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Woolnorth Tours - All You Need to Know BEFORE You Go (2024)

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Laura is an amazing guide. There is so much she knows about this part of the island. Her deep... read more

Great experience with an excellent Guide who is passionate about her business and loved providing a... read more

Was excellent. Well worth the money and the trip out. Morning tea was fine. Interesting and varied place would highly recommend

Laura is an amazing guide. There is so much she knows about this part of the island. Her deep connection gave us new perspectives. I had been a bit unsure before we booked this tour…but was encouraged by the comments from others. We absolutely encourage any unsure to join this tour. The beauty and spirituality of temdudheker has to be experienced. Highly recommended. Thanks Laura.

We tried to book online and there were no times available. We tried calling several times and there was no answer. We gave up.

Great experience with an excellent Guide who is passionate about her business and loved providing a well informed commentary on all aspects of the areas we explored. Wind farming , dairy cattle and wildlife all in harmony in a beautiful scene. Some historical aspects on the cruelty of early settlers towards indigenous people which we should all be aware of which was delivered with real passion and humanity. This is a great tour that visitors to the area should put on their priority list.

Absolutely phenomenal. Cannot recommend this highly enough. Laura's knowledge about farming, wildlife, history & the area is absolutely fascinating. We so enjoyed this tour and cannot be more thankful for this experience.

Was expecting a tour of a working farm. Maybe it is but not for sheep. The major focus was the wind farm. Pity we had to pay good money for the only way to visit cape grim. The bias and propaganda from the operator Laura made it very uncomfortable for us Would not do this again even if it was free!

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1665 Woolnorth Road 7330 Smithton Tasmania

(03) 6452 1493

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Due to COVID restrictions our first bookable tours are scheduled to begin from Saturday June 27 2020 in line with the lifting of Tasmanian Government restrictions.

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1665 Woolnorth Road

TASMANIA, AUSTRALIA

Phone: (03) 6452 1493

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Copyright © 2019 Woolnorth Tours, Tasmania, Australia

Woolnorth Tours

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WOOLNORTH TOURS - All You Need to Know BEFORE You Go

Review: Glitzy and high-flying ‘Aladdin’ tour soars in return visit to San Diego

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San Diego ticket-buyers get a lot of bang for their buck in the touring production of the Broadway musical “Aladdin,” now playing through Sunday at the San Diego Civic Theatre.

Directed and choreographed by native San Diegan Casey Nicholaw, the tour boasts 31 singer-dancers, an incredible collection of sparkling Middle Eastern-inspired costumes by Gregg Barnes, also a local native, a brass-enhanced 10-piece orchestra and some dazzling special effects. There’s also a head-spinning number of high-flying and extremely athletic dance scenes — some with drums and veils, some with tap shoes, some with scimitars and some with dinner trays that hide pop-up surprises.

In some ways, things move at such a dizzying pace in the two-hour, 30-minute show, the central love story gets a little lost, particularly in the action-packed second act. But fortunately, lead actors Adi Roy as Aladdin and Senzel Ahmady as Princess Jasmine, have warmth, charisma and strong singing voices. They also have great chemistry, which shines in their magic carpet ride scene (which really is magic — even from the fifth row I couldn’t figure out how they made the soaring rug move and spin).

For those not familiar with “Aladdin,” it’s based on the ancient Arabic story about a poor boy who discovers a genie in a magic lamp and uses his wishes to win the heart of a princess. Disney turned the story into a 1992 animated film that became a 2014 Broadway musical that’s still running today. The musical features seven new songs that weren’t in the film, and only one — “Proud of Your Boy” — is as memorable as the original songs.

Trying to recapture the zany, ad-lib riffing of Robin Williams, who was the voice actor for the genie in the film, musical bookwriter Chad Beguelin gives the stage genie wacky, wide-ranging, motor-mouth monologues that tap into topical references including multiple Disney film songs, Tik-Tok, “Dancing with the Stars,” curly fries, Wakanda and even Grogu (the baby Yoda-like character in “The Mandalorian”).

