I wrote about “You Mean So Much to Me” last month, tracing its evolution from a brassy Bruce Springsteen Band jam to a cool, jazzy showcase for the E Street keyboardists.
But the story doesn’t end there.
Although Bruce ditched “You Mean So Much to Me” part way through the Wild and Innocent Tour and never looked back, Bruce’s orphaned song found a new family.
When Bruce realized he wasn’t going to find a place for “You Mean So Much to Me,” and when Southside Johnny landed a record deal of his own, Bruce gifted his good friend with the song. Southside recorded it as a duet with Ronnie Spector with Steve Van Zandt producing, and the result was the definitive version of the song.
Or perhaps I should’ve said: the definitive studio version, because Southside and Ronnie take the song to the next level in their live performance on Ronnie’s Very Best of Ronnie Spector album.
But there’s still one more page to the story.
For two nights only in May of 1977, Ronnie Spector sang “You Mean So Much to Me” as a duet with the songwriter himself.
Originally billed as a Southside Johnny and The Asbury Jukes gig, Southside took sick and couldn’t perform. Steve Van Zandt rode to the rescue, creating an all-star revue called, well, The Asbury Park All-Star Revue, consisting of the Jukes, the E Street Band, Ronnie and Bruce.
The set list for each show (there were three across the two nights) consisted primarily of Southside songs, with a few Spector and Springsteen songs sprinkled in. But late in the encores came a special duet of a song Bruce hadn’t performed in more than three years and never would again.
Here’s one of those special performances, and the end of the line for Bruce’s custody of “You Mean So Much to Me.”
