43 years ago today (1/5/73), Bruce Springsteen release his first album Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. Along with Gary Tallent and Clarence Clemons who would star in the E Street Band for decades after (Tallent remains the bassist today), the band also featured Vini “Mad Dog” Lopez on drums and David Sancious on keys. Both “Blinded by the Light” and “Spirit in the Night” were released as singles by Columbia off Greetings, but neither made a dent in the US charts. Manfred Mann’s Earth Bandreleased a version of “Blinded by the Light” on their album The Roaring Silence, and scored a huge hit with it.
On November 22, 2009, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. was played in its entirety for the first time by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, at the HSBC Arena in Buffalo, New York, to celebrate the last show of the Working on a Dream tour. Watch Springsteen perform “Spirit in the Night” off Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. live in Los Angeles from 1973.