The tour first visited San Diego in 2019. In its return this week, Marcus R. Martin stars as the Genie. His energetic, hilarious and high note-filled performance reaches its zenith in the nearly 10-minute-long “Friend Like Me” production number that builds and builds.

Sorab Wadia is warm and endearing as Jasmine’s father, the Sultan of Agrabah. Anand Nagraj is wickedly campy as Jafar, the kingdom’s power-hungry vizier and Aaron Choi is intentionally cartoonish as Jafar’s henchmen Iago (transformed from a talking parrot character in the film). Also fun are Colt Prattes, Jake Letts and Nathan Levy as Aladdin’s three buddies.

A nice change from the film, which my own children watched hundreds of times on VHS in the early 1990s, is that there’s no longer the creepy scene where the leering Jafar turns Jasmine into a slave girl he plans to marry himself. There’s also less of Aladdin’s mansplaining. It’s a more enlightened story for a more enlightened time.

When: 2 and 7:30 p.m. Thursday, April 4; 7:30 p.m. Friday, April 5; 2 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 6; 1 and 7:30 p.m. Sunday, April 7

Where: San Diego Civic Theatre, 110 Third Ave., Downtown

Tickets: $34 and up

Online: broadwaysd.com

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Woolnorth Tours - Woolnorth Tours

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Was excellent. Well worth the money and the trip out. Morning tea was fine. Interesting and... read more

Laura is an amazing guide. There is so much she knows about this part of the island. Her deep... read more

We were privileged to tour Woolnorth- an amazing part of Tasmania. Our tour leader and driver Nigel was well versed in the history of the area and its current use. He was very enthusiastic in sharing his passion for this unique coastline. If one gets to Smithton the tour is a must for Tasmanians as well as tourists.

Thank you for your kind words and taking the time to fill out a review on TripAdvisor. We hope you will come again and do another one of our tours one day :) N

The tour was much more than we expected. Laura was very knowledgeable on a range of topics and the scenery is fantastic. Great to see they will run a tour for just two.

Thank you kindly for taking the time to rate us and comment on TripAdvisor. We hope to see you again in the future :) N

Great spot, informative and helpful host. Wind farm is stunning up close with no noise obvious above the wind. History of the area well recounted and chilling. memorable trip

Thank you kindly for taking the time to review us on Trip Advisor. It was our pleasure to host you. N

Experienced an amazing, enjoyable tour of Woolnorth. Scenery spectacular. Nigel's knowledge of the area was informative and interesting. An excellent tour in every way.

Thank you for taking the time to write a review :) Very kind of you. N

I did the night tour of Cape Woolnorth and Cape Grim with Nigel. Whilst I didn't have any particular expectations when I signed up for the tour, it turned out to be a magical evening. The weather was lovely, the sunset beautiful, the animals in full force - even caught a glimpse of the remains of a beached whale - and the history of VDL and the farm fascinating. The air was so fresh you could taste it! Nigel helped to make the tour both fun and interesting; the perfect host and guide in one. His knowledge of the area, his personable attitude and his professionalism added to the experience. The tour is very good value for money. Anyone passing through the Stanley-Smithton area should have this tour on their list of 'must do's'.

Thank you very much for your review and kind words. I will pass it on to Nigel. L

My husband and I did the day tour on 1 Jan. It was a great experience and Nigel was an enthusiastic host. The scenery was amazing and we loved the graceful wind turbines standing tall in the coastline. Highly recommend!

Thank you :) N

TaylorMade releases new BRNR Mini Driver Copper with nostalgic cosmetics

A look at TaylorMade’s new BRNR Mini Driver Copper with nostalgic cosmetics. (GolfWRX)

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In tennis parlance, the mini driver is a “second serve” option off the tee. It’s called upon when a driver would go too far and bring trouble into play, or when the ball needs to be shaped a bit more with a draw or fade. With more loft than a driver, it produces more spin, which makes shaping the ball easier. The heads of mini drivers are also smaller than a driver, as the name insinuates.

