See You in My Dreams." As with "Thousand Guitars," Patti sang harmonies and traded lines on the final chorus, while Bruce employed his harmonica in place of the piano and organ fills during the song's bridge. The song was a sweet and uplifting end to the event, reiterating a message of optimism and hope even in the face of sadness and loss.

It's only a matter of time until we're back at Madison Square Garden and we can live and laugh in person again — and who knows, maybe Bruce's dirty jokes will return — but this year's Stand Up for Heroes was an inspiring virtual tribute to the real heroes who make our country great, a reminder of their sacrifice and the importance of a strong community to surround and support them.

The full livestream is is archived to watch online, on the Stand Up For Heroes website or via YouTube:

Stand Up for Heroes is presented by the Bob Woodruff Foundation and the New York Comedy Festival, for more information or to donate visit: www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar

- November 19, - Dante Cutrona reporting

WHAT'S UP WITH THOM ZIMNY?
A new episode of What's Up on E Street? is online this week, with Thom Zimny the focus of this latest installment in the Bruce Springsteen Archives series. Host Bob Santelli catches up with the Letter to You director, discussing the new film, his creative process, and his work on E Street that goes back 20 years.

"You prepare a lot," Thom says of the various projects he's been a part of with Springsteen and Jon Landau, "but you have to remain open to what the universe throws you — or what Bruce throws you."

Watch below, or on the Archives' website and Facebook page.

For more with Zimny on Letter to You, don't miss our latest Backstreets Interview with the filmmaker, "Inside the House of a Thousand Guitars."

- November 18,

CITY OF A THOUSAND GUITARS
Starting tomorrow night, you can watch Willie Nile doing his own New York City serenade, in a new streaming special called Live From the Streets of New York . Presented by Little Steven's Underground Garage, it looks like the kind of virtual visit that'll do our homebound hearts some good.

"My bass player Johnny Pisano and I went around NYC to interesting locations and sang songs along the way," Willie tells Backstreets, "It's a trip through a bit of NYC with music and stories" — including an Edgar Allan Poe poem outside where the writer once lived. Their musical tour also hits the Statue of Liberty, the World Trade Center, Washington Square Park, local Greenwich Village haunts, Buddy Holly's apartment, and more,

The show premieres Wednesday, November 18 at 8pm; but if you're planning to watch Stand Up for Heroes, don't worry about the conflict — Willie's show will also be available on demand for a week, through Wednesday, November

Watch a preview below, and visit www.cronistalascolonias.com.ar for tickets.

- November 17,

SPRINGSTEEN & BLEACHERS FIND TOMORROW IN "CHINATOWN"
Back in July, on From My Home to Yours, Patti Scialfa talked about working with fellow New Jerseyan Jack Antonoff on her new material. The songwriter/producer/Bleachers frontman helped provide the "something missing" from her song "You're a Big Girl Now," a recording she'd been working on with producer Ron Aniello. As she told her husband on the radio show, "Ron and I were like, 'Let’s see what Jack thinks of this song, what he'd do,' and Jack took it in, just roughed it up a bit, and just put some horns on it and made it earthier."

With Jack's own band Bleachers, apparently the "something missing" on the stirring new song "chinatown" was Bruce Springsteen.

Out today, the new single has Antonoff and his home state hero and joining forces, with Springsteen singing on the track and appearing in the video —  listen and watch above. "chinatown" and its B-side "45" are sneak peaks at the third Bleachers album, scheduled for Both songs are available digitally as well as on 7-inch (which we'll be tyring to track down).

In today's press release, Antonoff talks about the new songs:

"chinatown" starts in NYC and travels to new jersey. that pull back to the place i am from mixed with terror of falling in love again. having to show your cards to someone and the shock when you see them for yourself. thinking you know yourself and where you are from…. having to see yourself through somebody who you want to stay… i started to write this song with these ideas ringing in my head. to further understand who you are pushes you to further understand where you are from and what that looks and sounds like. there are pieces in that that are worth carrying forever and pieces worth letting die. "chinatown" and "45" are both the story of this – "chinatown" through someone else, "45" through the mirror. 

as for bruce, its the honor of a lifetime to be joined by him. he is the artist who showed me that the sound of the place i am from has value and that there is a spirit here that needs to be taken all over the world.

Previously, Antonoff co-produced an artist and album Springsteen has raved about, Lana Del Rey's Norman Fucking Rockwell, along with big records for Lorde and Taylor Swift. He's put on an annual music festival in Asbury Park since — as Springsteen on Sunday host Tom Cunningham tells Backstreets, "Shadow of the City has become one of the go-to summer events at the Stone Pony Summer Stage."

Antonoff wears a "Welcome to New Jersey, Now Go Home" T-shirt in the video, which also features the Jersey state line and very familiar-looking Cadillac. As he tweeted when "chinatown" dropped today: "this ones for new jersey."
- November 16,

I'VE SEEN THE FUTURE AND IT WILL BE
Tipping our hat to the newly minted Hall of Famer Jon Landau, more from our book Bruce Springsteen: Rock and Roll Future
One evening in April , on the recommendation of a friend, photographer and music lover Barry Schneier went into Charlie's Place in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to hear a new artist from New Jersey who'd been generating local buzz. Barry would say afterwards that Bruce Springsteen's show that night was one of the most amazing performances he had ever witnessed, and he left with one thought in mind: he had to see Bruce and the band again.

The next day Barry introduced the band's music to his friend and concert promoter Ira Gold, insisting Ira book Springsteen and the band and bring them back to the Boston area. Ira borrowed the albums, and as Bruce's four-night run at Charlie's Place went on, Ira went to the club with his producing partner Jeff Hersh so they could see the act for themselves. By the end of that night, they offered Bruce a new opportunity: opening for Bonnie Raitt in May at Cambridge's Harvard Square Theatre — a show previously planned with no supporting act.

During that same Charlie's Place stand, another music lover, Jon Landau, also ventured in to see Springsteen for the first time. Landau, too, was blown away by what he heard.

Stars aligned at the Harvard Square Theatre a few weeks later, when Bruce opened for Bonnie. Barry photographed in a professional capacity, capturing the night from soundcheck to the end of the second set, while Jon famously reviewed the show for the local publication, The Real Paper.

As Landau recalled last weekend in his Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Induction speech:

On May 9, , I went to a concert at the Harvard Square Theater, and I was so overwhelmed by the performance that I went home after the show and wrote those famous words that I'm still so proud of: "I've seen rock and roll future and its name is Bruce Springsteen." That night, I decided that I would somehow find a way to work with Bruce on his music and career. And so I did, for the next 45 years as his co-producer, manager, and most importantly, as a partner and friend who loves him deeply.