This was the second single taken from "The River", released in February 1981 in the U.S. and in Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. (In the UK and Europe, "The River" was released instead.) In the U.S., "Fade Away" was not as successful as the previous single from the album, "Hungry Heart", but still reached #20 on the U.S. pop singles chart. It was only performed sporadically on The River Tour, and not at all for nearly the first two months. The judgement behind its selection as the second single was questioned, considering the more radio-friendly songs on the record, and the choice was blamed for slowing down sales of the album. It was then dropped from Springsteen's concert repertoire completely, only rematerializing for a handful of solo renditions on the 2005 Devils &amp; Dust Tour. E Streeter Steve Van Zandt has proclaimed "Fade Away" as one of his favorite Springsteen songs, but thinks that it is not played in band shows because it is too slow. Regardless, he says, "It's just one of those funny, lost little gems, you know?" It was finally given an E Street Band performance again at Stockholms Stadion on June 7, 2009 during the European second leg of the Working on a Dream Tour; Springsteen made reference on stage to Van Zandt's desire to hear it. The song was performed once on the Wrecking Ball Tour on July 20, 2013 at King's Hall in Belfast; Springsteen made reference on stage that it was Van Zandt's favorite song. The song was played nightly during the North American leg of Springsteen's 2016 River Tour, where "The River" was played in its entirety. When the tour reached Europe, the album presentation format of the tour was dropped, with the exception of a few shows. "Fade Away" has not been performed outside of the album format.