TaylorMade released its original BRNR Mini Driver in April 2023 and since then, multiple PGA TOUR players have put it in play including Tommy Fleetwood, Adam Scott and Jake Knapp, the rookie who won this year’s Mexico Open at Vidanta.

Fleetwood first put a BRNR Mini into play at the 2023 RBC Heritage and still has the club in his bag today.

“For me, if I had to hit a fairway, I’m more comfortable hitting a driver than a 3-wood,” Fleetwood said. “I would tee the driver down, and I would hit a little cut, or a neck-y cut in the fairway. The 3-wood isn’t for that. The 3-wood, generally, is a pretty hot club that I’ll hit from 270 or 280 in the fairway on a par 5. You get some courses where a 3-wood is not always necessary. (With the BRNR) you put a normal swing on it, and I’m more comfortable hitting it straight. It’s a replacement for a 3-wood, basically.”

Knapp, who used a BRNR during his victory in Mexico, echoed Fleetwood’s sentiments:

“I put in a 3-wood every once in a while, but I was just never able to find one that I loved,” Knapp said. “Three-woods, in general, I just hit on the bottom of the face. They spin a lot and don’t go anywhere. (The BRNR is) just an easier club to hit than a 3-wood. … It’s really just a tee club and kind of a fairway finder for me.”

Now, a year later and with plenty of PGA TOUR validation, TaylorMade is releasing a new BRNR Mini Driver Copper, which includes the same technologies and designs as the original, except the company has amped up the nostalgia factor.

Playing off the iconic Burner driver from the late-'90s, the new BRNR Mini Driver Copper has additional copper styling on the crown and a large retro TaylorMade logo centered on the sole. It also comes stock with a copper-and-black UST Mamiya ProForce 65 Retor Burner Edition shaft and a Golf Pride TaylorMade Victory Copper grip.

As with the original BRNR release from yesteryear, the new edition is made with split-weight technology, a multi-material head construction, a K-Sole design for improved turf interaction, a TwistFace for corrective ball flight, a Thru-Slot Speed Pocket for increased ball speeds and a 4-degree loft sleeve for minute changes to loft and face angle.

With the year’s first major at Augusta National coming up next week, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see a Masters contestant or two put the new BRNR version into play to help navigate the long and demanding layout.

TaylorMade’s new BRNR Mini Driver Copper clubs will sell for $449.99 in 11.5 (RH/LH) and 13.5 (RH) degree options, and they will be available for custom orders.

Mitski Is a Mesmerizing Study in Movement, and in Pedal-Steel Pop, at L.A.’s Shrine: Concert Review

By Chris Willman

Chris Willman

Senior Music Writer and Chief Music Critic

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Mitski is such a cerebral record-maker that I didn’t expect to be coming away from her 2024 shows making proclamations that I might have just seen the best- choreographed tour of the year. But it’s true: Her run of three shows at L.A.’s Shine Auditorium was the kind of unexpected, advanced study in movement that couldn’t possibly be guessed just from listening to her records — the latest and best of which was last year’s pretty heady “The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We.”

Not that the 2024 Mitski setlist wouldn’t still come off just fine if she presented it in a more or less still-life format. This latest album is a departure for her, with music that feels big and orchestrated, a little bit classic-country, and fairly reverb-y, in what adds up to slightly spooky beauty. The songs sounds like they were meant to be played at the “Twin Peaks” roadhouse bar or, barring that un-reality, then in a really huge room, where the sound can bounce around a little and you aren’t quite close enough to crack the code of her stony facial expressions. The Shrine (where years ago she’d played the side Expo Hall, before moving up to the big room) felt like a perfect place to hear something this quietly magisterial and kind of old-school.

