The Boss's horn section

If you were watching "Good Morning America" today, you may have seen a couple of familiar heads among the 17-piece band Bruce Springsteen has assembled for his jubilant folk-rock-swing-zydeco-country CD/DVD, "The Seeger Sessions."

That was Mark Pender with the bald head, the trumpet and the plunger mute; and that was indeed "La Bamba" next to him on the trombone. Both are members of the Max Weinberg 7 and Pender's from Kansas City, and a great guy.

Pender had emailed me earlier this month to note in passing that he might be doing "a little Springsteen touring" and that as a result, he would "probably miss my first couple of shows at Conan."  What he didn't say was he was a featured soloist on some of the CD's most exciting covers, "Jacob's Ladder" and "Mary Don't You Weep," nor that La Bamba, who also has never missed a Conan taping, was also in the band.

Anyway, I've stolen our music critic's CD this morning and it is a great ablum. And I would say that even if I weren't providing the Amazon clickthrough