Steve Van Zandt doesn't mince his words. Bruce Springsteen's guitarist loves rock with a passion — and that's why he gets so mad at modern music.

A lot of new rock is second-rate, Van Zandt says, as his E Street Band tours festivals from Bonnaroo, Tenn., to Glastonbury, England. In a backstage interview at London's Hard Rock Calling in Hyde Park, he complained that it's become unfashionable for new bands to play live, many young fans have no idea of pop's history, and music executives never discuss the music itself.

Van Zandt, 58, is celebrating the growth of his weekly radio program, which plays on 200 stations across the U.S. and has just signed its first affiliate in England, Absolute Radio.

The show is called "Little Steven's Underground Ga- rage," after his nickname. He's also known as Miami Steve, or Silvio Dante, for his role in "The Sopranos" TV drama series. Now, one can foresee a "Professor Stevie": his Rock and Roll Forever Foundation, backed by teachers, congressmen and senators, aims to get rock on the U.S. curriculum.

"It's become uncool to play other people's songs, and that's absurd," Van Zandt says. "It has got to change. It's the reason why everything's so mediocre."

Van Zandt is famous for his work with Springsteen, who he has known for 40 years. This year has been busy for "The Boss" — a new CD, "Working on a Dream" (Sony), plus shows at the presidential inauguration and the Super Bowl.

He reckons it was with 1980's "The River," five LPs in, that the Springsteen band managed to capture on disc what they were doing live.

"The first rule of rock and roll is it's all about live," Van Zandt says. "Then you have to learn a second craft, which is making records. It should go in that order.

"Kids are now going from their rooms where they are learning the rudiments of playing and they go right to MySpace and Facebook. They are skipping the most important stage of their life, which is the bar-band stage.

"The energy that comes when you compel people to dance stays with you your whole career."

Van Zandt urges up-and-comers not to be pretentious, remember that rock is meant to be fun and pay more attention to the pre-1990s past.

"Half of the modern world goes back as far as Pearl Jam," he says. "The real historians go back to U2. But they need to go back further. They have to go back to the '50s and '60s, where things started. That's how you get to be your own personality, by studying the masters."