CD Odyssey Disc 1473: Bruce Springsteen

I had an online event tonight, but it ended early. Instead of staring blankly at Netflix, I’m going to write this music review. Then I’ll sit and stare blankly at Netflix.

Disc 1473 is…. Letter to You

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 2020

What’s up with the Cover? This isn’t quite a Giant Head Cover. It is maybe two-thirds of the way there, but that’s it. Bruce looks cold here, but he’s aged well. According to the Interwebs he’s got a net worth of about $500 million, so you can afford a lot warm jackets and high end skin care products with that kind of dosh.

How I Came To Know It: Just another long-time fan checking out the boss’ latest to see if it appealed. It did.

How It Stacks Up: Out of my 12 Springsteen records, “Letter to You” comes in at #10, good enough to bump “Western Stars” and “Devils & Dust” down one spot each, but not so much as to dig into the classic catalogue. And here’s the full list…for now.

1. Darkness at the Edge of Town: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 612)
2. Nebraska: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 948)
3. Born in the U.S.A.: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 769)
4. Tunnel of Love: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 761)
5. The Promise: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 305)
6. The Rising: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 741)
7. The River: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 654)
8. Born to Run: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 574)
9. Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 506)
10. Letter to You: 3 stars (reviewed right here)
11. Western Stars: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 1424)
12. Devils & Dust: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 695)

Ratings: 3 stars

There’s a great moment in Alfred Lord Tennyson’s poem Ulysses where the titular character calls his friends around and says:

“Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho'
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;

These lines, where Ulysses acknowledges old age yet refuses to capitulate to it, echoed in my mind as I listened to “Letter to You.” No, this record is not “Nebraska” nor is it “Darkness” but it is still a solid collection of songs from a man who long ago ceased having to prove anything, but still puts himself out there and makes quality music.

This review won’t be all roses and light, so let’s start with the good stuff. First off, Bruce Springsteen has taken care of his voice. He’s always had the advantage of a multi-octave instrument with a natural rasp that makes every story he tells feel deep and meaningful. The Boss is now 71 years young, but it isn’t limiting him here. He sounds amazing and if he’s hiding anything in the song construction, he’s done it so smoothly I never noticed.

Many of these songs, including “One Minute You’re Here”, “Last Man Standing” and “Ghosts” confront mortality from a place of acceptance and honest retrospection. Sometimes Springsteen is remembering those now gone, and sometimes he’s keenly aware that he’s still here, but that long black ribbon is getting closer to the darkness. And while “One Minute You’re Here” has a weary quaver, and the others more anthemic, none feel morose. If anything, “Ghosts” is an anthem for the ages, and when Springsteen thunders out “I’m alive/I can feel the blood shiver in my bones” you will feel that same shiver. And you will like it.

That said, when I first this line, I thought he was singing “I can feel the blood sugar in my bones” which wasn’t quite as heroic. Every Springsteen record has to have a couple songs like this. On the third track at first I thought he wanted to take me on his “murder train,” and then on my next listen, “bullet train.” Turns out it was “burnin’ train.” This was marginally better than the first option but not nearly as good as the second.

Springsteen digs into his past for “Janey Needs a Shooter” which is a reworking of a song he cowrote years earlier with Warren Zevon. In Zevon’s version it’s Jeannie and it’s a song of the old west. Springsteen’s version is set in a stark urban landscape. I prefer the Zevon version, but both work.

There are also moments where I was less impressed. Sometimes Springsteen gets obsessed with an idea, such as “House of a Thousand Guitars” which might be a fun phrase to sing but made for a hackneyed image. On “Rainmaker” he invokes “Yahweh” when the line works just fine with the less pretentious “God”.

“If I Was the Priest” is one of my favourite songs on the record, and a great example of Springsteen blending the stark western feel of “Nebraska” with the lush lyrical quality of something of Asbury Park. This tune, where he imagines Jesus as the sheriff (trust me, it works) he had me in the palm of his hand. At around 4:45 it breaks down naturally to a single piano and the great final line for any western “I told him I was already overdue for Cheyenne”. That moment sits on an unresolved melody, which is exactly what the song needs to leave you staring into the middle distance and wanting to hear it all again.

Except, it doesn’t end. Instead, Springsteen decides to launch into another couple minutes of chorus repetition, harmonica wails and a lengthy electric guitar fadeout. It feels like he’s trying to capture the vigor of his live performances, but all it does is take a perfect song and drag it out without purpose.

After all these decades of brilliance, though, I can forgive the Boss a few long fadeouts the same way I patiently endure his self-serving musical documentaries. In the end, his talent makes it all worth it. Keep sailing, Bruce – you’ve still got it.

Best tracks: One Minute You’re Here, Janey Needs a Shooter, Last Man Standing, If I Was a Priest, Ghosts

CD Odyssey Disc 1424: Bruce Springsteen

Sorry for the delay, dear readers. It was one of those weeks where all that stuff adult life requires gets in the way of the hobbies.

Back to the music, where it feels like not long ago that I was summarizing my complete collection of Bruce Springsteen records. Now I have two more, including this next review. What can I say? The guy keeps putting out good music.

Disc 1424 is…. Western Stars

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 2019

What’s up with the Cover? A horse caught mid-gallop. I expect this picture was taken at some sprawling dude ranch owned by the Boss.

How I Came To Know It: I am a fan so I always check out Springsteen’s latest work. I don’t always like it, but I often do, and that was the case with “Western Stars.”