That rapt attention and appreciation didn’t seem at all mitigated, or Mitski-gated (sorry), by the fact that the singer sometimes delivered the oldies a little bit differently than they might have been expecting. That is to say, some of the material longtime fans are most familiar with was rearranged to skew closer to the style, or styles, of “The Land Is Inhospitable and So Are We.” Its genre could be described as modern Americana meets the ghost signal of a clear-channel megawatt station from the 1950s or ’60s. When I first heard the album, my thought was that I was so happy she’d ditched the producer of her previous album, 2022’s synth-poppy “Laurel Hell,” for some new genius; the punchline, of course, is that it’s the same guy, Patrick Hyland, as it almost always is. The two of them seem inhospitable to stasis, so they’ll probably switch it up again for the next album. But while they’re touring behind this one — with Hyland as her musical director as well as guitarist, naturally — they’re letting things cohere a little while they’re in this rich vein, while not being completely resisting having some of the “hits” be as indie or synthy as they always were in her catalog. It’s an ideal balance all around.

The extent to which they’re having fun with some of the rearrangements is best found in Mitski’s new take on “I Don’t Smoke,” a 10-year-old chestnut. If you look at some setlists, fans have marked it down as “I Don’t Smoke (Folk Version).” Well, no. It’s more like “I Don’t Smoke (Hoedown Version)” — far more determinedly country than anything on her latest album (or on Beyonce’s). That’s a big outlier in the set, but a welcome one. Plenty of other moments rely on Mitski’s Patsy Cline inclinations to a far subtler degree, although the amount of pedal steel, fiddle and accordion played by Nashville alt-country veteran Fats Kaplan, the ace in her seven-piece band, is telltale about where this round of influences lies. And if you don’t like the countrypolitan touches? No problem — there’s still a lot of familiarity in this set for any returning fans, whether she’s getting synthy early on with “Working for the Knife” or reviving her more twee rocker mode to close out the encore with “Washing Machine Heart.”

For the rest of the night, once the curtain is gone, the singer stays on a round, slightly elevated platform at center stage, where her props consist of… two wooden chairs, fitfully employed when she needs something to lie down and lean against, or stand atop like she might be jumping off a building. The second number, “Buffalo Replaced,” had her going through the robotic motions of alternately hiding her eyes with both hands and putting them out as a stop signal, something she maintained even during a long, awkward pause between songs and into the beginning of the next one, “Working for the Knife.” Suddenly, in that one, she dropped the peekaboo routine and was all about graceful fluidity, or the occasional go-go-girl pose. At one point she turned her back to the audience and let her hands, wrists and arms form wavelike motions, kind of like the dancer in Bob Fosse’s “The Aloof” number in “Sweet Charity.”

Much later, and much less gracefully, Mitski was down on all fours for, appropriately, the crowd favorite “I Bet on Losing Dogs.” When a performance can make you think of David Byrne, Roy Orbison, Bob Fosse and dog-man Iggy Pop, it’s obviously doing something right.

And this is before getting to the two most interestingly staged moments in the show. In her Billboard Hot 100 hit “My Love Mine All Mine” and on through to “Last Words of a Shooting Star,” shards of something — faux plexiglass? — descended on strings from the top of the stage on down to her platform, then dangled there for a while before finally ascending, one by one, as her touch commanded them to arise. Were we to take these jagged edges as a form of danger that could be commandeered only by the awesome psychic powers of Mitski… or beauty in brokenness… or just nifty-looking stagecraft in a show that otherwise dispenses with it? Probably 6,000 different 15-to-25-agers at the Shrine held 6,000 different interpretations, and the scattered old folks, too, but we were all taken with it.

But “Heaven” offered the sweetest moment, when Mitski danced, arm in arm (sort of), with the white beam of an overhead followspot. That’s probably not as easily choreographed as it looks. (What was it they said about Ginger Rogers, that she did everything Fred Astaire did, but backwards and in heels? Mitski did everything the spotlight did, but backwards and comprised of physical matter.)

