Appears Tonight in San Juan Capistrano : Nils Lofgren: Sideman Steps Into Spotlight

Ambitious musicians who find themselves in supporting roles behind superstars tend to develop a craving for the spotlight, chafing until they finally leave to take their own shot at stardom and free self-expression.

Nils Lofgren would seem to fit the profile. A proven singer and songwriter accustomed to putting out records of his own, Lofgren has spent the past 5 1/2 years as the talented little rocker standing in the great, big shadow of Bruce Springsteen.

But Lofgren, who fronts an acoustic trio tonight at the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano, has no intention of giving up his sideman’s spot as guitarist for Springsteen’s E Street Band.

“As long as the E Street Band is together, I’ll be there,” he said.

It isn’t that Lofgren has quit his own quest for success. After nearly 20 years and 12 albums of his own, he says he still is committed to the dream of expanding his cult following into a large, mainstream audience. But the thought that Lofgren kept coming back to and underlining during a recent phone interview was not about stardom. Lofgren’s mantra is “I love to play so much.” And what better place to play than on E Street?

“When you’re in a band that great, you don’t ever want to stop,” Lofgren said from his home in Los Angeles. “You want it to go on indefinitely. It doesn’t matter what else I’m doing--I’ll drop it. When I’m working on my own music and Bruce calls, I don’t have that problem of ‘When am I going to do my own stuff?’ I’ve been doing it since I was 17.”

Lofgren, now 38, said he has recorded most of the songs for a new solo album that will be his first since “Flip,” a 1985 release recorded during a break in Springsteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” tour. Currently without a recording contract, Lofgren said he is hopeful that he can strike a deal with a record label and get the album released next year.

On “Flip,” the underlying theme was Lofgren’s determination not to be cast aside by the music business after all those years of trying without a hit. “Every creation has a purpose and mine is to rock,” he sang on “King of the Rock.” The song went on to issue a MacArthur-like vow: “Cold, cold world you will notice me / Cause the screams you hear come from a wounded warrior, bent on recovery, bent on discovery.”

“At the time I wrote it, I couldn’t get a record deal. I couldn’t get arrested,” said Lofgren, who is accompanied in his current swing of Southern California shows by his younger brother, Tom, and by Larry Cragg, who plays synthesizers and guitars. “They called me a dinosaur. I was sitting at home with a drum machine, saying to myself, ‘I love music too much to be passed over so lightly. I’ve got to have enough to offer not to be ignored.’ ”

It was an unfair fate for a musician whose work has always been marked by passionate, heart-on-sleeve singing and a distinctively intense guitar style. While some of Lofgren’s albums have been inconsistent (his two gems are “1+1,” a 1972 release by his early band, Grin, and “Nils Lofgren,” his 1975 solo debut), it was obvious that he was an all-around talent who deserved a forum.

Lofgren was smarting from being dropped by his record company when he went to visit Springsteen at his New Jersey home in 1984. The two had been friendly since meeting at an amateur night at the Fillmore West during their early scuffling days.

“We were watching MTV together and they announced that (Springsteen) had a new guitar player,” Lofgren said. “He said, ‘That’s just a rumor, that’s not true.’ ” But Lofgren used that opening to tell Springsteen that if the E Street Band ever did need a new guitarist, he would like to be considered. A while later, after Steve Van Zandt’s departure from the band became official, Lofgren got the call.

More recently, Lofgren got a call from Ringo Starr, who was putting together a band for his first tour since the Beatles. Lofgren said he had met Starr at a party during the “Born in the U.S.A.” tour and had kept in touch with him by phone. Having recently completed a U.S. tour as a member of Ringo’s All-Starr Band, Lofgren will be part of a Japanese tour with Starr later this month.

Starr is trying to work out a recording deal for the band, Lofgren said, with the idea of making an album and doing another tour next year. The All-Starr ensemble includes such high-profile rockers as Dr. John, Clarence Clemons, Joe Walsh, Billy Preston, Rick Danko and Levon Helm.

