Bruce Springsteen, SXSW, Austin, Texas, review Bruce Springsteen started his day at the SXSW music business festival with a speech intended to inspire the next generation of musicians and ended it with a masterclass in performance. Playing in the relative intimacy of the 2700 capacity Moody Theatre, Springsteen was effectively introducing a new version of his E Street Band, one that is swelling in number. The show started with 16 people on stage and ended with thirty, with guests drawn from other performers at the festival. Rage Against The Machine guitarist Tom Morello contributed a wild, flamboyant solo to a beefed up version of The Ghost of Tom Joad. Jimmy Cliff came on, bizarrely dressed like a red pixie, to run through reggae classics including The Harder They Come with Springsteen grinning on rhythm guitar. He loves playing with heroes and, in a strange and apparently unscripted piece of synchronicity, it turned out Eric Burdon of the Animals was in Austin, from whom Springsteen had earlier claimed he had "stolen" every song he'd ever written. Dues were paid with an aged and rather creaky Burdon lending his still raw and stormy voice to We Gotta Get Out Of This Place. The night concluded, after nearly three fantastic hours, with a rambunctious singalong version of Woody Guthrie's This Land Is Your Land, with country rocker Joe Ely and indie stars Arcade Fire taking verses, and hosts of other musicians crowding in on the chorus. Yet, for all the numbers, the band has been marked by an absence, the death last year of long serving saxophonist Clarence Clemons. On a rollicking Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out, Springsteen stopped dead on the line "the Big Man joined the band" and the audience hollered their noisy tribute for a minute or more. Conducting a "roll call," Springsteen asked "Are we missing anybody? Yeah, we're missing a few. Organ player Danny Federici died in 2008, the family nature of this ensemble acknowledged in Springsteen's declaration "as long as you're here and we're here, they're here." What he has done is to reshape the band, with a five piece horn section (including Clemons' sax playing son Jake) and three backing singers, a mixed-sex line up that is starting to take on the qualities of the kind of multicultural America Springsteen avows in his politics. The music too is shifting emphasis from his trademark epic rock to embrace folk, gospel, funk, soul, blues and even a dash of rap. The way it all cohere's into a whole around the still physically commanding figure of Springsteen is something to behold. There is just no let up in a set that morphs and shifts and holds your attention for every moment. It was only the band's second show, and there were some rough edges, detectable in knowing glances and laughter from musicians. When they come to Britain in June, they will surely be tighter, slicker, better paced. But the joy of this concert was in the way they all committed to it, played for each other with camaraderie and transparent delight at being back on the road, where they belong. Any young musician fortunate enough to have heard Springsteen's speech and witnessed this show will know exactly how high they have to aim if they ever want to reach the top of their profession. On this evidence, Springsteen will be the Boss for a while yet.