Bruce Springsteen Song performance took on a powerful political tone during a surprise appearance at the Light of Day WinterFest benefit concert in Red Bank, New Jersey, on Saturday night. In a dramatic moment that captured both music and protest, Springsteen paused before performing his 1978 anthem.
“The Promised Land” to dedicate the song to Renee Good, a Minnesota mother who was recently killed in an encounter with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. Bruce Springsteen Song, 76, joined Joe Grushecky & the Houserockers onstage for an unannounced set at the Count Basie Center for the Arts, part of the annual festival that raises money for Parkinson’s disease research.
Before launching into “The Promised Land,” he delivered an impassioned speech condemning what he described as aggressive immigration enforcement actions by ICE and urging the audience to uphold the core values of democracy and liberty.
Which finances research into Parkinson’s and other neurodegenerative diseases. New Jersey music legends and fans poured into the event when it provided an unlikely stage for the rocker’s most aggressive political pushback he’d delivered in several months.
Springsteen then began his celebrated 1978 anthem “The Promised Land” with a point-by-point address to a raucous crowd about what was taking place, including immigration enforcement operations in Minneapolis following the death of Renee Good, 37 and mother of three and an American citizen, at the hands of an ICE agent on January 7.
It had already been watching federal agents when it shot her, leading to national protests and fuel disputes over police tactics. “I wrote this song to pay tribute to American possibility,” Bruce Springsteen Song told the crowd, placing his message within the context of the song’s themes of hope and resilience.
“We have some very critical times right now. The ideals and the values for which the United States stood are challenged more than anywhere in the last 250 years. During what he viewed as the erosion of those principles, Springsteen called upon listeners to champion democracy, liberty, and the rule of law.
Bruce Springsteen song Tribute Turns Political at Surprise New Jersey Performance
He slammed heavily armed and masked federal agents stationed in American cities and referenced Minnesota Mayor Jacob Frey’s exhortation for ICE agents to “get the out of Minneapolis,” wording that sounded like he was invoking roaring applause.
“If you stand against heavily armed, masked federal troops coming into an American city and [using] Gestapo tactics to fight against our fellow citizens, then that is a message to this president,” Springsteen said, stating that “ICE should get out of Minneapolis.
He then dedicated the “Promised Land” to Renee Good, for her, including “a mother of three and an American citizen.” The remarks are Springsteen’s most explicit political engagement in months.
The rocker has previously addressed social and political issues, and he released an openly scathing letter when the E Street Band opened the European tour last year, calling his administration a “corrupt, incompetent and treasonous thing.”
Bruce Springsteen song remarks on the matter got a mixture of applause and derision from social media; Springsteen himself had taken the stage in a country he believes should respect its basic civil rights.
Others chided him for putting politics on a musical page. Still, the attention to Renee Good and federal immigration enforcement indicated that they were trying to focus on some tensions within civil liberties, law enforcement, and immigrant rights in the United States. The Light of Day audience appeared receptive, cheering Springsteen’s demand to advance democratic values and do good.
As he sang “The Promised Land,” the room felt not only like a score but also, like so much of the rock he performed on the airwaves, weighed down with this message that would confirm Springsteen’s identity as not only a rock maestro who delivered the hits and covers but also a cultural commentator who will tell us why and how we should learn to understand our own time and future as a country.
