Last night Bruce Springsteen stopped by Asbury Park’s Light Of Day WinterFest for an unannounced appearance. (I hesitate to call it a “surprise appearance,” because the Boss has popped up at 13 of the previous 25 iterations of the New Jersey festival, including last year’s.) The main event, nicknamed “Bob’s Birthday Bash,” was headlined by Joe Grushecky & The Houserockers, who brought out Springsteen to perform with them. He took the opportunity to condemn the ongoing ICE raids in Minneapolis, dedicating a song to Renee Good, the civilian murdered by ICE agent Jonathan Ross earlier this month.
Before performing his 1978 song “The Promised Land,” Springsteen had this to say:
This next song is probably one of my greatest songs. And I don’t want to be out of water tonight, but I wrote this song as an ode to American possibility… both to the beautiful but flawed country that we are, and to the country that we could be. Now, right now, we are living through incredibly critical times. The United States, the ideals and the values for which it stood for the past 250 years, is being tested as it has never been in modern times. Those values and those ideals have never been as endangered as they are right now. So as we gather tonight in this beautiful display of love and care and thoughtfulness and community, if you believe in democracy, in liberty; if you believe that truth still matters, and that it’s worth speaking out, and it’s worth fighting for; if you believe in the power of the law and that no one stands above it; if you stand against heavily-armed masked federal troops invading American cities, and using Gestapo tactics against our fellow citizens; if you believe you don’t deserve to be murdered for exercising your American right to protest; then send a message to this president. And as the mayor of that city has said, ICE should get the fuck out of Minneapolis. So this one is for you, and the memory of the mother of three and American citizen Renee Good.
See that below.
Elsewhere during the evening, the Houserockers, Springsteen, and Gary U.S. Bonds all performed “This Little Girl,” the Springsteen-penned song made famous by Bonds in 1981. See that and other Springsteen-related highlights of the night below.