How It Stacks Up: I now have 12 Bruce Springsteen albums, but I’m not quite ready to rank where his 2020 release comes in (needs more listens). Instead, I’m going to rank “Western Stars” as though I only have 11. And of those 11 it comes in...10^th. Good enough to beat out “Devils & Dust” but not anything else.

Ratings: 3 stars

People who don’t like that Springsteen’s later albums have a kind of affected “ordinary man” vibe haven’t been listening very carefully to his earlier albums. All his albums sound like that. For the most part, they’re all pretty damned good at it. On “Western Stars” Springsteen feels a bit more affected than usual, but his natural talent for songwriting and storytelling still yields a few gems and makes the listen worthwhile.

I think this record is intended as a loose concept album. Or maybe more specifically, a drawn-out character study where the character is – I think – some California dwelling former stuntman living out on a farm. Think Brad Pitt in “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” except where the stuntman is even more chill, has a pet horse instead of a pet dog, and does a lot of introspection as he drives (or rides) around the desert.

The music and arrangements are deliberate, with Springsteen aiming for an anthemic, orchestral sound that evokes big wide-open plains and deserts. If you’re looking for the stark desolate sounds of “Nebraska” you won’t find it here. Springsteen’s later-life high plains drifter sees a desert teeming with life and memory, and decidedly less murder. I admit I wanted the record to have slightly more murder. Not all murder, or anything, but maybe one or two good ballads to keep things interesting.

But I digress…

All that anthemic flair can really interfere with the storytelling. “Sleepy Joe’s Café” has a rockabilly core, but it is totally drowned in production. Think “Mary’s Place” from “The Rising” but instead of the desperate joy of a community recovering from 9/11, just a bunch of old dudes getting quietly drunk.

The worst is probably “The Wayfarer” which feels like a somber jingle for “Wayfair” the online furniture store, if the ad was aimed at online indie kids living in rural Nevada. “Chasin’ Wild Horses” is a beautiful melody that would be one of the album’s better songs, but the soaring strings at the end sounded a bit too much like the theme from Jurassic Park.

The album also has plenty of wins, however. Springsteen’s Wistful Stuntman songs can be solid, and you get a real sense of the character on both “Western Stars” and “Drive Fast (The Stuntman)”. “Western Stars” is particularly good, with Springsteen singing in that timeless quaver of his, drawing you in to a man finding acceptance in the autumn of his years, even as he reflects back to glory days in lines like:

“Once I was shot by John Wayne, yeah, it was near the end
That one scene’s bought me a thousand drinks, set me up and I’ll tell it for you, friend.”

“There Goes My Miracle” is a bit schmaltzy with those ever-present strings, but it also shows how well Springsteen’s vocals have held up over the years. He can still bring it, and if that hook in the chorus doesn’t make you want to sing along then you may be a little dead inside.

The album ends with one of the album’s best. “Moonlight Motel” is a love letter to a relationship ended, seen through the dilapidated desert hotel now abandoned and overgrown. After all the bombast of strings and excess production, Springsteen wisely lets his best quality – songwriting and singing – shine through here at the end. The result is a bittersweet tale where you can taste both the desert air and the regret still hanging in it years later.

Compared to many other Springsteen albums covering similar ground, “Western Stars” is hampered by its production values, as well as the Boss’ efforts to shoehorn a story where a series of vignettes would have better served his purpose. However, there is still plenty of good stuff here, and well worth a listen.

Best tracks: Tucson Train, Western Stars, There Goes My Miracle, Moonlight Hotel

CD Odyssey Disc 948: Bruce Springsteen

For the second straight review the CD Odyssey delivers a 5 star album. Last time it was a bright and shiny newcomer. This time, it is a music veteran.

Disc 948 is….Nebraska

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 1982

What’s up with the Cover? A lonely stretch of back road. I’m going to go out on a limb and say it is somewhere in Nebraska, but as a west coast guy all that flatland pretty much looks the same to me. I’d rather have oceans and mountains but since this record isn’t about getting what you want, the cover is appropriate.

How I Came To Know It: Once I was hooked on Springsteen, I began drilling through his collection, starting in the period I liked his sound the most. Coming out in 1982, “Nebraska” fell right into that sweet spot, and didn’t disappoint.

How It Stacks Up:  I have ten Bruce Springsteen albums. This one is my second favourite. It is also the last of his records left for me to review, so let’s recap:

1. Darkness at the Edge of Town: 5 stars (reviewed at Disc 612)
2. Nebraska: 5 stars (reviewed right here)
3. Born in the U.S.A.: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 769)
4. Tunnel of Love: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 761)
5. The Promise: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 305)
6. The Rising: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 741)
7. The River: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 654)
8. Born to Run: 4 stars (reviewed at Disc 574)
9. Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 506)
10. Devils & Dust: 3 stars (reviewed at Disc 695)

Ratings: 5 stars

When an album entirely composed of remakes of songs from “Nebraska” can score four stars on the CD Odyssey, it is a pretty good bet I liked the original.

This album s a masterpiece, as stark and bleak as the album cover would suggest. Characters struggle to get by, sometimes making good choices, sometimes not.

Falling between hit machines “The River” (1980) and “Born in the U.S.A.” (1984) this record is sometimes overlooked by radio-friendly North America, but that would be a mistake.