And she did. No, it assuredly wasn’t a concert designed to wrap up her adoring hordes in warm fuzzies. But as a highly theatrical show that still maintained the sense of a real, cool, warm person animating all that minimalist artifice, it ironically felt kind of… could this be the right word?… hospitable.

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Vampire Weekend: Only God Was Above Us review – their most adventurous set yet

(Columbia) Indian raga, hip-hop and scuzzy, Strokes-like rock replace the west African guitar sounds of old on Ezra Koenig and co’s dazzling fifth album

W hen Vampire Weekend emerged in the mid-00s they sounded like nothing else around, quoting unfashionable sources such as Minutemen and west African guitar sounds (via Paul Simon) alongside a barrage of knowing, Ivy-League lyrical reference points. Only God Was Above Us , their fifth studio album, is perhaps their most musically adventurous since that 2008 self-titled debut: a dazzling auditory romp that takes in feedback and distortion, arpeggiating pianos, curlicued orchestral pop, 90s hip-hop rhythms and levels of chef’s-kiss production detail best appreciated on headphones.

Has a Vampire Weekend song ever sounded less like Vampire Weekend than the dubby, cinematic synth-and-trumpet fantasia The Surfer ? Gen-X Cops out-Strokes the Strokes at their own grizzled New York scuzz-pop, while Mary Boone , tangentially named after a disgraced New York art dealer, has time for Indian raga and a choir. As ever, mortality looms large – the title comes, indirectly, from a survivor of an 80s American air disaster. But reckonings with the past – New York in the 80s, family trees, how “the cruel, with time, becomes classical” ( Classical ) – also run through singer Ezra Koenig ’s skein of allusions and heartfelt exhortations. Both Capricorn and Hope, the eight-minute closer, are about not trying so hard and letting go: wise, rather than clever words.

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Beyoncé’s Country Is America: Every Bit of It

On the bold, sprawling “Cowboy Carter,” the superstar plays fast and loose — and twangy — with genre.

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By Jon Pareles

The first song on “Cowboy Carter,” Beyoncé’s not-exactly-country album, makes a pre-emptive strike. “It’s a lot of talking going on while I sing my song,” she observes in “Ameriican Requiem” over guitar strums and electric sitar, adding, “It’s a lot of chatter in here.”

That’s an acknowledgment that a pop superstar’s job now extends well beyond creating and performing songs. In the era of streaming and social media, Beyoncé knows that her every public appearance and utterance will be scrutinized, commented on, cross-referenced, circulated as clickbait and hot-taked in both good faith and bad. Every phrase and image are potential memes and hyperlinks.

It’s a challenge she has engaged head-on since she released her visual album “Beyoncé” in 2013. For the last decade, even as her tours have filled stadiums, she has set herself goals outside of generating hits. Beyoncé has deliberately made each of her recent albums not only a musical performance but also an argument: about power, style, history, family, ambition, sexuality, bending rules. They’re albums meant to be discussed and footnoted, not just listened to.

“Cowboy Carter” is an overstuffed album, 27 tracks maxing out the 79-minute capacity of a CD and stretching across two LPs. It flaunts spoken-word co-signs from Willie Nelson and Dolly Parton that interrupt its flow; it includes some fragmentary, minute-long songs. Its sprawl is its own statement of confidence: that even half-finished experiments are worth attention.

The “Cowboy Carter” album cover is an opening salvo, brandishing western and American symbols: Beyoncé holding an American flag while riding a white horse sidesaddle, with platinum-blond hair proudly streaming. In a red-white-and-blue outfit, high-heeled boots and a pageant sash that reads “Cowboy Carter,” she’s a beauty queen and a white-hatted heroine claiming her nation — her country, in both senses. The politics of her new songs are vague and glancing, but the music insists that every style is her American birthright. As a pop star it is: Pop has always breached stylistic boundaries, constantly exploiting subcultures to annex whatever might make a song catchier.

