Scope of Bruce Springsteen’s Surfing Roots Revealed at Asbury Park Music/Surf Festival

There’s a tale that has circulated around New Jersey for decades and only recently been more widely told.

In 1969, Asbury Park drummer and surfer Vini Lopez was putting a band together and asked a 19-year-old Bruce Springsteen to join. They played the now infamous Upstage Club on Cookman Ave. Lopez had found them a practice spot in nearby Neptune in the back of the Challenger East Surfboards Factory. They called themselves Steel Mill and shaper/owner of Challenger East, Carl “Tinker” West became their first manager.

Tinker, now 88, was a shaper and engineer who’d had experience with soundboards at large scale Grateful Dead shows in San Francisco. He was mowing foam at Challenger Surfboards in San Diego when he noted that 80 percent of the boards he made were going east. So, he packed up his tools and traveled to New Jersey where he produced boards for surf shops from Maryland to Maine. At its peak, he was churning out 60 boards a week, many of which are still ridden today.

The crew writing songs in the back would become Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. Tinker remained manager until 1972, the breakout era that included the release of Greetings from Asbury Park, as several members surfed and often ran with the local surf scene, including a Long Branch apartment next to Vince Troniec’s Islanders Surf Shop. Bruce, not one to waste his summer praying in vain for a savior to rise from his beach, would paddle out between tours. And Tinker was in the first class of inductees to the New Jersey Surfing Hall of Fame.

According to a 1975 Jim Kempton piece from the SURFER archives, the late, great sax player Clarence Clemons, recalled, “...Bruce was living in the back of Tinker’s Surf Shop, playing guitar, working on boards and writing songs.” Clemmons, aka “The Big Man,” also began riding waves when he joined the band. The story was most recently retold in more context in the film “We’re Still Here,” which examines New Jersey’s rich surf history and foundational surf shops.

The tapestry of the single-fin revolution happening on such a vibrant coast with radically different seasons and this rock n’ roll touchpoint is nothing less than legendary. And the folklore comes full circle this weekend when Springsteen headlines Sea.Hear.Now, the sold out festival of 35,000 that celebrates the confluence of music, art and surf on the beaches of Asbury Park, a partnership between C3 Presents under the direction of Tim Sweetwood and Asbury-based Between The Sets. Springsteen and the E Street Band play the Surf Stage at 8 p.m. Tinker West will be there.

The best surfers from the Mid-Atlantic will also be there, doing their wave dance on Asbury’s North Beach, just steps away from where 311, The Hives, Action Bronson, Noah Kahan, The Trey Anastasio Band, Peaches and others perform. When Jack Johnson headlined a few years ago, he actually paddled out on a fish before his set.

In another layer to the tale, Tinker will display boards he built with Monmouth County shaper, Charles Mencel off original templates he still has from the '60s, with the 1958 Skill 100 he drove cross country with to launch the label. One is a 9’0" hot dogger, the other a 10’0" racer adorned with the art of Sea.Hear.Now co-founder and lauded music photographer, Danny Clinch. The boards will be part of the Clinch’s Tranaparent Gallery portion of the festival.

“What an incredible experience this has been. As a kid growing up, if you wanted to build surfboards in Monmouth County, you always heard about Tinker. Challenger East was the start of the lineage of everything we have here now,” said Mencel, who first had to win Tinker’s trust and then shaped the boards with him in Tinker’s garage in Highlands, New Jersey.

It also afforded Mencel an opportunity to meet The Boss.

“He’s cool as shit,” beams Mencel, “Just super mellow, super aware. It was mind blowing and I was lucky to be a part of it.”

And on Sunday, after the action, the surfers will watch New Brunswick New Jersey’s alterna/folk/rock/punk favorites warm things up on the Park Stage before the legendary Mr. Springsteen himself takes the Surf Stage

“We’ve had crazy access to the stage,” said Mike Gleason, the state’s respected power surfer and barrel rider. Gleason is coming off a busy season with a growing family and running his surf/tackle retail shop Tak Waterman.

“The first year they did this, myself, my wife Tina, Pat Schmidt and his wife Quincy climbed up on this catwalk and we’re watching Incubus from right above the stage. And we looked over on the catwalk and there’s Jack Johnson watching with us. And when my kids were born, standing in the sand, dancing with them to the bands is amazing.”

The surf crew doesn’t see it as much of a contest as a showcase where they’re entertaining the crowd, showing off the state’s waves and talent to rock fans. With the region’s best filmers involved, the action in the water is broadcasted up to jumbo screens next to the stages, tying surf to music in a way that’s not been done before. This year will feature Balaram Stack, Cam Richards, Sam Hammer, Audrey Iglay, Logan Kamen, Jamie DeWitt, Cassidy McClaine, Rob Kelly, Paul Francisco, Tommy Ihnken and Cole Deveney.

Elaborate art installations on the beach make for an incredible experience, specifically the work of local artist Pork Chop. Also featured are the surf photography of former Surfer Mag staffer/Eastern Surf Mag publisher, Dick ‘Mez’ Messeroll and former ESM staff photog Donald Cresitello.

“This is the surf community that’s been doing events together for 20+ years. We’re all hanging and watching our families grow,” Gleason added. He’s excited for Bruce, noting that when the Boss came on stage with Social Distortion at this festival in 2018 was one of the highlights of this festival over the years.

Springsteen has a way of transcending generations and few artists represent a socio-geographic region like he does for the middle class of the New Jersey Shore, specifically the diversity and sonic history of Asbury Park, which buoyed the town through its famed City of Ruins days. Asbury was a thriving resort city at the turn of the century that famously fell to depression, fires, corruption and neglect. This city has seen more rapid gentrification than any other town, largely because just 20 years ago, the beachfront was still all but abandoned - a wild frontier for skaters, bikers, creatives and a few intrepid surfers. And yet, Bruce will take the stage a block from the Stone Pony (50 years old this year) and in the shadows of 100-year-old Convention Hall, places that saw his most legendary performances and have managed to avoid the wrecking ball that has crushed so many other coastal beacons of culture.

“What it means to this place is just hard to quantify,” says Tim Donnelly, Sea.Hear.Now’s co-founder and partner.

“15 years ago, we were the only ones on the beach. There would be five of us on the peak on an epic day. Now, there's more of us on the peak and the beach is packed. It feels the whole world is here to hang with us and soak in the vibe that has been created That is pretty radical.”

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