Talk:E Street Band

Should there be a separate E Street Band article?

[copied in from Talk:Bruce Springsteen to indicate the origins of this article]

There is a seperate article for The E-Street Band in their own right. Could somebody establish a link between the entry for Springsteen and this article. At moment the link from Springsteen's entry just reverts to his page. djln 26 Oct 2005

Ugh, this is a total mess. The intent has been that the Bruce Springsteen article would have section that would handle the E Street Band as a unit, while each E Street member would have their own individual article to cover their careers, including outside of Bruce. That's why E Street Band and The E Street Band just redirect back to the Bruce article.

This new The E-Street Band article overlaps and duplicates both the Bruce and the individual member articles. It also isn't very well written, and is based on a false premise (in my opinion) that the E Street Band has some meaningful existence outside the context of Springsteen. When I get a chance I'll try to look at the whole shmagoo and figure out what to do. Wasted Time R 15:25, 26 October 2005 (UTC)

It gets worse. There is also a separate E-Street Band (stub) article as well. Wasted Time R 12:01, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

It is only natural that articles will overlap and duplicate. None of us live in isolation and articles cannot be seperated so easily. In my opinion The E-Street Band article is well written in comparision to this article which is disjointed and contains some mistakes and plenty of waffle. To say the band is not worthy of a seperate article is frankly insulting and disrespectful considering their contribution to Springsteens albums and those of others. I find it hard to believe any true Springsteen fan could hold such an opinion. I agree the stub should be got rid of as it is very poor. djln --81.159.229.130 00:54, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

No reason not to have an article about the band itself. I moved The E-Street Band to E Street Band, cleaned up, copyedited, removed a few POV phrases. Overall it's a good article although there is still a lot of overlap with this one. [...] Rhobite 01:36, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

! NOTE ! : I've moved the continuation of this discussion into Talk:E Street Band, since it belongs there now that that article exists. Wasted Time R 01:31, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

[end copying in]

Proper usage of name

[also copied in from Talk:Bruce Springsteen as is relevant to editors here]

Usage note: "E Street" is never hyphenated, no matter if used as a proper name or compound adjective. See the song and album titles that use it; see the album covers at [1] that use the group name, or see any of the Marsh biographies, etc. [13:05, 19 March 2005 68.197.107.71]

[end copying in]

Which Springsteen albums are E Street Band albums?

[...] Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but the E Street Band was not involved with Human Touch, Lucky Town, Ghost of Tom Joad, or the MTV show, right? I removed these from the band's discography. Rhobite 01:36, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

Also, 81.159.229.130, it would be more helpful if you could point out specific issues with this article and help to fix them. On Wikipedia there is no ownership of articles, so please don't feel like you have to write an alternate version in order to effect change here. You are welcome to improve this article - it's often better to improve an existing article than to write a new one. Rhobite 01:46, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

OK, the separate article is a done deal now; big thanks to Rhobite for moving it to a non-hyphenated title, although I think The E Street Band might have been even better.

It would be helpful if djln got a login instead of his rotating IP addresses. Also, djln needs to write in a more neutral, encyclopaedic tone; his E Street Band (and related Jersey Shore music scene) edits contain a bit too much fangush, and didn't deal honestly at all with Springsteen's firing of the band at the end of 1988, something I'm starting to correct. Wasted Time R 02:17, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

Its seems I've opened a hornets nest by writing the article on The E Street Band!. I never intended to put anybody out or undermine this entry. However, I just felt The E Street Band deserve an entry of there own as opposed to being tagged on to this one. I fail to see any significant overlap as The E Street Band only occasionally gets mentioned here and there is no mention of their work with other artists. I am disappointed my contributions have been dismissed as fangush. I thought we were all fans!. There is plenty of fangush in this article but that does not detract from it. Thanks to Rhobite for improving my article. Feel free to add to any other entries I've written. However just one point. I included albums in discography, both by Springsteen and by others, where two or more members of the band made a significant contribution. The four albums you mention all feature two or more members of The E Street Band and thats why they were included. This maybe spilting hairs, I know. Only Nebraska is a truly non E Street album. In response to Wasted Time. Was The E Street Band really fired in 1988?. This sounds a bit extreme and suggests there was animosity. It is my understanding that there was'nt any serious falling out and all the band members continue to return Springsteen calls. I think it more accurate to say Springsteen chose to work with other artists. For the record I also think The E Street Band is more correct than E Street Band. PS I am fairly new to Wikipedia, how do I login? djln--81.159.158.194 23:59, 1 November 2005 (UTC)

To get a login, follow "Create account" on the upper right. If you plan to keep contributing to WP, it's a good idea to do, because the veteran editors and admins take login writers more seriously than anons.