Beyoncé grew up in Texas, where country music has long mingled with styles from jazz to blues to hip-hop — and where, in fact, early cowboys were enslaved Black men . Beyoncé met a racial backlash when she performed “Daddy Lessons,” a country song from her 2016 album “Lemonade” about gun-toting self-defense, with the (then-Dixie) Chicks at the 2016 Country Music Association Awards. Presumably that’s what she alluded to when she wrote on Instagram that there was “an experience that I had years ago where I did not feel welcomed.”

She wasn’t daunted. Instead she pushed further, and the mere prospect of Beyoncé releasing a country album stirred things up. Even before its release, “Cowboy Carter” prompted reminders of country’s obscured Black roots — like the African origins of the banjo and the genre’s long cross-pollination with the blues — and pointed at, yet again, its historical exclusion of nonwhite performers, despite a handful of exceptions like Martell, Charley Pride and, more recently, Darius Rucker, Mickey Guyton and Kane Brown.

What Beyoncé drew from country is productions that feature hand-played instruments — guitars, keyboards, drums — rather than the programmed beats and glittering electronics that propelled her 2022 album “Renaissance,” which also had Beyoncé on horseback on the cover and was subtitled “Act I.” That album was Beyoncé’s time-warped, multilayered homage to the electronic dance music that emerged from Black gay subcultures. “Cowboy Carter,” subtitled “Act II,” also scrambles eras and styles, with samples, electronics and multitracked vocal harmonies unapologetically joining the guitars.

The advance singles from “Cowboy Carter” paired “16 Carriages,” a booming arena-country song about Beyoncé’s industrious career and artistic drive, with the foot-stomping, banjo-picking “Texas Hold ’Em,” about enjoying Texas-style good times away from home. “Texas Hold ’Em” seized No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, making Beyoncé the first Black woman to do so, and topped the all-genre Hot 100.

If Beyoncé had merely wanted to make mainstream country hits, she could have hired a seasoned Nashville producer and had her pick of expert Music Row songwriters. But “Cowboy Carter” has different aspirations, and Beyoncé brought her own brain trust, including producers known for hip-hop and R&B. “This ain’t a Country album. This is a Beyoncé album,” she wrote on Instagram. That’s true.

“Cowboy Carter” leans into its anticipated discourse, openly interrogating categories and stereotypes and pointedly ignoring formulas. With historical savvy, Beyoncé enlisted Linda Martell — the Black country singer whose 1970 album, “Color Me Country,” included the first charting country hit by a Black woman, “Color Him Father” — to provide spoken words. For the intro of “Spaghettii” — which features Beyoncé rapping — Martell says, “Genres are a funny little concept, aren’t they? Yes, they are. In theory, they have a simple definition that’s easy to understand. But in practice, well, some may feel confined.”

Beyoncé gathers young Black women currently striving for country careers — Brittney Spencer, Reyna Roberts, Tiera Kennedy and Tanner Adell — on a remake of the Beatles’ veiled civil-rights song, “Blackbird.” It’s a careful gesture, though it might have been more substantial to write a new song with them.

The album includes some understated, largely acoustic contenders for country or adult-contemporary radio play — notably “II Most Wanted,” a duet with Miley Cyrus that harks back to Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide,” and “Levii’s Jeans,” a boast about being a “sexy little thing” that she shares with a besotted Post Malone. In the steady-thumping, Motown-tinged “Bodyguard,” Beyoncé plays an amorous, jealous but selfless partner in an uncertain romance. And in “Protector,” an acoustic-guitar lullaby, Beyoncé personifies a loving, supportive parent singing about “lifting you up so you will be raised.”

Beyoncé also reworks Parton’s “Jolene” — a country classic about a dangerous temptress — by turning it inside out. Where Parton’s 1973 original had her “begging” Jolene to stay away, in 2024 Beyoncé isn’t one to cede power. She starts out by “warning” Jolene and raises the threat level from there, reminding her target, “I know I’m a queen.”

