This story originally appeared in the Asbury Park Press on Sept 3, 1995.
CLEVELAND – Gracious and accommodating, E Street Band drummer Max Weinberg seemed ready and willing to answer all questions connected to the historic reunion of Bruce Springsteen’s legendary backing unit last night — their first appearance before the general public in about eight years.
Facing a sea of reporters gathered to cover the grand opening of the city’s $92 million Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum yesterday afternoon, Weinberg seemed a little weary as he addressed questions about the band’s role in the six-hour show organized to cap the weekend.
Broadcast live to HBO’s 20 million subscribers last night, the concert featured some of the most memorable team-ups in rock history, including: Johnny Cash with John Mellencamp, Soul Asylum with Iggy Pop, Al Green with Aretha Franklin, Chrissie Hynde with Jon Bon Jovi, and Bob Dylan with Melissa Etheridge and Bruce Springsteen.
Easily the most anticipated concert in recent memory, the show also featured one of the most anticipated band reunions in history, with the Jersey-bred E Streeters tapped to back both Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis, in addition to their own Boss.
But there was one question Weinberg wasn’t about to answer. What, exactly, were the E Streeters themselves going to play?
“I don’t want to let that surprise out just yet,” said Weinberg, who eventually performed chestnuts like “Darkness on the Edge of Town” and Elvis Presley’s “Little Sister” with his longtime bandmates.
“As for Chuck Berry, we haven’t rehearsed with him yet, either,” he added. “But if you need to rehearse `Johnny B. Goode,’ you probably shouldn’t be up there playing it. It’s simple — when his foot goes down, you start playing, when his foot comes up, you stop.”
Weinberg’s appearance before reporters fed the sense of anticipation many felt in the final hours before last night’s long-awaited show.
As increasing numbers of celebrities arrived in the lakeside city for the concert, nearly everyone in Cleveland had a star-sighting or two to relate: Iggy Pop walking down a city side street; George Clinton hopping a cab to the Hall of Fame; James Brown greeting fans at the museum’s on-site record store; Al Green signing autographs on the steps of the city convention center.
With so many luminaries in one spot, the special moments began piling up like cordwood.
“We’ve got the most piano players in history at one place,” cracked Bon Jovi keyboardist David Bryan, who looked forward to rubbing shoulders with Jerry Lee Lewis, Booker T., Little Richard, Paul Shaffer and E Streeters Roy Bittan and Danny Federici. “It’s the history of rock and roll.”
The building sense of anticipation came yesterday as the 150,000 square-foot-facility opened to the public for its first full day of operation, welcoming hundreds of fans for a true test of the museum’s exhibits and infrastructure.
Though some members of the public were allowed a look at the six-story building’s main lobbies Friday afternoon, these initial guests yesterday — admitted to the site through tickets that named specific entrance times — were the first from the rock ‘n’ roll masses to view the assembled displays.
“Nothing’s knocked me out yet, but the excitement of walking through the front door is what it’s really all about,” said Craig Bolotsky of Manalapan Township. A longtime fan with backstage passes from 12 different Springsteen tours dangling from his neck, Bolotsky jumped at the chance to attend the museum’s first-day showing.
“I’m really here to get autographs,” he said, pulling out a program from the 1995 Hall of Fame induction ceremony, held this spring in New York City. “I’m hoping to get a few famous people to sign it.”
Other fans of New Jersey rock found the lack of items from homegrown artists Jon Bon Jovi and Southside Johnny Lyon a disappointing omission.
“In that respect, this pales next to the stuff they had in the Asbury Park Rock and Roll Museum,” said Debbie Mayer of Manhattan, author of the mid-’80s Springsteen trivia book, “Prove It All Night.”
“There’s nothing here that’s really recent,” she added, waving at the glass case which holds Springsteen’s high school yearbook, lyric sheets written in his own hand and old concert posters. “It’s a little disappointing.”
Still, artifacts like former Plainfield resident George Clinton’s atomic dog boots and Dr. Funkenstein costume, along with Jersey City-based Queen Latifah’s early stage clothes and high school yearbook, offered unusual glimpses into New Jersey’s rock ‘n’ roll history.
For Shore native Robert Santelli, now serving as the museum’s director of education, the biggest kick came from watching the assembled celebrities tour the museum this week — particularly at the museum’s $1,000 per plate black-tie dinner gala, held Friday evening.
“I know (Bon Jovi guitarist) Richie Sambora loved looking at all the blues guitars, and Jackson Browne was very pro education,” Santelli said. “Sometimes, the artists are as much fans of the music as we are — and it’s great to see the fan come out as they look at this stuff.”
“I’m most impressed by the (museum) building itself,” said legendary producer Sam Phillips, founder of Sun Records and the man who discovered a Southern-born, singing truck driver named Elvis Presley.
“When they first started putting together ideas, I said, `Now, don’t get too fancy here,’ ” Phillips said of the facility, which now includes a majestic jumble of futuristic-looking geometric shapes and cantilevered spaces. “Now I see they’ve created something that would last forever. I would have done it differently, but I would have been wrong.”
Many of the stars in town for the show attended the Friday dinner, which featured music by novelist Stephen King’s Rock Bottom Remainders — a group of book-writing celebrity musicians that includes humorist Dave Barry, Simpsons creator Matt Groening and “Joy Luck Club” author Amy Tan.
Enthusiastic crowds of fans showed up to welcome the stars, walking down a long, red carpet lined with photographers and news reporters to enter the gala affair.
“It’s historic … beyond imagination,” said Hall of Fame member Robbie Robertson, former guitarist for The Band. “You could spend the whole day here and never see it all.”
When it came to fan devotion, however, few could match the dedication of a group calling themselves the Luckytowners — Springsteen fans who commiserate through the global network of computer networks known as the Internet.
The promise of seeing the E Street Band back in action prompted the group to organize an in-person trip to Cleveland that drew over 60 people from the 2,800-member list of Luckytown members — many of whom had never met each other in the flesh before.
“If you really like Springsteen, then you’ve got this faith … a life view that’s hard to describe,” said Michelle Stadnik, a Cleveland-area resident and Luckytown member who helped organize the meeting. “There’s this joy and faith in relationships and each other that binds us together. I can’t really defend or explain it … either you get it, or you don’t.”
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This article originally appeared on Asbury Park Press: Rock and Roll Hall of Fame show features Bruce Springsteen, 1995
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