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1958-1964

The only source of information about the early years of Springsteen's musical career are the Bruce's testimony he himself submitted under oath as part of his 1976 management suite with Mike Appel.
According to those declarations, the very first band that Bruce came in contact with was called "THE ROGUES".
Even if not providing any specific date, Bruce talked about a gig with THE ROGUES played at the Elks Club in Freehold, saying that had been the first time he was paid to perform.
In his deposition, Bruce also vaguely mentions other gigs as a member of THE ROGUES.
No other information on this pre-Castiles period are available by now.
Apart from the 1976 deposition, Bruce has always talked about The Castiles as his first-ever 
band and he has never even mentioned any other earlier band affiliation.
It is known from Bruce's interviews that he was bought a guitar in "late 1950’s", but it is also known that h did not seriously started to learn playing it until he went across The Beatles performing on the Ed Sullivan TV show, which dated in february 1964.
Bruce has stated that he "locked himself up in his room for many months trying to learn how to play", and this basically sets the date of the first Bruce paid performance in the spring / summer of 1965, with summer more likely, considering he was in the 2nd year of high school in that period.
THE ROGUES were based in Rumson-Fairhaven and were specialized in surf-related music. They became a popular band of the local shore area in spring / summer of and they remained popular until mid-1967. They often played at the same shows as THE CASTILES.
THE ROGUES members in that period (see below) were from Rumson, Fairhaven or New Shrewsbury they were aged around Bruce's age and their ages ranged from a year younger to two years older 
than Springsteen. More than a full-member of THE ROGUES, Bruce is believed to have been a sort of "practice boy" accepted in the band. He practiced pretty good, didn't he?

"THE SIERRAS" were formed in late 1964 by George Theiss (rhythm guitar, vocals), Bart Haynes (drums, vocals), Mike DeLuise (guitar) and Vinnie Roslin (bass). They spent the most part of their short life in rehearsal and the only (by now) known shows they regularly performed were a couple of gigs at "The Elks Club". Around February 1965 Vinnie Roslin quit THE SIERRAS to join another local group, "THE MOTIFS". Vinnie Roslin had affirmed in an interview that when he quit THE SIERRAS he had not met or heard of Springsteen, and Tex Vinyard had still not contacted THE SIERRAS with any management offer. 
Vinnie Roslin was replaced in THE SIERRAS by a new bass player named "Henry", and a couple of weeks later an additional vocalist named "Danny" was taken in the group. We are in April 1965, and Tex Vinyard contacted the band after hearing them practicing in Bart Haynes' house, next to his. Under Vinyard management, in a couple of months or even less, "Danny", "Henry", and Mike DeLuise were dropped and the only members remained Theiss and Haynes. At this point (May 1965) George Theiss changed the name of the group from THE SIERRAS to "THE CASTILES". Frank Marziotti was taken in the group as bass player and Paul Popkin as a new vocalist. Bruce was still not involved:

The no-Springsteen Castiles group was very short-lived and is not known to have ever been paid to perform a single gig. In early summer of 1965 Tex Vinyard hired Bruce Springsteen as lead guitarist:

Vinny Manneillo replaced Bart Haynes in October:

Curt Fluhr replaced Frank Marziotti in late February, originating the "Castiles" as known from the most part of the surfaced registrations:

Springsteen leaves Castiles in August 1968 to form a new band with John Graham and Michael Burke. He first met them in May 1968 at The Off Broad Street Coffee House 
and had been jamming informally with them during the May-July period:

In February 1969 it is know that Vini Lopez was looking for people to form a new band and attended to one or more Earth shows, for sure it was present at the last one, 14-Feb-1969. In late February at least two times Springsteen, Lopez, Roslin and Federici, gathered for jam sessions which eventually made "CHILD" born: 

A progressive rock band called "CHILD", which already published and Album was the reason of the name-changing from CHILD to STEEL MILL:

After the 28-Feb-1970 show, Vini Roslin was fired and replaced by Steve Van Zandt:

Robbin Thompson was offered a position as vocalist in the group. Accepted:

In December 1970 Bruce decided to end STEEL MILL and to find new directions. From late January 1971, until May 1971 he jammed around a lot, playing as guest with other local groups:

At a certain point of the "jamming experience", Bruce formed the very short-lived "Dr. Zoom & the Sonic Boom" band, which is known to have been performed only two shows:

After that, another couple of months was spent jamming with various local bands (see the setlist section for more information about those groups). Steve was often involved in those groups Bruce played with, and Bruce also became for a few shows a core band member of the SUNDANCE BAND:

Those infinite jam sessions, guesting appearances and experiments, finally lead to the creation of the:

The BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN BAND was actually overloaded of members, and Bruce recorded GREETINGS with a very small part of them. Anyway Bruce did not still have a "touring" band and made the rehearsals with what we know as the first E STREET BAND, thus it was still more than a year away from being billed with that name.

David Sancious "official" debut with the band, even if he already performed in a couple of gigs:

The E Street Band #2 (early, still unnamed)

Before the beginning of the 12-Feb-1974 show, there was a hard discussion between the "road manager" Steve Appel and Vini Lopez, and after the show, Bruce firmly asked Vini Lopez to resign and leave the group immediately. He was then replaced by Ernest "Boom" Carter, and some shows was cancelled in the meanwhile.

Max and Roy join the band, which is now officially known and billed as "THE E STREET BAND". Suki Lahav would join in a couple of weeks:

Steve Van Zandt officially joins the E STREET BAND. In the meanwhile, Suki Lahav decided to leave the band to come back in Israeli with her husband:

In 1982 Bruce did what nobody expected him to do: Nebraska. A solo album followed by no tour but a year of guesting / jamming with pretty unknown groups of the Jersey scene in NJ and NY clubs and bars. When he called back the boys, Steve Van Zandt decided not to follow Bruce in the BORN IN THE USA adventure, and was replaced by Nils Lofgren:

In 1992 Bruce decided to try to explore new musical directions, and with a totally new band recorded the HUMAN TOUCH / LUCKY TOWN albums, performing a long 2-leg tour with them. The new band never entered the heart of Bruce's fan and they probably did not even go near the level of perfection and unionships the old E STREET BAND had had. This was probably what Bruce wanted, obliging himself to play knew song with new musical ideas, rather than ending up singing the old anthems of his past. "Born to run" is played acoustically, "Thunder Road", "Bobby Jean", "The River", and other old great songs are played in tour in a way the people can not easily recognize. Seems like Bruce want to demonstrate himself he can still doing something new:

In 1995 Bruce did it again. Like 13 years before he tries the 'solo way' to express himself, publishing THE GHOST OF TOM JOAD followed by a long two years solo tour. Then BLOOD BROTHERS, and moreover, TRACKS, put the E STREET BAND together again, with both Nils and Steve for the REUNION and RISING tour