The musician who Bruce Springsteen thinks kept the E Street Band together
When you see the E Street Band live, they are a well-oiled machine. Bruce Springsteen might be their leader, their conductor, ‘The Boss’… but without the rest of the band, the whole thing falls flat. The way they work with Springsteen and how he admires their abilities, as if it’s the first time playing together, is truly a spectacle to behold. There’s a reason they’re still considered one of the greatest live acts on the planet.
They weren’t an overnight success; Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band’s efficiency is the result of decades of hard work. This means playing in small rooms, living in the back of a van, arguments followed by months on the road, and, of course, practice, practice, practice. Every member of the E Street Band has an ear for sound and a tolerance for road life that supersedes anyone else in rock, and the end result is one of the greatest musical outfits in the world.
Springsteen recalled one of their low points (if you could call it that) with a story following a riot on stage in Middletown, New Jersey. The E Street Band had been playing for too long, which prompted police to rush the stage and put an end to their show. A bit of rough and tumble caused one member of the band to knock over a stack of amplifiers, which accidentally landed on some of the police officers.
The perpetrator was none other than Danny Federici, who earned the nickname ‘Phantom Dan’ because of his innate ability to stay out of reach of the coppers. It was during this riot that Springsteen first saw Danny slip into character.
“I looked over to see Danny with a beefy police officer pulling on one arm while Flo Federici, his first wife, pulled on the other, assisting her man in resisting arrest,” recalled Springsteen. “A kid leapt from the audience onto the stage, momentarily distracting the beefy officer with the insults of the day. Forever thereafter, ‘Phantom’ Dan Federici slipped into the crowd and disappeared.”
Federici had a search warrant put out for his arrest following the altercation, which was just one of the many periods of trouble he found himself in while with the E Street Band; however, these bouts of chaos brought the band closer together. Additionally, he was also a phenomenal musician, not just somebody who could carry himself, but someone Springsteen credited with helping to keep the band together.
“He was the most intuitive player I’ve ever seen. His style was slippery and fluid, drawn to the spaces the other musicians in the E Street Band left. He wasn’t an assertive player; he was a complementary player. A true accompanist,” he gushed. “He naturally supplied the glue that bound the band’s sound together. In doing so, he created, for himself, a very specific style. When you hear Dan Federici, you don’t hear a blanket of sound, you hear a riff, packed with energy, flying above everything else for a few moments and then gone back in the track. ‘Phantom’ Dan Federici. Now you hear him, now you don’t.” It’s clear why Springsteen holds him in high regard.
