As I prepare to head off for the St. Paul installment of the Vote for Change tour, I thought it worth mentioning the recent Rolling Stone interview with Bruce Springsteen about the concerts.
An excerpt:
I don’t think the audience are lemmings. They get their various points of view from a lot of places. I try to come in and be that alternative source of information. I try to speak my case as directly as I can. If that makes you angry, that’s fine. The artist is there to open up discourse, to get people thinking about American identity: Who are we? What do we fight for? What do we stand for? I view these things as a fundamental part of my job, and they have been for the past thirty years.
The importance Springsteen is attaching to the tour may be shown by another interview. Backstreets is THE magazine for Springsteen fans. I was shocked to learn that an interview with him about the tour in the latest issue was the first interview Springsteen has given the magazine. A portion of that interview is near the bottom of this page. The page also contains information on the VFC performances to date at the Springsteen locations. In addition, AlterNet has an article on the Philly concert while Rolling Stone takes a broader look.
