Bruce Springsteen 2013Australian tour finallyconfirmed

Bruce Springsteen has finally confirmed that he’ll be back in Australia with the E Street Band in March 2013. The Boss will play shows in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne, as well as a special show at Hanging Rock in Victoria’s Macedon Ranges as rumoured.

Springsteen was last in Australia way back in March 2003 when he played just four shows – stadium concerts in Sydney and Melbourne, and a pair of arena gigs in Brisbane. Since then he’s released five albums and played nearly 500 gigs without setting foot in Australia.

The midnight announcement follows nearly 12 months of rumours, ‘leaked dates’ tip-offs and industry murmurs. But now that the dates have finally been announced we can focus on the next issue: The length of the setlist.

While this may be an album tour in support of new-ish release Wrecking Ball, given Bruce’s long absence from our shores, perhaps we’ll get a retrospective gig from The Boss and his E-Street band (Patti Scialfa, Garry Tallent, Roy Bittan, Max Weinberg, Steven Van Zandt and Nils Lofgren).

Most shows on the E Street Band’s current tour have lasted between to three and three-and-a-half hours with his performance in Helsinki earlier this year breaking the record for Springsteen’s longest ever show: A 33-song setlist that clocked in at four hours and six minutes. Not bad for a bunch of 60 year olds.

At Springsteen’s most recent show in Anaheim, California (setlist below), he was joined on stage by Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine and Mike Ness from Social Distortion.

Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band tour:

Thursday, March 14 – Entertainment Centre, Brisbane
Monday, March 18 – Allphones Arena, Sydney
Sunday, March 24 – Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne
Saturday, March 30 – Hanging Rock, Macedon Ranges

General public tickets on sale from 9am local time, Friday December 14

Springsteen’s most recent setlist:

Land of Hope and Dreams
Adam Raised a Cain
Streets of Fire
Hungry Heart
We Take Care of Our Own
Wrecking Ball
Death to My Hometown
My City of Ruins
Spirit in the Night
The E Street Shuffle
Long Time Comin’
Reason to Believe
This Depression
Darkness on the Edge of Town
Bad Luck (Social Distortion cover)
Because the Night (Patti Smith cover)
Darlington County
Shackled and Drawn
Waitin’ on a Sunny Day
Raise Your Hand (Eddie Floyd cover)
The Ghost of Tom Joad
Badlands
Thunder Road

Encore:
Jungleland
Born to Run
Dancing in the Dark
Santa Claus Is Coming to Town (J. Fred Coots & Haven Gillespie cover)
Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out

December 4 – Anaheim, California