“I kind of laugh about it with the guys that I’m the only guy in the band who has never had a hit,” Lofgren said. But when Starr played at the Pacific Amphitheatre last month, it was Lofgren who jolted the show to life after it had lagged in the early going. His yearning anthem, “Shine Silently,” received a big ovation from an audience that probably included only a handful of people who had ever heard the song before.

It took some nerve for Lofgren to earn his first, career-launching endorsement from a major rock star. At the time, he was a Maryland kid who was planning to move to California with his unknown rock band, Grin.

“Neil Young was on his first tour with Crazy Horse at the Cellar Door in D.C.,” Lofgren recalled. “I was a crazy teen-ager determined to get something going. I snuck backstage into their dressing room. I was kind of manic.” Lofgren says he started peppering Young and his band with questions about the music business and rattling on about his own band and its plans and aspirations.

“Neil got tired of hearing it and handed me a guitar,” Lofgren said. “ ‘If you’re so good, let’s hear it.’ ”

Lofgren ran through a bunch of songs he had written for Grin, and an impressed Young became his patron. Lofgren played on Young’s 1970 album, “After the Gold Rush.” He also contributed two songs to Crazy Horse’s excellent debut album in 1971. Grin’s recording career began the same year. Lofgren was with Young again for the 1975 album, “Tonight’s the Night,” a landmark recording that is essentially a musical wake. “Tonight’s the Night” exposed the frayed-end emotions and spiritual exhaustion Young felt after the drug-related deaths of Crazy Horse guitarist Danny Whitten and Bruce Berry, the road crew member eulogized in the song, “Tonight’s the Night.”

Lofgren says the album’s special intimacy stemmed from Young’s decision to record it without rehearsals. “It was a very emotional period because Danny had died and Bruce Berry had died. We all played very emotionally. I admire Neil’s courage and vision for wanting to let the audience in on it, mistakes and all. He wanted to allow an audience to see how music is in that form, without the polished production.”

Lofgren last toured with Young in 1982. “I see Neil a couple times every year. We’re real close friends. I have a feeling sometime in the future we’ll work together.”

One musical collaboration that Lofgren has dreamed about hasn’t occurred yet: He would love to play with Keith Richards.

“What I’d like to do is just sit around with two guitars and jam,” said Lofgren, whose 1975 song, “Keith Don’t Go,” was a memorably urgent musical fan letter to Richards inspired by rumors that Richards was on the verge of succumbing to his drug problems. “Years later, a couple of people who had talked with him said he’d liked it. I’ve met him a few times, but he never discussed that song,” Lofgren said.

When Mick Taylor left the Stones in the mid-’70s, Lofgren called Richards and asked to be considered for the opening.

“Keith was kind enough to tell me, ‘We want Ron Wood. If he won’t do it, we’ll have open auditions in Geneva.’ The line would’ve gone around the world. I just wanted to let him know that I loved the band and I wanted to fit in if they couldn’t get the guy they wanted.”

One partnership that took Lofgren by surprise was his marriage nearly three years ago to actress Cis Rundle. From the beginning, one of Lofgren’s recurring lyrical themes had been that of the reticent lover, reluctant to commit to a relationship out of fear that his heart would be broken.

“For most of my life I had that attitude,” Lofgren said. “I was hoping never to fall in love because my only experience was negative. By the time you’re 30 you go through enough of them and you just get fed up. When I ran into Cis, at first I fought it. I’m still distrusting or disillusioned and apprehensive about relationships like that. But I just got lucky. I met the right girl. It calmed me down, and made me less crazy.”

And perhaps it will give Lofgren a new slant for his love songs. “I write a lot of semi-autobiographical stuff, mixed in with fiction,” he said. “This gives me a lot more positive stuff to relate to.”

Nils Lofgren plays tonight at 8 at the Coach House, 33157 Camino Capistrano, San Juan Capistrano. Admission is $19.50. Information: (714) 496-8930.