41 Bruce's hit "Cover Me" was originally written for Donna Summer, but Landau persuaded Springsteen to keep it for himself. He wrote another song--"Protection"--for her.

42 Before Natalie Cole had a hit with Springsteen's song "Pink Cadillac," Bette Midler recorded her own version of the song but couldn't get Bruce's permission to release it.

43 Bruce celebrated his 30th birthday onstage at Madison Square Garden, and his 40th dancing with his mother at a small club in New Jersey.

44 On April 23, 1988, he led the crowd at the Los Angeles Sports Arena in singing "Happy Birthday" to Roy Orbison, who'd come to see the show on his 52nd birthday.

45 On Springsteen's own birthday exactly five months later, Orbison flew to Oakland, California, and surprised Bruce by coming onstage and leading the crowd in the same song.

46 During a 1993 New Jersey show, Springsteen performed Billy Ray Cyrus' country smash "Achy Breaky Heart."

47 His song "Lift Me Up," heard over the end credits of the John Sayles movie Limbo, is the first song Bruce has ever sung entirely in falsetto.

48 On the acoustic tour to support his dour album The Ghost of Tom Joad, Springsteen regularly performed a new song called "Pilgrim in the Temple of Love," one verse of which described a department store Santa Claus receiving oral sex in a car in the parking lot of a strip club. ("Pilgrim in the Temple of Love" remains unreleased.)

49 Dr. Ruth Westheimer once visited Bruce backstage and told him she liked what his songs had to say about love and sex but wished he'd mention contraception. "Gee," he replied, "it's going to be tough to get the word contraception into a song."

50 On the last day of rehearsals for the E Street Band reunion tour, Bruce invited fans who'd been hanging around outside the Asbury Park Convention Center to come in and listen.