Martell returns to introduce “Ya Ya,” explaining, “This particular tune stretches across a range of genres. And that’s what makes it a unique listening experience.” The song is a hand clapping, 1960s-flavored garage-rock stomp that samples Nancy Sinatra, quotes the Beach Boys and brandishes lines like “There’s a whole lot of red in that white and blue/History can’t be erased,” then moves on to dancing and lust. It’s not geared for any radio format. It’s just a romp.

It’s the odder, genre-fluid songs that give the album its depth. “Just for Fun” — a hymnlike duet with Willie Jones, a Louisiana songwriter who draws on country and R&B — plunges into Beyoncé’s somber low register as she sings, “I need to get through this/Or just get used to it.” “Riiverdance” deploys intertwined Celtic-tinged guitars and close-harmony backup vocals to sketch an enigmatic relationship that encompasses murder and resurrection and weekend seductions. And “II Hands II Heaven” is equally cryptic and celebratory; using an electronic pulse drawn from Underworld’s “Born Slippy (Nuxx),” it has Beyoncé and backup voices singing about whiskey, coyotes, God, sex and “Lost virgins with broken wings that will regrow.”

Beyoncé has been a stalwart of the full-length album, sequencing and juxtaposing songs in synergistic ways. But “Cowboy Carter” is a bumpier ride than “Renaissance,” “Lemonade” or “Beyoncé.” It suggests that Beyoncé wanted to pack all she could into one side trip before moving on elsewhere. Perhaps she’s already immersed in Act III.

Beyoncé “Cowboy Carter” (Parkwood Entertainment/Columbia)

Jon Pareles has been The Times’s chief pop music critic since 1988. He studied music, played in rock, jazz and classical groups and was a college-radio disc jockey. He was previously an editor at Rolling Stone and the Village Voice. More about Jon Pareles

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Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band Get Loose in Los Angeles

• By Ethan Millman

Ethan Millman

Three hours into Bruce Springsteen ‘s epic return to Los Angeles on Thursday night with the E Street Band, he stared down the sold-out crowd at the Forum. “Do you have anything left?” he shouted, midway through “Twist and Shout,” the second-to-last song of his first L.A. show in eight years. Five decades in, the magic of a Springsteen show remains: He always seems to have a little bit left in the tank. 

The 2024 version of the tour has been looser than last year’s, which stuck fairly close to a single set list, and Thursday was no exception. Springsteen kicked off with a true rarity, a cover of John Lee Hooker’s “Boom Boom” (most frequently played on the Tunnel of Love Express Tour back in 1988), before jumping into “Lonesome Day” (rarely played last year, but now a staple in the set) and “Prove It All Night,” then his live -favorite arena-rock reworking of Jimmy Cliff’s “Trapped.”

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Six dates into their return to the road, Springsteen and the E Street Band sounded like they had never been interrupted. “Are you having fun yet? Because we haven’t had fun yet,” Springsteen told the crowd just over an hour into his show. “This is our pre-fun. We’re here to wake you up, shake you up, and take you to higher ground. The E Street Band is here to bring the joyous power of rock & roll into your life. But we need your help. We plan on sending you home with your feet hurting, your hands hurting, your ass in paralysis, and your sexual organs stimulated.”

Springsteen maintains a remarkably simple setup and show presentation compared to the other blockbuster live shows currently on the road. The visuals are limited to video screens and elegant stage lights, keeping the focus on the 17 musicians onstage with him. He doesn’t really need much else. 

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From there, the show was all joy and catharsis, with an unbroken string of hits and live favorites, beginning with Nils Lofgren’s jaw-dropping guitar virtuosity on “Because the Night,” and inevitably reaching “Thunder Road” and “Born to Run.” As he has throughout the tour, Springsteen finished the show alone with his meditation on life after death, “I’ll See You in My Dreams.” 

Springsteen and the E Street Band will play another Forum show on Sunday.

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