On Facebook, Mullman tags us and asks us to rank our shows. The fair introduction to his list: "I'm often asked, after ranting and raving about a great show like the other night, how it compares to all the others. I generally shrug and say the request is akin to being asked to rank your kids. They're all fun, and I've never once regretted going. But some are better than others. So here's my stab at a ranking. If you've been tagged in this note, take a swing at it." Okay, let's go.

1. Philips Arena, 2002. I needed a win. I never admitted as much in the blog at the time, but I needed one desperately. That Thanksgiving had been the worst, loneliest day of my life, angry from myself to my family to everyone I knew, and I had to bounce back or I had nothing. Got in line at the arena next to where I worked two days early, and it was some kind of fortune the GA check-in was the CNN Center door closest to my desk, next to my food court cheesesteak place, for the duration. Ended up in the front row, between Steve and Patti. Then found them down on the loading dock giving autographs afterward. Upon review of the bootleg audio and the DVD, Bruce was in bad, sick form, but I had one of the best days of my life that night. It was such a win.

2. MCI Center, middle night, 1999. My first show. I had Greetings and Tracks and maybe Born to Run at this point, but certainly not much more. This was the night that sold me, the night of the conversion. I'd sold my upstairs tix to the Post teen-sex writer, and With good buddy Jeff picked up 100s off the Clarence side downstairs. The set caught me with the extended guitar intro line to 10th Avenue and the ripped cities of Light of Day, and Trapped and BtR sealed the rest. 

3. St. Louis, '00. In the middle of an ice-snow storm down the Illinois highway, I spun a van with my girlfriend and all my friends in it off the road. I was fucked up but observably functional but couldn't write straight for weeks. Thank you to Medill's SPJ chapter for coinciding with the Bruce show, but I apologize to the Daily development desk and again to everyone I scared the hell out of. We sat in the second to last row of Kiel Center, but it was worth it. Rode the make-no-sense St. L light rail back to the hotel, where a dozen-plus of us slept on the floor. The spin may have given us a flat hours later, but we met that hobo — train-jumper, he said — in the back-alley tire shop and he liked Bruce.

4. Nissan Pavilion, 2006. Second row after sprinting from the gates. J. Freedom in the Post called it the most fun show he'd ever attended. Same for me. The Devils and Dust tour was underrated but Seeger Sessions was even more so. God bless the Miami Horns, the Chocolate Wonder and that grad student fiddler. The band was a real band, with a real leader, with all the fun those two elements produce, and getting out of Nissan parking within minutes and back to my apartment within the half hour was pure icing on a pretty night under a tin roof outside.

5. Toronto, 2007. Came up a day early for the ONA conference, met all kinds of cool people in line (shoutout to area French teacher Luigi, who among others stood next to me, held the line and helped me feel at home abroad), wound up in a surprisingly-but-awesomely young GA pit thanks to a deal with security chief Jerry and the lottery. Hot girl a few spots over, you wore the BtR lyrics T-shirt so well I bought it myself. 

6. Richmond, 2005. Like I said, D&D tour was way underrated. I was too young to see the Joad tour, but this got me close. No Mexican suite but all kinds of randomness that the audience had to take and do with what they would. Even halfway back in the upper deck, it was freezing in the arena with the ice under the floor seats. The rawness and the person you were with kept you warm. Most diverse crowd I've ever seen at a Bruce show (thank God) cheered for the prostitute sex/other love in Reno, the family on the run in Long Time Coming and the guitar slap of Promised Land. Plus solo Incident. And Part Man, Part Monkey.

7. MCI Center, October 2004. The finale of the VFC mini-tour, weird to describe to people who weren't there because I'm not partisan.  A try: You only get so many shows meshing all kinds of generationally great music, and I'm glad a friend bought tickets and we were separate from the division that banned going. Example of the crowd split? The couple next to us kept talking about '60s Takoma Park acts of disobedience, and the assholes in front us from Philly kept asking to dance with my girl. The Because the Night pairing with Michael Stipe (Bruce singing the his original lyrics, Stipe the Patti Smith ones in a Gender Studies thesis-worthy moment) and E Street backing Fogerty better than he'd been backed since Mardi Gras were straight-up highlights. The night also sold me more on Dave, sexier-than-ever Raitt and definitely on Cougar.

