TORONTO 1975 – SENECA FIELD HOUSE, SENECA COLLEGE, TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANADA – 21 DICIEMBRE 1975 – 3CD – OFICIAL SONIDO DEFINITIVO

SENECA FIELD HOUSE, SENECA COLLEGE, TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANADA, 21 DICIEMBRE 1975.

Editado de los archivos de Bruce Springsteen.

Gira Born To Run.

El sonido definitivo. 3CD oficiales.

¡Atención: Se edita en CD el 25 de enero de 2025. A partir de ahí el plazo de entrega es de 3-4 semanas!

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We The North: The Live Archive cruza por primera vez la frontera canadiense para el primer concierto de Springsteen en Toronto en el marco de la gira Born to Run. Enfrentando una gélida noche de Ontario, Bruce y la E Street Band calientan el Seneca Field House y conquistan a más de 3.000 habitantes de Toronto en el concierto. La lista de 17 canciones está repleta de regalos, como «Lost in the Flood», «Saint in the City», «Kitty’s Back», «Jungleland» y un alegre paseo por «Pretty Flamingo». El bis incluye una de las primeras interpretaciones de «Santa Claus Is Coming to Town», un ágil «Detroit Medley» animado por «toda la maldita banda» y un devastador «For You» solo de piano.

We The North: The Live Archive series makes its maiden crossing of the Canadian border for Springsteen’s first-ever show in Toronto on the Born to Run tour. Braving a freezing cold Ontario night, Bruce and the E Street Band warm up the Seneca Field House and win over 3,000 Torontonians in the process. The 17-song setlist is packed with gifts including «Lost in the Flood,» «Saint in the City,» «Kitty’s Back,» «Jungleland» and a joyful stroll through «Pretty Flamingo.» The encore features one of the earliest performances of «Santa Claus Is Coming to Town,» a snappy «Detroit Medley» enlivened by «the whole goddamn band» and a devastating, solo-piano «For You.»

1975-12-21 – MINKLER AUDITORIUM, SENECA COLLEGE, TORONTO, ON
This show was originally scheduled for Seneca College’s 1,000-seat Minkler Auditorium but due to ticket demand was moved to nearby University Of Toronto’s 2,000-seat Convocation Hall, then switched yet again to Seneca’s larger, 3,000-seat Field House.

1975-12-21 – CONVOCATION HALL, UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO, TORONTO, ON
This show was originally scheduled for Seneca College’s 1,000-seat Minkler Auditorium but due to ticket demand was moved to nearby University Of Toronto’s 2,000-seat Convocation Hall, then switched yet again to Seneca’s larger, 3,000-seat Field House.

1975-12-21 – SENECA FIELD HOUSE, SENECA COLLEGE, TORONTO, ON
THUNDER ROAD / TENTH AVENUE FREEZE-OUT / SPIRIT IN THE NIGHT / LOST IN THE FLOOD / SHE’S THE ONE / BORN TO RUN / PRETTY FLAMINGO / IT’S HARD TO BE A SAINT IN THE CITY / BACKSTREETS / KITTY’S BACK / JUNGLELAND / ROSALITA (COME OUT TONIGHT) / 4TH OF JULY, ASBURY PARK (SANDY) / SANTA CLAUS IS COMIN’ TO TOWN / DETROIT MEDLEY / FOR YOU / QUARTER TO THREE

This show was originally scheduled for Seneca College’s 1,000-seat Minkler Auditorium but due to ticket demand was moved to nearby University Of Toronto’s 2,000-seat Convocation Hall, then switched yet again to Seneca’s larger, 3,000-seat Field House. The listed 17-song setlist is the complete show. Final tour appearance for «Santa Claus Is Comin’ To Town». «Thunder Road» is the slow version with Roy on piano and Bruce on harmonica and vocals. «Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)» includes a snippet of «Theme From Shaft» in the midsection. «For You» is solo piano.