"I thought we were all fans!" No. We're supposed to be objective writers, like newspaper reporters except for an encyclopedia. I happen to be a Springsteen fan, but I've also made extensive contributions to the Frank Sinatra article, extolling his importance in popular music history, and I basically can't stand the guy. It shouldn't matter one way or the other.

To say in your discography list that Human Touch and Luckytown are E Street Band albums beggars the imagination. The whole point of those albums, for better or worse, is that he didn't want to work with the E Street Band!! And other than Bittan, which E Streeter made a "significant contribution" to those two records? Or to the MTV Plugged concert? And who contributed signficantly to Tom Joad?

The question of were they fired at the end of 1988, and what their reaction was, and so forth, needs further attention, which I hope to get to. Wasted Time R 01:42, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the help with login details. I appreciate the need to be objective, but fans can contribute with details, history and facts that an objective writer would not know. The debate about the E Street Band been fired in 1988 needs to be resolved. It is a definitely a grey area, but the people who really know the truth are'nt talking. However in answer to the above question about the discography, members of The E Street Band continued to work with Springsteen. This is not my understanding of being fired. Roy Bittan, Patti Scialfa and David Sancious are all credited on Human Touch. Bittan, Scialfa and Soozie Tyrell all featured on Lucky Town. Bittan and Scialfa played on MTV concert and Danny Federici, Garry Tallent, Scialfa and Tyrell all featured on Tom Joad. I am not claiming these albums are E Street Band albums but E Street personnel played on them all and that is why I included them in the disography. Djln 2 November 2005 (UTC)

I would analyze this as follows: of all the E Street Band members as of 1988 who weren't married to Springsteen (Scialfa is obviously a special case), only Roy Bittan survived to participate in HT/LT/MTV. The other five - Weiburg, Tallent, Federici, Lofgren, Clemons - all had no role. To me, 5 out of 6 gone means those weren't E Street Band projects in any shape or form. A former member and a future member (Sancious and Soozie) showing up on a few tracks here and there doesn't change the picture. Indeed the HT/LT Tour (that MTV Unplugged sort of represents) is known to Springsteen fans as "The Other Band" tour and was not too well-liked to say the least. So to leave these albums in the list of E Street Band projects is the kind of mistake that brings mockery to Wikipedia as hopelessly wrong. As for Tom Joad, I think there it's valid to say that it's a Bruce solo album with some scattered E Street participation, in the same category as Tunnel of Love and Devils & Dust. Wasted Time R 21:23, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

I've now changed the Bruce part of the discography to look how I think it should. See what you think. Wasted Time R 22:17, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

It's just not right to mix Tunnel of Love in with the rest of the full E Street Band albums. It's true they all appear at one time or another, but never more than three (not counting Patti) on any given track; four tracks have none at all; Bruce uses drum machines and his own bass on most tracks, etc. To categorize this the same way as Darkness or The River is just silly. But I see you've now put HT/LT/MTV back on the list, so this is hopeless. Wasted Time R 23:45, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

To be honest I reckon this is really spilting hairs. The discography was intended to inform readers of albums E-Street Band personnel played on whether as a band or as groups of individuals. All the above mentioned albums fall into that category. I like the idea of two categories for the albums as this improves clarity, but how will we agree what goes where. Tunnel Of Love despite the way it was recorded, is one of the only albums to actually credit the band. It was recorded much the same way as Greetings, so do we remove that as well. I think the article itself makes it clear, that Born To Run Darkness The River BITUSA are the classic E Street albums and that the later Springsteen albums have only limited E Street involvement. However we can't deny that E-Street personnel played on them. If you think the article does not reflect this, feel free to amend. We'll get there in the end. djln --81.159.158.172 00:14, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

Wasted Time, I've added some more about the spilt/firing but agree, we need more information on this area. I've tried to make it more clear about E-Street personnel and LT/HT/MTV, I've mentioned that there are opposing views about TOL and I've re-edited the discography to see if it comes closer to an acceptable compromise. . Despite our opposing views I've enjoyed our ongoing debate. Looking forward to your reply. djln --81.159.226.187 23:25, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