8. MCI Center, August 2002. Sat in uppers of the far end of an arena that at the time didn't handle sound well down there. Cool to be there a few shows into the Rising tour but damn were we far away and did the sound suck. Still had a fun with then-girlfriend, brother and cousin.

9. Chicago, middle night 1999. Went for free in the 100s, thanks to neighbor and friend Val's Sony/Columbia connections. Didn't know nearly enough about the catalog then to appreciate the random and rocking setlist enough. Also, jerks behind us that Val excellently put on her NYC attitude to yell at. Dudes, you may've been Chicago Police, but you were jerks. Still glad we took the El there and that Val shows up in my Fb news feed. Distant as she may be, she's good people.

10. Verizon Center, 2008. In the mid-level on the Clarence side, the Magic show where I was with somebody, hoping the show would be good for that person. The kid in front of us knew the words to all of it, gestures included, and we cheered for the guys from Walter Reed. 

11. Fedex Field, 2003. Screwed up an upgrade attempt, losing to ex-girlfriend's evil roommate, sat on the field but 90 yards away. Heard I Walk the Line, Paradise and Jungleland on a great summer night, but I still think the old school stadium encores were way overrated.

12. Gwinnett Center, 2003. Drove up after work, stood at the rail halfway back on the floor, talked Stray Cats with the dude next to me, got the Grammy snub jokes, saw security body-slam the fan who rushed from the back of the stage, had a good time. 

13. Lincoln Memorial, 2009. We only got one song, so I can't rate this higher. But we got the Lincoln and we got history. As a D.C. native, inaugurals are important, no matter your partisanship. After narrowly missing some Reagan events as a kid, this was my first inaugural event. Glad a good friend talked me into going. It's cool when there's a choir singing and everyone else on the Mall is rooting for your guy.

14. Is tonight with a friend and as yet unreviewed and unranked.

I went back and forth for weeks on whether to submit an idea for the fall's planned Glory Days Symposium. The idea started as a comparison of Springsteen storytelling to the evolution of narrative journalism into crowd journalism (with narrative existing now and crowd existing then, just in different proportions). Then it became more about how Bruce's life development mixed with change in storytelling challenges. Then it became how a storyteller living in the real world felt the content and connected/isolated identity pressures of that world today. And there it had to stop because with about two minutes to go before the already-extended midnight deadline last night, I had to submit an abstract. 

The worry that had sent me back and forth was being unsure how I'd compete with the academics who drive things called symposiums. I can do Powerpoint at conferences, but my longest college paper was at most 25 pages. And it was the longest by a mile. But the tipping point on this trouble was e-mailing the coordinator late Sunday night and getting a great, friendly response within minutes. Sure, he said, we've had some non-academics before who did fine, so give it a shot.

So, okay. Why not? Even if the abstract falls big-time to Harvard and Monmouth, playing with the ideas and trying to focus them was fun.

Anyway, if you don't know the reference (tight Main Point '75 audio and ridiculous L.A. '85 video with fortune-teller and bear costumes):

I stood stone-like at midnight suspended in my masquerade / I combed my hair till it was just right and commanded the night brigade / I was open to pain and crossed by the rain and I walked on a crooked crutch / I strolled all alone through a fallout zone and came out with my soul untouched / I hid in the clouded wrath of the crowd but when they said "Sit down" I stood up / Ooh-ooh growin' up…

Abstract:

The clouded wrath of the crowd is a lot more cloudy than it used to be. Enveloped in this century's wealth of societal conversations, we hide by fact, not by choice, and we have to grow in a paradoxically connected world where everyone and no one notices our story. Do we sit down? Stand up? It's hard to tell the actions apart anymore. 