Bruce Springsteen – Lead vocals, guitar, piano, harmonica; Roy Bittan – Piano, backing vocal; Clarence Clemons – Tenor and baritone saxophones, percussion, backing vocal; Danny Federici – Organ, glockenspiel, accordian; Garry Tallent – Bass; Stevie Van Zandt – Guitar, backing vocal; Max Weinberg – Drums

Recorded live with the Fedco Mobile Recording Unit

16-track master tapes transferred by Jamie Howarth, Plangent Processes via Sonicraft, Freehold, NJ

Mixed by Jon Altschiller; Additional engineering by Danielle Warman

Mastered by Jon Altschiller

Post Production by Brad Serling and Arya Jha

Art Design by Michelle Holme

Cover Photo by PJ Plutzer

Management: Jon Landau

HD files are 24 bit/192kHz; Audiophile DSD files are DSD128 (“Double DSD”)

Bruce Springsteen, Toronto, ON, December 21, 1975
You Better Not Pout, I’m Telling You Why
By Erik Flannigan

To all but a few misanthropes among us, the Live Archive series has been received as the bounty of riches it is. Each installment is an audio time machine that transports us back to specific, historic performances in Bruce Springsteen’s career. It bears repeating that, for those who traded iffy live tapes for decades, the idea that nearly 100 vintage multitrack recordings would be released for sale was unimaginable back in the day. It’s especially true when factoring in the release of every show of a current tour. If dreams came true, well wouldn’t that be nice?

Regardless of era, each Archive release has its distinct merits, but performances from Springsteen’s climb up the mountain (contrasted with those played at the career summit) offer extra appeal.

That’s what we get to hear on Toronto, December 21, 1975. This previously unheard, let alone unreleased 49-year-old recording is one of the more transporting in the series to date. From inside the Field House at Seneca College, this new audio evidence strongly suggests nary a person in attendance had ever seen Springsteen before.

Per Brucebase, the Toronto show was originally slated for a 1,000 seat venue, then bumped twice to bigger ones due to ticket demand, ultimately landing at the Field House. The 3,000 Bruce curious who assembled that frigid evening applaud with well-mannered respect between songs but remain uncannily quiet otherwise as they witness the sublime performance unfolding in front of them. Case in point: when Bruce hits his first hard stop before introducing the band in “Rosalita,” the smattering of applause makes clear the crowd has no clue how to react.

The Archive release of Berkeley Community Theatre July 1, 1978 conveyed a similar sense of aural intimacy and audience respect, but with Toronto, the “You Are There As It Happens” element sounds even more pronounced.

The Toronto concert was originally recorded to 16-track, two-inch master tapes which were Plangent Process transferred just a few weeks ago and newly mixed by Jon Altschiller. That work, combined with the sonic byproduct of an unusually polite Ontario crowd, yields a close-up, wide stereo recording rich with detail. When A/V aficionados talk about OLED TV screens, they say “the blacks are so black.” The equivalent with the Toronto audio is “the silences are so silent.”

The aforementioned notion of Springsteen’s climb up the mountain applies to several factors in a performance, like whether he’s playing to audiences that need convincing, which is surely the case in Toronto. Another is that this line-up of the E Street Band with Stevie Van Zandt, Roy Bittan and Max Weinberg only had five months together under their belts. While they are undeniably locked into each other, their parts aren’t as fixed as they would eventually become, so there’s a fresh, in-the-moment feeling to the band’s playing throughout the Toronto set.

Given the crowd vibe, the night begins modestly, with Bruce and Roy performing the slow piano version of “Thunder Road” that opened most Born to Run tour concerts in 1975. It’s worth reminding ourselves that this now-familiar arrangement must have been an enormous surprise to hear if all you knew was the album version.

A rousing “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out” and “Spirit in the Night” (both loaded with tasty licks from Van Zandt) follow and the audience shows signs of beginning to absorb what they are witnessing, particularly after “Spirit.” The band is sharp from the jump and while Bruce’s otherwise strong vocals carry a hint of him holding back ever so slightly, something shifts in “Lost in the Flood.”

Tension builds organically through the second verse, and when Bruce sings “The kids call him Jimmy the Saint,” Van Zandt unleashes a wicked guitar trill, the rest of the band smashes in, and the song bursts open. Stevie’s guitar continues to sparkle throughout and Springsteen’s vocal restraint vanishes in favor of passion and intent. When “Lost in the Flood” quiets down again for Bittan’s piano outro, the cliche “you can hear a pin drop” has never been more accurate.