“Nebraska” is a quiet record, with light lo-fi production, and a heavy focus on lyrics and sparse instrumentation. If you’re looking for Clarence Clemons to blast a saxophone lick, you’re going to be disappointed. In fact, I found sections of the record to be a bit too lo-fi. The whole record was essentially recorded as a demo tape, and some of those imperfections (changes in volume, Springsteen mumbling a word here and there) pull you out of the experience.

And that quibble is the only one you’re going to hear from me about “Nebraska”. This is a great record, filled with some of the best songwriting Springsteen has ever delivered.

The opening (and title) track is a master class in storytelling. A low and mournful harmonica starts you out on the cold plains of Nebraska, and the colder streets of Lincoln. From there, a broken and damaged man and a young girl tear through Wyoming, murdering ten people before meeting their end in the electric chair. Well, he ends up in the chair. He requests she sit on his lap when they pull the switch, but I don’t think they allow that kind of thing.

Springsteen’s ability to capture the numb disconnect of the narrator is captured at the song’s conclusion:

“They declared me unfit to live

said into that great void my soul’d be hurled.

They wanted to know why I did what I did

Sir, I guess there’s just a meanness in this world.”

Yikes.

Later on the record, a guy down on luck takes his fading love to “Atlantic City” to make a little extra money doing something shady, another man contemplates the local prison on the hill. On “State Trooper” people pray that they don’t get pulled over by the cops, on “Used Cars” kids scowl and lose their innocence watching their parents get chiseled by used car salesmen. On “My Father’s House” the character arrives too late to reconcile with his father, who has died or moved out but either way, is gone.

That stark production I complained about earlier fits these desperate stories like a fingerless glove held over a burning barrel on a winter night; stained and frayed but serviceable with a sense that it ‘belongs’.

The record’s best song is “Highway Patrolman.” It is about two brothers: one a highway patrolman, and the other a ne’er-do-well. Again, Springsteen tells a tale of honour and sacrifice through the prism of one man’s moral dilemma, letting the specifics of that story represent those bigger concepts. The song begins:

“My name is Joe Roberts, I work for the state.

I’m a sergeant out of Perrinville, barracks number eight

I always done an honest job, as honest as I could

I got a brother named Frankie, and Frankie ain’t no good.”

Watching Joe Roberts try to reconcile his commitment to justice and his inability to get his brother to walk the straight and narrow is both heart-rending and emotionally complicated. That complicated feeling persists until the song’s end, when (spoiler alert) Joe lets Frankie escape to Canada.

For all the bleakness, however, Springsteen’s core of optimism remains, even if it is shining through in distorted ways. Joe Roberts holds onto his humanity even though he has to violate his sworn oath to the state to do so.

The record ends with “Reason to Believe” which on a record as stark as “Nebraska” is the perfect tonic for the troubled mind. “Reason to Believe” doesn’t offer up any easy solutions either. A man runs over a dog, a woman is left by her man. A boy grows up and lives his whole life in poverty, and a man gets left at the altar. Yet the musical backdrop to all this misery is an up-tempo almost hopeful tune. As Springsteen triumphantly sings in the chorus “At the end of every hard-earned day, people find some reason to believe.”

It isn’t much of a victory, to be sure. It should ring hollow given all the human misery we’ve heard on the record, but somehow it makes us feel a little better – that somehow enduring through tough times is its own reward.

The real reward here is the masterpiece of mood and music that is “Nebraska”. Beautiful to listen to and as affecting and though-provoking on the tenth listen as the first time you hear it.

Best tracks: all tracks

CD Odyssey Disc 769: Bruce Springsteen

Two of my friends are on anti-clutter kicks so last night I was inspired to give a kitchen drawer a thorough cleaning. It was exhilarating. A few moments ago I went to get something and ended up cleaning up about twenty items out of the next drawer before I could tear myself away. Getting rid of clutter just feels good.

So does music, which is why you’re actually here. Let’s talk about that, shall we?

Disc 769 is….Born in the U.S.A.

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 1984

What’s up with the Cover? This is what the start of the movie “Patton” would’ve looked like if Patton had been the town mechanic instead of a five star general.

How I Came To Know It: Everyone my age knows this album. In 1984 this record was inescapable.

How It Stacks Up: Only 9 albums ago I hinted that there was a three way tie for second place with “Tunnel of Love” and two other records. This is the first of those two. In fact, I’m going to bump “Tunnel of Love” down to fourth and put this one third instead.

Ratings: 4 stars but almost 5

Think for a second about the first note on the title track of “Born in the U.S.A.” Do you hear the snap of the snare drum’s first beat? Maybe for you it starts with the clarion call of the organ up high in the mix. You probably glossed right over that low gloomy piano chord, which is how it actually starts. It’s little moments like that, flitting subtly past your ears, which are key to why this album is as good as it is.

That gloomy piano is in the background through the whole song, ponderously alternating between two chords like the rest of the song, only sadder and in the background. It is like an old dog that can’t quite keep up with his master on the morning walk anymore, but is resigned to plod along behind faithfully anyway. I won’t belabor the oft-made point that this song’s triumphant sound is undercut by lyrics that are all about the American dream gone wrong. I just wanted to note that the song undercuts itself as well, and is another example of Springsteeen’s subtle genius.

An apparent tonic from the oppressive gloom of Sprinsteen’s previous album “Nebraska,” “Born in the U.S.A.” is still an album that wants to explore the tales of the downtrodden. It just does so at a faster tempo and with more saxophone.

Normally all the horns and bells and whistles on an album like this would just annoy me, but “Born in the U.S.A.” has a magical quality that makes it all work. The good old boys partying for the 4^th of July on “Darlington County” are just having a good time, and a little horn section makes it all the more festive.

