It’s a muggy Saturday night in Barcelona. There are 64,000 Catalonians crammed into Camp Nou. On the stage is Bruce and the band, belting their way through the first song of the night: Badlands. And next to me? My dad. Grinning. BEAMING. Jumping like a kid high on sweets.
He wasn’t supposed to be here.
He wasn’t supposed to be here.
Dad has taught me lots of great things. How to ride a bike; how to fall off a bike; how to win at Monopoly (buy everything). Music. Bruce Springsteen.
But then there’s the one thing he hasn’t taught me: how to travel. Sure, we’ve been on holidays – my childhood dotted with camping trips to Flamingo Park in Yorkshire, lilo wars in Spain and that banana boat in Malta. But it’s not what he loves. He doesn’t obsess over the next place he wants to visit, he doesn’t spend hours online searching for cheap flights to Europe, and he definitely doesn’t do Springsteen abroad. Or standing. (Our first Springsteen concert together was sitting watching the full Born to Run album from the stands in Coventry.)
So when I asked him to come on a last-minute trip to Barca to see Bruce he said no. Absolutely not. There was no time to arrange it. And what would the crowds be like? Too crazy, he said. I deleted the email, huffed a bit, sighed a bit, stropped a bit and decided to go on my own anyway.
And then a few hours later he emailed again. “I’ve made a plan,” he said. (He likes plans.) We’d get the first flight on the Saturday morning, back on the Monday before work. “We’ll see Bruce, drink beer and eat tapas.” It would be our first trip abroad together since I was 12 years old.
You’ve seen the setlist, read the reviews. Plenty of The River album dotted through a semi-random selection of tracks. Was it the best run of Springsteen songs in the world? Maybe not. But getting to see my dad hear them for the first time, in a Catalonian crowd that was soooo happy, friendly and welcoming? I felt so lucky to be there with him, seeing those 36 songs in that order in that city.
The next day we sat on an open top bus tour (I’m easing him into this travel thing), drank beer, ate the tapas, walked. Dad, unsurprisingly, loved it. And I think it’s triggered something – not a crazy desire to fuck it and book flights at the last minute, but enough intrigue that he'd do it again.
This year I’ve had loads of people tell me they are taking their sons/daughters to their first Springsteen concert, or that they are being taken by their now grown-up child. But then I have people telling me that their children won’t go with them to concerts.
This. is. Madness.
And I hear it far too much.
So parents, please let me have a word. I hope I can help.
Because they need to see you at that Bruce Springsteen gig.
But then there’s the one thing he hasn’t taught me: how to travel. Sure, we’ve been on holidays – my childhood dotted with camping trips to Flamingo Park in Yorkshire, lilo wars in Spain and that banana boat in Malta. But it’s not what he loves. He doesn’t obsess over the next place he wants to visit, he doesn’t spend hours online searching for cheap flights to Europe, and he definitely doesn’t do Springsteen abroad. Or standing. (Our first Springsteen concert together was sitting watching the full Born to Run album from the stands in Coventry.)
So when I asked him to come on a last-minute trip to Barca to see Bruce he said no. Absolutely not. There was no time to arrange it. And what would the crowds be like? Too crazy, he said. I deleted the email, huffed a bit, sighed a bit, stropped a bit and decided to go on my own anyway.
And then a few hours later he emailed again. “I’ve made a plan,” he said. (He likes plans.) We’d get the first flight on the Saturday morning, back on the Monday before work. “We’ll see Bruce, drink beer and eat tapas.” It would be our first trip abroad together since I was 12 years old.
You’ve seen the setlist, read the reviews. Plenty of The River album dotted through a semi-random selection of tracks. Was it the best run of Springsteen songs in the world? Maybe not. But getting to see my dad hear them for the first time, in a Catalonian crowd that was soooo happy, friendly and welcoming? I felt so lucky to be there with him, seeing those 36 songs in that order in that city.
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| When dad tries to take a selfie |
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| In the middle of Glory Days. The person behind me - I know that feeling |
The next day we sat on an open top bus tour (I’m easing him into this travel thing), drank beer, ate the tapas, walked. Dad, unsurprisingly, loved it. And I think it’s triggered something – not a crazy desire to fuck it and book flights at the last minute, but enough intrigue that he'd do it again.
This year I’ve had loads of people tell me they are taking their sons/daughters to their first Springsteen concert, or that they are being taken by their now grown-up child. But then I have people telling me that their children won’t go with them to concerts.
This. is. Madness.
And I hear it far too much.
So parents, please let me have a word. I hope I can help.
Because they need to see you at that Bruce Springsteen gig.