I'll take a look. But you're still confused about logging in! The idea is to do the "log in" operation at the top right of your screen before you start any editing. Then, all the changes you make will be marked as from djln, instead of a series of rotating anon IP addresses. Right now, you're only using your login to sign your comments here, which is not the whole idea. Wasted Time R 23:46, 4 November 2005 (UTC)

It's much better and much clearer now in terms of the levels of E Street participation, good job. I did a couple of cleanup passes over it to fix minor issues. Then I did an edit to try to expand upon the split and the effects it had. Better yet would be to get some interview quotes from the band members on what their reactions were. Wasted Time R 03:48, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

A subsequent footnote on Tunnel of Love - see http://www.shorefire.com/artists/springsteen/pr_springsteen_06_03_02.html. Shore Fire Media, Bruce's own public relations firm, does not consider it an E Street Band album. I've added a cite to that effect in the article. Wasted Time R 19:45, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Has the E Street Band really performed with other artists?

I'm kinda uncomfortable with the statement in the article that The E Street Band has performed with other artists. Individual members of the band have done so of course (sometimes several of them at the same time), but never as the band. Its misleading to suggest they have, and leaves the inference that somewhere out there is a Gary US Bonds and The E Street Band album. [04:33, 14 February 2006 OttawaShane]

I agree, the article needs more clarity here. As far as I know there is one clear case where they did: "Say Goodbye to Hollywood" is credited to Ronnie Spector and The E Street Band. Are there any other such instances? Wasted Time R 12:18, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Also, I've pulled in some of the history of this article's creation from Talk:Bruce Springsteen, so that above you can see that some felt back then that the E Street Band has little real existence outside the context of working with Springsteen. Wasted Time R 12:18, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Biography assessment rating comment

The article may be improved by following the WikiProject Biography 11 easy steps to producing at least a B article. -- Jreferee 22:23, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Bill Chinnock

I don't have background on Mr. Chinnock, however with the inclusion of his page link on the E street page and having no existing page on the Wiki, I wanted to add that if someone wanted to go down that road, Chinnock passed away on March 9, 2007. Reference: Boston.com -- Rabbi Bob 11:28, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Is Springsteen himself really a member?

The infobox lists Bruce Springsteen first as a member of the E Street Band. While he's inevitably associated with them, I question whether this is really accurate for several reasons. First, when they play together live they're invariably credited as "Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band." Second, if, as Wasted Time R notes above, a record was credited to "Ronnie Spector and the E Street Band" (assuming that record didn't involve Springsteen), then he's arguably separate. Third, the first sentence of the article implies that Springsteen isn't a member: "The E Street Band is a musical group that has periodically toured and recorded with rock musician Bruce Springsteen since 1972." This sentence is worded in a way that suggests that they're a backing band (although I think most of us would give them a lot more credit than that).

I don't think it's a huge problem, and since the E Street Band is universally associated with Springsteen it might be odd to delete him. That's why I raised it here instead of changing it in the article. A casual reader who is not a hardcore Springsteen fan might find it more confusing were his name not there. Anyone have any thoughts? 1995hoo (talk) 14:34, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Soozie Tyrell

One or more of this article's authors used up a fair amount of space parsing Soozie Tyrrel's status vis a vis the band. She was onstage during Springsteen's Super XLIII halftime show, playing guitar and singing backing vocals, for whatever that's worth. So it would appear that she is in fact a member of the band. Timothy Horrigan (talk) 01:53, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

No, it's still ambiguous. There's a de jure E Street Band and a de facto E Street Band. The former, perhaps bound by legal status, is represented by promotional photographs that leave her out and album credits that put her in a separate space apart from both the other band members and any other additional musicians. The latter is represented by reality: she appears on several tracks per studio album, the same as some other ESB members outside the Weinberg-Tallent-Bittan core, and she appears on every song of every show on concert tours, playing featured violin parts on some songs and backing vocals, acoustic guitar, or percussion on all the others. And when de jure member Patti Scialfa misses shows, which she does quite often (sometimes a majority of the time) due to domestic duties, Tyrell takes her place on the front line of the stage and takes over her featured duet vocals role as well. So I've taken the approach here that the de facto should taken precedence in terms of the template box, but we do have to explain the situation in the article. Wasted Time R (talk) 00:19, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Jay Weinberg as a member or an associated act?