This could be the same guys on the next track, gleefully laying blacktop on “Working on the Highway.” With all that hand clapping and jumpy organ, it sounds like working on the highway is the best gig in town, until you realize the guy is actually on a prison road crew. And then you realize that if you hadn’t been listening really carefully, you’d probably thought it was just this guy’s job. But the song’s structure made the mistake an easy one to make.

“Glory Days” tells the stories of people living in the past. A kid who didn’t quite make the big leagues, still tells high school stories at the local pub. A former beauty queen now divorced with two kids is now resigned to her life. Even the narrator of the song, who is keenly aware of the denial all around him, chooses the same path:

“Think I’m going down to the well tonight

And I’m gonna drink till I get my fill

And I hope when I get old I don’t sit around

Thinking about it, but I probably will

Yeah, just sitting back trying to recapture

A little of the glory of,

But time slips away and leaves you with nothing mister

But boring stories of glory days.”

Seeing the road to hell leading straight to your local and walking it anyway.

There are moments of redemption and small victories throughout “Born in the U.S.A.” as well, but they are always tinged with doubt. “I’m on Fire” is a love song, but tinged with the slow burn of desire for a woman who’s not in your arms. “No Surrender” is an anthem of protest, where the only solace left in an unjust world is that your woman is now there for you when you turn out the lights.

“If there is a true moment of redemption, it comes on “Dancing in the Dark,” where Springsteen acknowledges that we are in the dark, but we’re dancing, and that optimism is the spark you need to carry you through the hard times.

The record ends with “My Hometown” – a song about the slow and recurring pace of small town life, and how people hang on to their old lives, generation to generation, even though the textile plant is closing and the jobs are gone.

“Dancing in the Dark” and “My Hometown” are my two favourite songs on the album, despite both having a fuzzy production that wrecked a lot of lesser records at this time. Springsteen avoids the excess futzing that nibbles around the edges of his next record, “Tunnel of Love.” Instead, the production here puts a layer of artifice on top of deeply emotional content. The distance created gives you a perspective that you need in order to see the character’s Springsteen’s raspy vocals bring to life. It is the energy you need to believe that these characters can break free of their chains (real or metaphorical) and get the hell out of town. They never do, but it is the tension from them being on the verge that makes you keep listening for a miracle.

This whole album is about the broken dreams of America, but it is also about the chutzpah and bottomless well of enthusiasm that just can’t be knocked out of the working man. Does that refusal to give in make the stories on this album more or less tragic? I think Springsteen wants you to decide that for yourself. As far as I’m concerned you can’t start a fire without a spark, and this album is that spark.

Best tracks: Born in the U.S.A., County, Working on the Highway, Downbound Train, I’m On Fire, No Surrender, Glory Days, Dancing in the Dark, My Hometown – yes, that’s 8 of the 12 songs on the album. I told you it was close to 5 stars.

CD Odyssey Disc 761: Bruce Springsteen

I’m on the early shift at work and I’ve just risen from a satisfying nap (even more satisfying after I kicked my begging cat out of the bedroom).

Disc 761 is….Tunnel of Love

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 1987

What’s up with the Cover? Lest you think that only production values sucked in 1987, here’s a cover to remind you that fashion, haircuts and – yes – even fonts were all total crap as well.

How I Came To Know It: When I met Sheila she was raving about how great this album was. She was right.

How It Stacks Up: We have 10 Springsteen albums and would rank “Tunnel of Love” 3^rd on that list although in many ways it is in a three-way tie for second with two other albums. Since I’ve reviewed neither of the other ones, I’ll let their names remain a mystery.

Ratings: 4 stars

“Tunnel of Love” is one of very few albums so good that not even 1987 production values could wreck it.

It isn’t from lack of trying, though. The drums on “Tougher than the Rest” are electronic and dull and the most touching moment on “Walk Like a Man” is inexplicably punctuated with schmaltzy organ solos. The only song that escapes the sabotage unscathed is the title track, and that’s because the carnival feel of the song is well-suited to the empty majesty of a theme park ride. Wait…on a closer listen even “Tunnel of Love” has a weird eighties dance intro that sounds like in a Debbie Gibson song from the same year. Fortunately it only lasts twenty seconds and then Bruce gets down to business.

And that last paragraph is the only bad thing I have to say about this album. The songwriting on this record is as solid as anything Springsteen has recorded, he sings with conviction and power and thematically the album holds together in all its tragic and romantic glory. These songs are too good to fail.

I don’t usually get into behind-the-scenes bumpf when reviewing an album, but it is worth noting that Springsteen recorded “Tunnel of Love” while going through a divorce from his first wife and falling in love with his back-up singer Patti Scialfa. However personally difficult the transition must have been, it gives the whole album an added emotional punch. We listeners can be thankful Bruce had all that pain and conflict to share with us. Don’t feel too bad, either; he and Scialfa are still together 25 years later, so it all worked out for him too.

Back to the album, which has all number of classics my favourite of which is “Tougher than the Rest” – a song I continue to try and fail to play competently on the guitar. In the process of learning it though, I’ve realized a whole new level of how great it is. How, Springsteen drops ominously down to E minor when he sings about how the road is dark, or holds to the home chord of G an extra measure when he tells his girl he’s tougher than the rest. At every step the music and lyrics are in perfect synch as they draw your soul down the long and twisting road of love’s trials.