The challenge for the narrative follows closely. How does the storyteller begin to speak for the masses or even for self? Cultural and personal lenses come in a diversity that exceeds our comprehension. Unable to take it all in, we each push a great deal away and turn inward, observing ourselves and publishing these observations more than ever. Technology for self-expression — in e-mail, blog, song, video, comment, or tweet — has driven the propagation of lenses and perspectives but also allowed us this placement in the narrative sprawl. The storytellers among us, the ones who want to look across the land, have to collect, interpret and filter before even beginning to create the narrative — and far before any storytelling can occur. 

The challenge for the storyteller has always been to live in the world, and now the world is distributed and crowded. For Springsteen, he's seen both aspects in his career but never at the same time until now. The wild, bicoastal cast of characters in his early work came in his first decade of music, and the true crowds came in the second. As the masses packed in, the characters became archetypes or angled examainations of self. 

But in this decade, as the crowds have stayed and as new-media researcher Jay Rosen's "people formerly known as the audience" have amplified themselves to new levels, we have seen Springsteen's song storytelling run in three previously unexplored directions: to deep character minutiae, to a place beyond character and — in a flip of part of the '80s approach — to self as angled examinations of characters. Springsteen the storyteller has always lived deep within the crowd, but decreasing visibility there has forced new narrative resolutions. 

While Springsteen may claim to stay away from the Internet proper, digital's social explosion and its narrative effects have clearly influenced a vinyl troubador's new stories.

Finally, the Hitler meme gets a Springsteen treatment. (Via SPL.)

Last weekend, it turned out the Dave's Records I had found on Record Store Day's site and followed on MySpace was just down three blocks from where I was staying at Karen's. There was a line outside before opening. (And hey, there I was. As you can see in the picture, Karen tolerated the line affair, but I soon took mercy and sent her away.)

I had fantasies of Tweedy working at the counter with a "JEFF" badge, but Dave and his trusty assistant were pretty cool. Got the Wilco DVD, the Springsteen 45 for my favorite WOAD song and Whiskeytown's 45. (The Gaslight live EP was nowhere in Chicago RSD previews I found.)

A Wilco moment that did occur: Waiting with CRCers at Hot Chocolate, hearing the opening notes of Impossible Germany – the first song the restaurant was playing all day, sounding wonderfully pure and rich — just as Lindsay saw this painting and totally misinterpreted my "Nice!"

(Screengrab, Hot Chocolate site.) (Also, fair enough.)

And now, maybe, he'll get one. For just a dollar a day, you can buy three healthy tickets a year. You can help Bruce. Please give today. 

(In all seriousness, Backstreets and the photographers have a pretty awesome thing here. Your $25 goes to a great cause and gets you a chance at original prints of some of the best art in the Bruce canon.)

What you said about phases once, I can't get back… I said your comment about phases reminded me of a string of Springsteen albums, and I try to hold back on Springsteen analogies, I really do. (I'm so much better than I used to be. Believe me.) But this analogy doesn't come from me originally, so I figure that makes it more okay. Narrative journalist/hero Tom French is also a Boss fan and is the originator here (long story but he bought me a good hot dog once), and I've just kind of extended it. If you'll indulge me, maybe this will be a blog post someday…

The first album is starting to put your thoughts out there, even though most don't make any sense. The next album, your thoughts are words or phrases, and they begin to make some sense. You start to see how you're more than your words. The next album, you can put together that first brilliant picture of yourself, innocent and flying and powerful. The next album is the fall, the introduction of darkness (yes), which once introduced to a passionate person can pour into every corner. Your power and hope are still there, but the challenges rise equally.

The next album, as time passes and the darkness isn't so new, the picture is more even. The highs and lows are balanced, more nuanced, more lively in all directions. The next album is a pause. Shut off volume and look to see what's really there. Happy or angry, no matter — who are you when you think as you fall asleep at night? What do you have?