Shouldn't Jay Weinberg be listed as a member in the infobox rather than an associated act? After all, he is technically a member, certainly as much as Suki Lahav was. Daskill (talk) 22:31, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

There's no good definition of who was/is a member of the E Street Band and who isn't. But Jay certainly isn't an associated act; I've removed that. Wasted Time R (talk) 23:41, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Agree with removal. I've added him in as a member; I think he fits the bill. Daskill (talk) 11:48, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

Band photos -- allowable use?

Regarding the photos of the band on this page... The maker of the photos (Wasted Time R) has released them under Creative Commons. But, I'm not sure that makes the images copyright-clean. Every rock concert I've been to specifically restricts the use of cameras and recording devices. A picture of a band member taken on the street (in a public place) is acceptable use, but inside the paid area of a performance venue is definitely not a public place. So, if the pictures were taken without the permission of the performers, then they aren't copyright-clean, right?

Granted that with ubiquitous cell-phone cameras this may be a losing battle, but Wikipedia should not be publishing works that violate copyright laws. 152.17.59.56 (talk) 18:55, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Giordano and Tyrell

Shouldn't both now be considered E Street Band members? On Springsteen's current Wrecking Ball Tour and during the band Roll Call segment in My City of Ruins he has announced both as being part of the E Street Band. He even has announced members like Roy Bittan before Charlie Giordano or Soozie Tyrell. On past tours he would announce them prior to the E Street Band introductions but now they are part of it. He also announces the members of the E Street Horns and E Street Choir. Jason1978 (talk) 12:08, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Orphaned references in E Street Band

I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of E Street Band's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "NYT1":

• From Rock music: J. Wray (28 May 2006), "Heady Metal", New York Times, archived from the original on 13 February 2011
• From We Are One: The Obama Inaugural Celebration at the Lincoln Memorial: Stelter, Brian (January 18, 2009). "It's Not TV. It's BHO". The New York Times.
• From Clarence Clemons: Ben Sisario (June 18, 2011). "Clarence Clemons, Springsteen's Soulful Sideman, Dies at 69". The New York Times, A24. Retrieved July 1, 2011.

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT⚡ 00:48, 5 September 2016 (UTC)

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Timeline chart

The timeline for the band looks rather odd. There are some back and grey stripes all over the image. What is this supposed to be? --Soren84 (talk) 23:11, 22 April 2017 (UTC)

The last edit had somehow broken the timeline chart. I've just undone it--Gorpik (talk) 14:06, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

One thing is wrong. Little Steven returned 1999. He played some gigs but not all as a guest 1995 but not a member. In 1999 he was back as member. See Greatest hits album 1995 Where only Nils Lofgren is credited as well see Peter Carlines book Where Bruce asks Nils Lofgren in 1999 if it was ok to bring back Little Steven. Peter7777ab (talk) 21:56, 23 July 2021 (UTC)

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Little Steven

Little Steven did not rejoin the E street band 1995 but 1999. In 1995 he was not a member of the E street band. He rejoined 1999 after Bruce asked Nils if it was ok. He played some gigs with the E Street band 1995 but only as a guest not a member. On the 1995 Greatest hits album Only Nils is E Street band guitarist as seen on the photo of the CD. Peter7777ab (talk) 21:32, 23 July 2021 (UTC)

Band members section inaccurate

The Band members section of the article is inaccurate. The Springsteen website is quite explicit that the only current members are Springsteen, Van Zandt, Scialfa, Weinberg, Tallent, Bittan and Lofgren. Tyrell, Giordano and Jake Clemons are listed as "Additional Musicians". The Wikipedia article should report the facts as they are published by the band. WWGB (talk) 02:07, 31 August 2021 (UTC)

Picked the cherries?

Section on Asbury Park origins. Does a phrase like "picked the cherries of the Jersey Shore" really belong in an encyclopedic source? If this is quoting a person or publication, it should be encased in quotes and provide the appropriate references. Otherwise it's slang that lends a biased tone to the facts. If Springsteen sought out other talented musicians who were locally popular at the time in the same region of New Jersey, then that's what it should say. Wiki articles shouldn't rely on familiarity with colloquialisms to be understood. 2603:9000:7002:A819:9572:B030:139:4473 (talk) 23:32, 25 May 2022 (UTC)