“Spare Parts” is a boisterous song about a woman learning to survive after being abandoned by her man. At one point she contemplates drowning her love child. Instead, she snaps out of it, goes home and sells the bastard father’s engagement ring and the wedding dress she never wore. It was a relief to hear a song like this not end in someone drowning in a river – folk music is rarely so kind to the lovelorn.

“Cautious Man” is a subdued song about the man facing his own crisis of faith – getting up in the middle of the night and seriously considering driving away from his marriage and never coming back. Instead, he returns to the house and lets love conquer fear. Earlier we learn that he’s tattooed “love” and “fear” on his knuckles, which flies in the face of his characterization as a cautious man. I guess that’s the point.

Both these songs manage to escape the 1987 production values for the most part, with “Spare Parts” rockabilly style feeling like it belongs on “The River” and “Cautious Man’s” quiet acoustic guitar sounding like something off of “Nebraska.”

“Brilliant Disguise” is one of the great break up songs, and “When You’re Alone” captures that desolate space and how the death of love is a one way journey. As Johnny tells his girl when she tries to retrace her steps to his door:

“I knew some day your runnin’ wild would be through

And you’d think back on me and you

And your love would be strong

You’d forget all about the bad and think only of

All the love that we had

And you’d wanna come home

Now it ain’t hard feelings or nothin’ sugar

That ain’t what’s got me singing this song

It’s just nobody knows honey where love goes

But when it goes it’s gone gone.”

Ever tell someone you’ll always be there for them if they want to come back to you? I have. That verse is exactly how it feels when you wake up one day and know it’s not true anymore.

With all this heart-wrenching exploration of love and honour Bruce finally lets us off the hook with the final song on the album, “Valentine’s Day.” This is a sweet and thoughtful love song with nothing more terrible in it than a bad dream, and nothing more complicated than a desire to see your girl. After pulling us through the wringer he ends the record with a reminder that sometimes it all works out, and all those dark roads thrumming ominously to the tune of E minor just make it that much sweeter when it does.

Best tracks: Tougher than the Rest, Spare Parts, Cautious Man, Walk Like a Man, Brilliant Disguise, When You’re Alone

CD Odyssey Disc 741: Bruce Springsteen

I’ve been on a bit of a housecleaning mission lately. This week I not only cleaned the shower, I also dusted all the wood surfaces in the house and I’m gearing up to do a bunch of vacuuming and floor cleaning this weekend. I’m not sure what’s come over me, but I will say it is much nicer to relax in a clean and tidy house.

Disc 741 is….The Rising

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 2002

What’s up with the Cover?  A blurry-faced Springsteen greets us from around the corner of a brick building. Is he out of phase with our dimension? Trapped in a teleporter accident? Did he just need someone to say, “OK Bruce, one more, and stop moving around so much – this camera is old”? The answer is lost in the mists of time, along with the reason why this ridiculous cover was chosen in the first place.

How I Came To Know It: I didn’t know much about Springsteen’s more recent work, but I had recently bought the album that follows this one (“Devils & Dust” reviewed very recently at Disc 695) and I had liked it. I had heard good things about “The Rising” and it seemed a natural progression to give it a try.

How It Stacks Up:  I’ve got 10 Springsteen albums, and I’ll put “the Rising” sixth, bumping both “The River” and “Born to Run” down a peg, although all three albums are relatively equal. I think I favour each one of them when I’m under its spell, only to switch allegiances when I hear the next.

Ratings: 4 stars

Halfway through “The Rising” I was worried it wasn’t going to hit me emotionally like it had on prior listens. I began to think maybe it had lost its power to inspire, and was prepared to be embarrassed at how often I’d sung the praises of this record as a hidden gem in Springsteen’s later catalogue. It is true that at 15 songs and over 70 minutes, it is a little bloated but by the end of it, it was still shining with the same lustre I remember when I first heard it.

Coming out in 2002, this album is Springsteen’s reaction to 9/11. The same year Steve Earle’s album “Jerusalem” was leveling angry charges at the American system but Springsteen opted for a more conciliatory approach.

On “The Rising” Springsteen strings together a loosely connected series of songs about the tragic loss of life as a result of the collapse of the World Trade Centre. The songs tell the story of an emergency responder who dies in one of the towers and the grieving spouse he leaves behind to try to make sense of it all.

The songs that hit these themes the hardest, “Into the Fire,” “Empty Sky”, “You’re Missing” and “My City of Ruins” are spread evenly across the record and it is a good thing they are; when taken together are almost too much to bear. There are other songs on the album that touch on the events of September 11, 2001, but none do so as strong as these five.

“Into the Fire” is a yearning track of heroism and the loss that comes with it, as Springsteen sings the tale of the firefighters that went back into the buildings, many of whom would not return. Instead of making this a political statement, he brings it down to the personal level.

“The sky was falling and streaked with blood

I hear you calling me, then you disappeared into dust

Up the stairs, into the fire

Up the stairs, into the fire

I need your kiss, but love and duty called you someplace higher

Somewhere up the stairs, into the fire.”

“The Rising” is a journey through every aspects of grief, from the immediacy of “Into the Fire” to the numbing disconnect of “Nothing Man.” “Empty Sky” alludes to the constant reminder of the crime whenever we look at the New York skyline, and “You’re Missing” is the bookend to it – a reminder that for each life lost there is a house somewhere with a bunch of abandoned clothes representing a hole just as vast.

