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Mighty Max in Margate: Springsteen drummer plays a surprise Shore gig on his day off

The E Street Band drummer played for a crowd considerably smaller than the one at the band's Citizens Bank Park show.

E Street Band drummer Max Weinberg playing with the band the Weeklings on the balcony of a beach house in Margate on Thursday on his day off between Bruce Springsteen shows at Citizens Bank Park.
E Street Band drummer Max Weinberg playing with the band the Weeklings on the balcony of a beach house in Margate on Thursday on his day off between Bruce Springsteen shows at Citizens Bank Park.Read moreAmy Rosenberg
    by Dan DeLuca
    Published 

What do you do on your off day if you’re the drummer in Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band?

Why, naturally, you play a birthday party for a 90-year-old at a beach house in Margate.

On Thursday evening, fresh off playing a three-hour-plus show at Citizens Bank Park in South Philadelphia — where Springsteen & the E Street Band will return tonight — drummer Max Weinberg sat on his throne on the Atlantic Ocean-facing balcony of a Kenyon Avenue beach house and played to several dozen fans gathered on the sand below.

He was joined by the Weeklings, the seasoned central Jersey band featuring longtime rocker Glen Burtnik, which bills itself as “America’s most unique tribute to the music and inspiration of The Beatles.” The band also plays Beatles-inspired power-pop originals and covers. On Thursday, it played Springsteen’s “Ramrod,” “Glory Days,” and “Pink Cadillac” under a pink sky at sunset, as well as Tommy Tutone’s “867-5309.”

So what was Weinberg doing there? He’s a friend of the owner of the beach block house, a lifelong Springsteen fan who spoke to The Inquirer but asked not to be named.

The birthday party was for the owner’s mother, and cake was passed around on the beach for friends and fans who had gathered, as reported by The Inquirer’s Down the Shore Newsletter bureau chief Amy Rosenberg.

» READ MORE: Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band’s glory days are still very much here

The band playing with Weinberg on Kenyon Avenue included Burtnik and Bob Burger of the Weeklings. The duo often join the Springsteen drummer — who also was a TV house band leader with Late Night with Conan O’Brien and The Tonight Show — for gigs at Max Weinberg’s Jukebox, and have frequently performed at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, at the other end of Absecon Island in Atlantic City.