Wise guy takes to the decks before Dublin date with his Boss

SINCE THE death of saxophonist Clarence Clemons last year, Steve Van Zandt is now the best known member of Bruce Springsteen’s legendary E Street Band.

The diminutive guitarist turned accidental actor arrived last night in a blacked out Range Rover at Tower Records in Dublin to broadcast his weekly radio show. The two-hour programme, broadcast by Dublin City FM in Ireland, goes out to a worldwide audience.

Some 200 fans got wristbands to access the store with another 100 or so outside with their noses pressed up to the window.

Van Zandt (61) has been with the E Street Band, on and off, since 1975. He also gained a new audience for himself with his acting role as the devious toupe-wearing, Mafia figure Silvio Dante in The Sopranos.

He sounded a more conciliatory note about the decision on Saturday night to pull the plug on Springsteen’s marathon concert in Hyde Park while he was on stage with former Beatle Paul McCartney for the first time.

Immediately after the concert Van Zandt tweeted that the English were living in a “police state” but has since mellowed in the realisation that it was not the Metropolitan Police who pulled the plug.

“I wasn’t really, really angry. Maybe I was a little bit too tough on the police, I think I should apologise about that and I think I will because I’m not sure who pulled the plug,” he said jokingly. “We don’t intend to break curfews. We just always do.

“The problem with curfews is they are scheduled too early. They should reschedule the curfew. We were literally 10 minutes past curfew. We’re usually an hour past curfew. We could have done three more songs and been off stage by 11 o’clock. Who were we disturbing? Six people in a council meeting! It was a Saturday night.”

The mutual admiration society that has come of the relationship between Springsteen and his Irish fan base shows no sign of diminishing.

Both tonight and tomorrow night’s concerts at the RDS are sold out, with 70,000 fans expected to attend.

“We have a wonderful relationship with the Irish fans which goes back a long way,” said Van Zandt, who said the influence of Irish music on Springsteen can be seen in much of the rootsy music he has done in recent years. “Ireland is perhaps the most musical country in the world.”

Springsteen is touring the Wrecking Ball album, which went straight to number one in the Irish charts and in several other countries.

Springsteen is on at the early time of 7pm so there’s little chance of a curfew restricting the set. There’s no support and he’s expected to play for about three hours, but, as Van Zandt said, don’t bet on him not running over.