Stylistically, the album has good range with “Lonesome Day” and “Mary’s Place” filled with joyful horn; proof that life will go on after tragedy as surely as it did before, if you’ll only let it. Our protagonist on the album’s first track (“Lonesome Day”) never makes it home, but “Mary’s Place” reminds us if you are lucky you’ll still be surrounded by friends to share the burden.

“World’s Apart” tries to find a connection with the people in the desert far away, grieving their own love ones. With its overly obvious Middle Eastern rhythms I thought the song felt a bit forced, but I’m glad Springsteen explored this aspect of the story, particularly at a time when many Americans weren’t in the mood to hear any such thing.

There are weaker tracks on the album, among them the muddy “Countin’ On a Miracle” and the schmaltzy AM radio feel of “Let’s Be Friends” but they aren’t bad enough to pull the album’s overall impact.

With “The Rising” Springsteen was able to capture a tragedy in a way that walks the line between judgment and forgiveness, between anger and sorrow. It is a nuanced exploration of anguish, which is accented throughout with a resolute determination to rediscover joy. The music soars when it can, and sinks when it must, but stays close to the bone throughout. Throughout it maintains an emotional honesty in both song construction and lyrics that acts like a time machine to the heart, bringing you back to exactly how you felt the day you watched the towers fell.

Best tracks: Lonesome Day, Into the Fire, Nothing Man, Empty Sky, You’re Missing, The Rising, My City of Ruins

CD Odyssey Disc 695: Bruce Springsteen

I came to the end of a long literary journey this weekend, when I finished reading “The Two Noble Kinsmen,” completing my long-held goal to read every one of Shakespeare’s 38 plays. I had already read about half of them over the years, but I re-read all of those as well for the full immersive experience.

I did it by keeping the complete Shakespeare in my bathroom (being divided into scenes made it a perfect fit) so it took a lot longer to read than it might have. Like Sheila recently said on her blog, you should always have a bathroom book.

Disc 695 is…. Devils & Dust

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 2005

What’s up with the Cover? Bruce looking contemplative, with a weathered and worn frame that implies, “I’ve seen a lot of shit, man.”

How I Came To Know It: I saw a video for the title track and absolutely loved it, so I raced out and bought the album. Here’s the video, which is basically like the cover, only the pictures move.

How It Stacks Up:  We have ten Bruce Springsteen albums. I like all of them, but since this is the section where I stack ‘em up, I must admit that “Devils & Dust” is my least favourite – so 10.

Rating: 3 stars

This album began with one of my favourite Springsteen songs, and it ended with a quiet, little regarded gem, but in between it gave me pause for doubt more than once.

“Devils & Dust” is Springsteen stripping away his rock edge and going for a contemporary folk sound. At times he sounds like he’s trying to channel the solo work of Mark Knopfler, and at other times Bob Dylan. Mostly he works hard to create a new version of himself I hadn’t heard before.

The album’s opening (and title) track was enough to get me to buy the album by itself, which is a good thing since with “Devils & Dust” peaking at #72 and no other song charting at all, I wasn’t going to hear anything else without seeking it out myself.

I knew that “Devils & Dust,” was going to stand the test of time, infuriatingly pointless ampersand or not. It is an anthem for soldiers, but it isn’t a celebratory anthem. This is a song that explores the dehumanizing nature of war. It is an oft-explored folk theme, but Springsteen breathes new life into it, in a haunting and hopeless kind of way. The chorus sums up how high ideals can easily get lost in the wind:

“Now every woman and every man

They want to take a righteous stand

Find the love that God wills

And the faith that He commands

I’ve got my finger on the trigger

And tonight faith just ain’t enough

When I look inside my heart

There’s just devils and dust.”

This song also serves as a perfect coda for Springsteen’s previous album, 2002’s “The Rising” which explores the loss and anguish America experienced in the wake of 9/11.

Sadly, nothing that follows on the album lives up to the promise of the title track. Springsteen decides to play the majority of the instruments throughout, including guitar, keyboard and even drums at times. While competent on the guitar, he’s no Mark Knopfler and I think by deciding to do so much, he stretches himself a bit too thin in places.

Springsteen is always a great storyteller, and “Devils & Dust” has some peculiar ones, notably a visit to a prostitute in “Reno” that crosses subtle and pretty melodies with occasionally raunchy lyrics to create a wonderful tension, and no small amount of tenderness where it is least expected.

A couple of times Springsteen also tries out a new singing style where he climbs almost into falsetto. It is so un-Springsteen-like you wouldn’t know it was him if you hadn’t put the album on yourself. Of the two songs he tries this on, “Maria’s Bed,” and “All I’m Thinking About,” “Maria’s Bed” is by far the better track. “All I’m Thinking About” has him reach a little too far, with his voice going thin and strained.

Despite this, there is no doubting Bruce’s overall range, which is consistently underestimated because he uses his voice to service the song and not vice versa. On this record, it feels like the opposite on “All I’m Thinking About,” but “Maria’s Bed” is such an upbeat and joyful track that I forgive him.

The album ends on a sombre note, with “Matamoros Banks” a song about a Mexican trying to cross the desert into the United States and finding only his death in a river crossing. Again, the poet in Bruce rises up and shines:

“For two day the river keeps you down

Then you rise to the light without a sound

Past the playgrounds and empty switching yards

The turtles eat the skin from your eyes, so they lay open to the stars.

“Your clothes give way to the current and river stone

‘Til every trace of who you ever were is gone.