“She’s the One” picks up where “Lost in the Flood” took off, as the audience claps along to Bruce’s harmonica over Weinberg’s Bo Diddley beat. Later, Springsteen’s own guitar work matches Van Zandt’s stride for stride in this outstanding reading that’s met with the biggest applause of the night so far. Sensing he may have cracked the code, Springsteen sings “Born to Run” with fervor you can hear in the very first utterance of “tramps LIKE us.”

Off those peaks, “Pretty Flamingo” cools things down for 14 languid, enchanting minutes that include two storytelling patches. The first starts in familiar territory as Bruce recounts sitting with Steve on the porch day after day watching a pretty girl walk by on her way home from work. In this version, however, they are joined by Bruce’s dad.

“My father was home a lot. He was the kind of guy, he would get up in the morning — well, he’d wake up and decide if he was gonna get up. And if he felt like going to work, he’d go. If not, he’d stay around home…. He was always watching what I was doing, keeping his eye on me. He thought I was always getting into all kinds of trouble and stuff. He figured that was more his job to stay home and make sure I was cool. So he’d be sitting out there with us on the porch.”

Springsteen goes on to recall buying a guitar at Western Auto and a bicycling Clarence Clemons “riding by with no hands, playing the saxophone,” all in an effort to impress the woman strolling by each day. It’s a fun variation on the familiar tale, as is a second chapter later in the song about hiring a detective agency only to realize his sister could have been his ideal ambassador.

Guitars return to the spotlight for “Saint in the City” and once again the clarity of the Toronto recording shines as the guitarists swap licks across the stereo field, with Bruce in the center and Stevie on the right. As if the musicianship wasn’t already showing out, “Kitty’s Back” gives each member of the band a moment. Listen for Bruce’s guitar solo at 11:14 giving a nod to Van Morrison’s “Moondance.”

An immense “Jungleland” with still more magic moments from Van Zandt and Clemons carries the show’s denouement and “Rosalita” takes the set home. While the audience was disoriented in the latter’s first break, their applause at the end makes it clear they figured it out.

“Sandy” starts the encore evocatively, with Clemons’ low baritone sax underpinning Danny Federici’s accordion in a gorgeous take. It’s fun to hear a version of “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” that’s contemporary to the officially released version from Greenvale, New York, recorded nine days prior. While the arrangement is the same for both, the introductions are charmingly different (and the ensuing banter is, too).

After “Detroit Medley,” the now-sustained audience response is joined by cheers and whistles: by this point we’ve witnessed Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band completely win over the crowd. And he’s not done yet.

In what might be the high point of the evening, Springsteen returns for a solemn solo piano “For You.” His performance delivers unique line readings and vocal dynamics, especially in the final verse and chorus which are riveting. Bruce also alters the pivotal line in the bridge, singing, “Remember how I kept you waiting, when it was FINALLY my turn to be the god?” “Quarter to Three” ends the evening with a buzz that surely lingered for all 3,000 Torontonians.

Born to Run, both album and tour, turn 50 years old in 2025. It was a time when Bruce’s future career wasn’t guaranteed, but performances like Toronto were the occasions where the curious became the converted.

Toronto 1975 was painstakingly transferred from the original 2″ master tapes at Sonicraft utilizing the Plangent Processes playback system, and mixed and mastered from the original 16 track recording at Chiller Sound earlier this month.

Reviews

Soren — 12/22/2024 2:31:02 PM «I really enjoy these 75-shows. The performances and the crystal clear recordings make these shows so enjoyable to listen to over and over again.»

Alex K — 12/22/2024 9:47:08 AM «Brilliant! That’s all I can say! Merry Christmas to all!!!»

Sneaksox — 12/21/2024 9:23:11 AM «Flood is my favorite Bruce song and this version is fantastic! I admittedly haven’t kept up over the years, but this is the era of the band that gives you that giant boost of energy whenever you need it. Great show. Thanks Nugs!»

Rob — 12/20/2024 1:07:24 PM «Thank you Nugs. This is the absolute best Christmas gift we could hope for. Great show. »

Smitty — 12/20/2024 12:19:34 PM «More 1975 please ????»

Jerry Mouse — 12/20/2024 12:19:06 PM «THANK YOU Nugs and Bruce!!!!!»

ML — 12/20/2024 10:26:03 AM «The vocals on Flood gave me chills. The emotion is fresh and real, his voice a little raspy. Wow! Had I been a polite Canadian at the start of the show, that would have just kicked me out of my seat.»