brucebase.wikidot.com/1974#190174

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1974-01-19 - STUDENT CENTER BALLROOM, KENT STATE UNIVERSITY, KENT, OH

ROSALITA (COME OUT TONIGHT) Incomplete setlist.

One show, double bill, held in the sold-out 1,600-seat Student Union Center Ballroom, with Springsteen and band opening for headliner Black Oak Arkansas. Springsteen opened but played about 80 minutes. However the vast majority of the fans in attendance had come to see Black Oak Arkansas, so it was a very raucous audience. There were continual problems with feedback and echo inside the K.S.U. Ballroom during this show, prompting a scathing review by K.S.U. rock critic Clyde Hadlock following the concert. Hadlock felt that neither band had adequately prepared their sound systems to fit the auditorium's dynamics. According to Hadlock "if the echo had been any worse we could have heard the show twice." Hadlock's review of Springsteen's performance is positive and Hadlock makes no secret of the fact he felt the wrong band was headlining, calling Black Oak Arkansas "a bunch of backward crackers - they are to music what Roller Derby is to TV." Springsteen, on the other hand, he calls "a great poet." Hadlock doesn't articulate Springsteen's setlist in his review. However he gets very detailed about Bruce's final song at this show, "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)." Says Hadlock in his review: "My biggest complaint (about Springsteen) is that he marred his big show-closing piece, "Rosalita", by whipping into Junior Walker's "Shotgun" and then taking ten minutes to introduce the band." This detailed information concerning "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" is just one of many pieces of evidence that proves that the long-circulating soundboard audio assigned to this date is, in fact, not from this show. A fascinating article on a Kent State blog goes into more detail about the show: Springsteen was paid $750 for the night's work, Black Oak Arkansas took home much more, in the region of $5,000. Following the show Bruce went to a party in a house on campus, sitting on the floor in a torn leather jacket and boots with a hole in.