And the things of the earth they make their claim

That the things of heaven may do the same.”

When I first heard this song, I thought it was about some woman drowned by her psychotic boyfriend down by the river. I guess I’ve been listening to too much Nick Cave and Neil Young over the years. I only know what it was actually about, because Bruce put it in the liner notes. Regardless of subject, he once again walks that narrow line between beauty and tragedy where art shines brightest.

I admire “Devils & Dust” for consistently trying to walk that lofty line throughout. At times Bruce comes up short, and you can’t help but notice the resulting misstep, but over thirty years removed from his first album, he’s still fearlessly trying to find new ways to climb up there.

Best tracks: Devils & Dust, Reno, Maria’s Bed, Matamoros Banks

CD Odyssey Disc 668: Various Artists

I’m having a fun weekend; so much fun it feels almost too full.

Case in point – I am scrambling to write this review so I can go watch my beloved Miami Dolphins plan the Oakland Raiders. If this review posts after kick off don’t judge me – I’m taping the game to make sure I don’t miss a single play.

On to the record!

Disc 668 is…. Badlands: A Tribute to Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska

Artist: Various Artists

Year of Release: 2000

What’s up with the Cover?  An abandoned car on the side of the road offsets a string of power poles stretching into the distance. No grain-yellows of Nebraska are here, just a washed out brown-grey that speaks to the stark loneliness of the Great Plains and the desperate characters that inhabit them on this album.

How I Came To Know It:  I’ve only had this album a few months. I think I was falling down the Youtube rabbit-hole one day and saw the Chrissie Hynde/Adam Seymour version of the title track. A little digging at the local record store unearthed the rest of the album.

How It Stacks Up:  This is a compilation album, so doesn’t really stack up. It does make me wish more classic albums would get this treatment.

Rating: 4 stars

Hearing other artists sing the songs from Springsteen’s “Nebraska” underscores what a masterpiece the original album is. “Badlands” is an exact replica of the original 1982 record, with various artists putting a new spin on each of the songs. I generally prefer the Springsteen originals, although there are many tracks here that equal the original recording. The great thing is you don’t have to choose one over the other – “Badlands” gives you a chance to hear the whole record again with fresh ears.

The original album is filled with the stories of desperate characters doing desperate, often illegal things, as they stumble through a life with a lot of hard turns. Since I haven’t reviewed “Nebraska” yet, I’ll focus on the treatments given the songs, rather than their subject matter.

The album opens with Chrissie Hynde and Adam Seymour covering “Nebraska.” Hynde’s deep and soulful rock voice is the perfect match to this song, and she perfectly captures its sparseness and desperation. An organ echoes throughout, underscoring the emptiness of bad decisions and broken futures. It is one of the album’s standouts.

Folk singer Dar Williams comes through strong as well, covering my favourite song on the original, “Highway Patrolman.” The song is about two brothers – one good and one bad – and I like that Dar doesn’t change the main character’s sex. It doesn’t matter that she is singing a male part. It just gives the song a great storytelling quality.

In fact I was listening to this track right as I arrived at work earlier this week and it inspired me so much that I immediately looked up the chords and printed them out so I could learn it on guitar. I haven’t picked the guitar up in two months, but when I do so next, it will be to learn “Highway Patrolman.”

Hank Williams III is the perfect touch of lowlife twang to give “Atlantic City” a new feel. Hank III’s redneck approach to the song makes the character in the song simultaneously more cocksure and less able to handle the trouble that’s bussing in from out of state to Atlantic City. I had this cover from Hank III’s album “Lovesick, Broke and Driftin’” but that version had a ‘hidden track’ tagged onto the end of it, which is annoying. It is nice to have just the song on its own.

On “Used Cars” Ani DiFranco’s whispered delivery brings out Springsteen’s character of a young child’s first understanding of economic disparity. These are the kids that grow up to the crime sprees on “Nebraska” and DiFranco gives you a front row seat to the innocent kids they start out as in a way the big an manly Springsteen can’t do.

The original “Nebraska” album ends with the relatively optimistic “Reason to Believe” and the cover on “Badlands” by Aimee Mann and Michael Penn is even more upbeat.  My only quibble on this song is wishing Mann took the lead on vocals, rather than providing loose harmony support to Penn. That’s just because I love Aimee Mann’s voice though, not an indictment of Penn’s solid work here.

Instead of ending with “Reason To Believe” the CD has three bonus Springsteen covers off albums other than Nebraska. The best of these is Johnny Cash’s version of “I’m on Fire,” but Raul Malo and the Mavericks version of “Downbound Train” and Damien Jurado and Rose Thomas’ “Wages of Sin” are both excellent as well.

When your original material is five-star quality you’ve already got a leg up, but you also have a lot of pressure to do the work justice. “Badlands” comes through beautifully, providing new takes on one of Springsteen’s great achievements, without losing the core elements of the original that make it such a classic.

Best tracks: Nebraska (Chrissie Hynde), Atlantic City (Hank III), Johnny 99 (Los Lobos),  Highway Patrolman (Dar Williams), Open All Night (Son Volt), Reason to Believe (Aimee Mann/Michael Penn), I’m on Fire (Johnny Cash)

CD Odyssey Disc 654: Bruce Springsteen

This next record was the subject of an enjoyable drunk discussion between me and my friends Casey and Randall.

