Caryn Rose

A new newsletter featuring thoughtful insight, discussion, commentary and analysis on and about the work of Bruce Springsteen.

On Wednesday night, Bruce Springsteen took the stage at Toronto’s Scotiabank Arena over an hour late with profuse apologies — there was plane trouble, apparently. He then declared, “This is a fighting prayer for my country,” and roared into an emphatic version of his 2007 song, “Long Walk Home,” following immediately with an enormous, majestic rendition of “Land of Hope and Dreams.”

This is the Outlaw tour, but the stage setting is entirely still Rough and Rowdy Ways, down to a red curtain along the back.

“We haven’t done a matinee show in years,” Mick Jagger observed drolly, halfway through The Rolling Stones’ first appearance at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival on Thursday evening. As usual, the Stones began their set with “Start Me Up” — but shortly after 5 p.m., launching into an early but enthusiastic 18-song set of old hits and new numbers from 2023’s “Hackney Diamonds,” and a couple of local surprises in honor of the occasion.
Jagger began the evening wearing a glittery turquo...

In Las Vegas, U2 harnesses its superpower: relentless earnestness

On Friday, six Detroit singer-songwriters will gather inside Rivera Court at the Detroit Institute of Arts for what’s known in Nashville as a “Writer’s Round.” The Friday Night Live! event that evening will feature musicians Isis Damil, Michelle Held, Audra Kubat, Marbrisa, Mayaeni, and Emily Rose.

“What up, doe?!”
With that traditional, very Detroit greeting, Michigan native Little Stevie Wonder brought his “Sing Your Song! As We Fix Our Nation’s Broken Heart” tour to Little Caesar’s Arena in the Motor City on Tuesday night.

When your all-star Detroit concert opens with none other than Miss Diana Ross gliding down the stage catwalk in an enormous cloud of orange chiffon singing “I’m Coming Out,” you are setting the bar high from the jump — especially if you’re kicking off an event with Eminem, Jack White, Jelly Roll, Common and many others.
She is Diana Ross, daughter of the Brewster Projects, queen of Motown, representing some of the city’s glorious past on two levels: She is here in front Michigan Central train...

Last night, Bob Dylan concluded his latest leg of the Rough and Rowdy Ways tour. Barring any Farm Aid-level surprises, that makes this his final show of 2023, with no future dates announced as of now. The year-end finale took place in Evansville, Indiana, and we’ve got an on-the-ground report from writer Caryn Rose.

Peter Dennis Blandford Townshend tells you everything you need to know about his first real solo album[1], Empty Glass, with the (literally) iconic cover image: Pete as an angel, with his sacrament (brandy) in front of him, flanked by acolytes, two beautiful women offering their best come-hither looks. It is a record both casually and deathly spiritual, with Townshend engaged in the latest plane of the spiritual inquest he’d been engaged in since 1968’s Tommy.

Newsletter publishing original articles, analysis, commentary and discussion, featuring concert reviews, music book reviews, documentary reviews, album reviews, features and more.

The first time music journalist Ben Edmonds heard about the MC5, it was from musician friends in a band called Magic Terry and the Universe. He liked what his friends had to say about the band, so Edmonds made sure to go to the MC5’s first New York City show at the Fillmore East. The verdict? “I thought they were hands down the best rock and roll band I had ever seen in my life. It’s an opinion I hold to this day,”

The idea of something disco-adjacent was still, at this point, uncharted territory for an artist so deeply rooted in rock and roll, but it was absolutely a destination of choice and not a random decision on the part of the label to which the artist had no input.

Patti Smith arrived in New York City at the end of the Age of Aquarius in search of work and purpose. What she found—what she fostered—was a cultural revolution. Through her poetry, her songs, her unapologetic vocal power, and her very presence as a woman fronting a rock band, she kicked open a door that countless others walked through.

An exhaustively comprehensive 11-disc box set explores a defining work by the classic rock band alongside the ambitious, shelved concept album that would become Pete Townshend's white whale.