At SXSW Springsteen Draws an All-Star Guest List AUSTIN, Tex. - Bruce Springsteen, of all people, used the word "Twitterverse" during his South by Southwest concert at ACL-Live at the Moody Theater, a 2,700-capacity room here where the public television series Austin City Limits is staged. On Thursday morning in his SXSW keynote speech he had praised the Animals, particularly the song "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" - about the son of a hard-working father, looking for a better life - as the source for "every song I've ever written." The Animals didn't write the song; it's by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil. Mr. Springsteen then demonstrated how similar the Animals" bass line in "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" was to the one in his own "Badlands," accusing himself of "successful theft" (although he actually switched it from a minor to a major key and changed its contour.) Mr. Springsteen also appreciated the Animals" general homeliness, he said, because at the time he considered himself "hideous." By Thursday night, through the Twitterverse, word had gotten to Eric Burdon, the Animals" lead singer, who happened to be in Austin and was apparently not too insulted to be described as "like your shrunken daddy with a wig on." Among the encores in a set that ran over two-and-a-half hours, Mr. Burdon performed "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" backed by Mr. Springsteen and his much-expanded E Street Band; his desperate growl was still there. That was SXSW's visibility and serendipity at work. Its status as a magnet for musicians brought more guest encores. A vocally and physically limber Jimmy Cliff, the reggae pioneer, took over the band for three encores, and in the finale - Woody Guthrie's "This Land Is Your Land" - Mr. Springsteen was joined by two of Austin's local musical heroes, Alejandro Escovedo and Joe Ely, along with members of Arcade Fire and the Low Anthem, Garland Jeffreys and Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine. Mr. Guthrie, a major inspiration for Mr. Springsteen's new album, "Wrecking Ball," would have been 100 on July 14 of this year, and Mr. Springsteen started the set with Guthrie's "I Ain't Got No Home," an itinerant worker's lament. His expanded band, which adds a horn section, backup singers and fiddle to the core E Street Band, treated it like a gospel song with six-part harmony. The bulk of the concert - apparently the framework of his coming arena tour - was almost exactly the set Mr. Springsteen played at the Apollo Theater. Thursday's concert added a nod to Texas in "Seeds," which is about a homeless man in Houston after an oil boom and bust. After vowing "to put a whuppin" session on the recession," Mr. Springsteen said, "As usual, we've got a story to tell you." With groups of songs segued together, the set was a series of cycles of struggle and hope, connecting the "Wrecking Ball" album to his longtime themes. Again and again, fist-shaking gave way to fist-pumping. "Shackled and Drawn," a foot-stomping song of desperate hard times, moved into "Waiting on a Sunny Day," which is rainy but more optimistic. "Wrecking Ball," about living with the knowledge of mortality, gave way to "Badlands," which insists things will turn around. The songs from "Wrecking Ball" often sound merrier than their lyrics, heading for a hootenanny, a New Orleans brass-band parade, an Irish dance or a mariachi serenade; their music embodies Mr. Springsteen's inclusive America. Older songs deploy the E Street Band as a wall of sound, a rhythm-and-blues revue and a righteously martial rock army. The set was also grounded in gospel music, from its opening harmonies to the way its closer, "Land of Hope and Glory" became a gospel-train medley with "This Train" and "People Get Ready." There was mourning, too, for longtime E Street Band members who have died: the keyboardist Danny Federici and the saxophonist Clarence Clemons. "We're missing a few," Mr Springsteen said, then added, "If you're here and we're here, then they're here." In "Tenth Avenue Freeze Out," after the line "the Big Man joined the band" - Mr. Clemons's nickname - Mr. Springsteen stopped the music and let the applause swell and swell. When the music resumed, with what had been Mr. Clemons's saxophone line, the whole horn section played it, as if Mr. Clemons was too mighty for a single substitute. Jake Clemons, his nephew, is now on tenor saxophone. It was deeply respectful, and then the music surged onward. No matter how tough things get, Mr. Springsteen reaches for redemption. The set list: 1. "I Ain't Got No Home" 2. "We Take Care of Our Own" 3. "Wrecking Ball" 4. "Badlands" 5. "Death to My Hometown" 6. "My City of Ruins" 7. "Seeds" 8. "The E Street Shuffle" 9. "Jack of All Trades" 10. "Shackled and Drawn" 11. "Waiting on a Sunny Day" 12. "Promised Land" 13. "The Rising" 14. "We Are Alive" 15. "Thunder Road" 16. "Rocky Ground" 17. Land of Hope and Dreams/People Get Ready Encores: 18. Jimmy Cliff: "The Harder They Come" 19. Jimmy Cliff: "Time Will Tell" 20. Jimmy Cliff: "Rivers of Babylon" 21. Eric Burdon: "We Gotta Get Out of This Place" 22. "Tenth Avenue Freeze Out" 23. This Land Is Your Land