The next album is release, breathing, trading inward look for outward rush. The pattern then goes on. There are some wobbles as different elements of life arrive. But after having learned the lightness and the darkness in a certain stretch of life, you breathe through what comes.

… but the thing is… since that's all that was in the folder… the question is, which are you? You me or you you. I can't answer, but you can't ask.

I'm very tempted to submit a proposal to Glory Days, the Springsteen symposium coming this fall, with abstracts due in a week. My working concept: "Springsteen and the struggle with the distributed narrative."

The storyteller swings a broad social scope to capture scene properly, with observation serving as evidence of his existence, before needing to go inward for evidence as this world complicates, and upon turning outward again finds the world's tale is beyond scope and requires the inner tools applied to the crowd. Vinyl troubador vs. social explosion.

Thing is, I'm not sure I could write that paper academically. Between my headphones and my work, it would come from a personal theory.

It's easy to complain how older fans dominate Bruce crowds until you realize you've been using the same site to find bootlegs for a decade.

A very happy birthday to Springsteen.on-demand/Lacava.org/SPL, the one place online I'd pay for content (except they give it away for free).

The good part of today was finding out The Wrestler was robbed. Good for me because I got to see the movie, not good for the movie itself… Walked to Georgetown under the big midday sun, went to the theater beneath the Whitehurst and loved the film. As much as I liked Slumdog and thought it was deserving of cinematography awards, The Wrestler should've won Best Picture. Among other awards, Bruce's song should have received a nomination and beaten Jai Ho, a fine song but not an amazingly placed standout like I saw this afternoon, and I've put Milk now even higher on my watchlist to see if Penn beat what Rourke did.

Going to have to see Vicky Christina Barcelona again to see if Cruz beat Tomei. I equated the Cruz role to Brad Pitt's in Burn After Reading. Have yet to see the other three supporting actress movies. But I like Tomei. If she did more movies I've seen or had a TV show, she'd be on my list.

The less-good part of today was finding out Kinetic Vox had lost in the Knight News Challenge. The idea made it to the final round with about 70 of the original 2,300 applicants, but it didn't make the cut for funds. I knew the idea was a longshot all along, but I probably got my hopes up just a little toward the end. I'm not a big fan of losing. Next year.

Jeremy gave the following preamble on Facebook, and I liked it: "I dutifully ignore most of these Facebook lists, in which you get tagged in someone else's and are therefore obligated to make your own, but this one sounded kinda fun. So the challenge is to list 15 albums that changed your life, most impacted you or whatever …  I'm limiting mine to officially released material only because otherwise this would be a list of 15 Bruce Springsteen recordings unavailable in stores." My list:

1. Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen
2. Darkness of the Edge of Town, Bruce Springsteen
3. Kids in Philly, Marah
4. A Legendary Performer Vol. 2, Elvis Presley
5. Gold, CCR
6. Tunnel of Love, Bruce Springsteen
7. Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, Wilco
8. Summerteeth, Wilco
9. Pneumonia, Whiskeytown
10. Get Lifted, John Legend
11. Greatest Hits, John Denver
12. Joshua Tree, U2
13. My Aim Is True, Elvis Costello
14. Pet Sounds, Beach Boys
15. West Side Story soundtrack

If you want to fight, each one is easily explainable, and I know karate.

Most difficult cuts: Demolition, The River (but you know The River is fine without you), James Brown 20 All-Time Greatest Hits, Chronicle, The '59 Sound (I'm guessing it'll stick), Songs for Swingin' Lovers, Bill Withers Live at Carnegie Hall, Let's Cut the Crap and Hook Up Later on Tonight.

The Millions finds a Rolling Stone photo of Bruce's "writing room" to be far more interesting in print than online. Online, you can see the desk and the bookshelves. In print, you can see what's on the desk and the bookshelves. Someday Rolling Stone is going to have an enlarge link. On the shelves? The Tipping Point and other good stuff, Millions learns.