Casey started off claiming “The River” was a brilliant album, falling short only of “Darkness on the Edge of Town” for Bruce’s best. I countered that I agreed about “Darkness…” being number one, but “The River” was more middle of the pack. Randall would then point out it was a bit bloated as a double album. I would agree to this, which would get Casey going again about how it was still brilliant. I think over the course of the night we hit for this particular cycle three or four times.

The album is a bit too long, I still put it in the middle of the pack, but there is no denying this record’s brilliance. In a weird way we were all right. Every time.

Disc 654 is…. The River

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 1980

What’s up with the Cover? A ‘Big Head’ shot, Bruce style. Bruce looks like he’s been working the night shift down at the mill and not bothering to shave. Bruce was grunge before grunge was cool. 

How I Came To Know It:  This was just me drilling through Bruce’s collection. Because I love the album that comes before and after this one, it was a natural purchase. Casey also bought me a copy of it on vinyl, which is pretty cool.

How It Stacks Up:  We have ten Bruce Springsteen albums. “The River” is pretty good, but competition at the top is tough. I’ll put it 6^th bumping both “Born to Run” and “Greetings from Asbury Park” down a slot from where I originally ranked them.

Rating:  4 stars

It is hard to follow up a great record like “Darkness on the Edge of Town” but “The River” holds its own pretty well.  

“Darkness…” had enough great material that a whole double album of cast-offs formed another record years later (released as “The Promise” in 2010). With “The River” Bruce skipped the wait and put out as a double album right away. This is always a dangerous decision, but “The River” holds up well.

Springsteen once again goes to his standard themes of tough streets and finding love in adversity. On “Born to Run” these themes played out in rebellion, and on “Darkness…” with a quiet and desperate resignation. “The River” doesn’t offer up many easy answers, but there is a core of hope and optimism on the record much stronger than on the two records that preceded it.

This is particularly true on Side One and Two (or Disc One, depending on your format) which is faster paced, with upbeat melodies. Here we find the album’s biggest hit (and the biggest to this point in Bruce’s career) “Hungry Heart.” This is a song about the bumps and bruises we get trying to find love. At its core it is a song about being alone, but it wraps itself up in the fact that everyone’s got a hungry heart, so no one is really all that alone after all. Like the Police’s “Message in a Bottle” it leaves you feeling connected to all those sad strangers you pass on the street every day.

There’s a number of songs on the first album of “The River” that had me thinking of Buddy Holly, with their genial early sixties vibe, particularly “I Wanna Marry You” and “Sherry Darling.” Sure they are gritted up a bit for the start of the cynical eighties, but they are like a lead actress in a Hollywood romance; always beautiful even when a scene calls for her to have dirt on her face.

That said, I do prefer my Bruce dark, and I was happy when Bruce digs down deep for the first album’s final track, “The River” a song about broken dreams and the regular people trying to pick up the pieces.

Sides Three and Four (or Disc Two) picks up where the title track leaves off, and overall has a slower, more somber feel.

Bruce’s love affair with cars comes out strong and buoyant with “Cadillac Ranch,” and “Ramrod” before turning the theme tragically on its head with “Stolen Car” and “Drive All Night.” Few can weave the imagery of a car into the story of a song like Bruce, and the plethora of car songs make the whole of the second record a real joy for me.

Springsteen ties both the good and the bad car imagery together in a bow with the record’s final song “Wreck on the Highway,” a song about a man driving home and coming across a dying man in a wreck. It is a tragic loss for that man’s family, but for the witness it reaffirms in him the love he holds for his own wife when he finally gets home:

“Sometimes I sit up in the darkness

And I watch my baby as she sleeps

Then I climb in bed and I hold her tight

I just lay there awake in the middle of the night

Thinking about the wreck on the highway.”

Love can be hard to find, and harder to hold on to, so savour every moment that you can before it’s gone. It is fitting that for all its winding ways, “The River” ultimately ends with two lovers arm in arm. Bruce, you old softie, you got me again.

Best tracks:  Independence Day, Hungry Heart, Out On the Street, You Can Look (But You Better Not Touch), The River, Cadillac Ranch, Fade Away, Stolen Car, Ramrod, Drive All Night, The Price You Pay, Wreck on the Highway

CD Odyssey Disc 612: Bruce Springsteen

This next album is a ‘desert island’ album, meaning if I were stranded on a desert island and could only have a small number of records, this would be one of them. Hopefully I'd also have a record player.

Disc 612 is…. Darkness on the Edge of Town

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 1978

What’s up with the Cover? I feel like someone should’ve told The Boss that he was having his photo taken for the cover of his new album. Maybe then he would have put on something nice. At the very least he could’ve run a comb through his hair.

How I Came To Know It:  My friend Casey put me on to this album. I was enjoying Sheila’s two Springsteen albums (“Tunnel of Love” and “Born in the USA”) and I was eager for a recommendation of what to get next. Without hesitation, Casey said “Darkness at the Edge of Town.”

How It Stacks Up:  We have ten Bruce Springsteen albums. There are a lot of good ones in there, but none better than “Darkness at the Edge of Town.”

Rating:  5 stars

When a record is so good that you can make another two four star albums out of just its discarded outtakes (see Disc 305), you know you’ve got a good record.

This album is Springsteen’s crowning achievement. On it he captures all the heartbreak and triumph of working class America. It isn’t just relatable to the late seventies or just to Americans either. It stands outside of time and space in a place of its own, accessible to any generation.

This is a record about the long lonely intervals between the so-called events in our lives, and how those spaces are events in themselves. The music is perfectly suited to the task. The album is subdued, and relies on sparse instrumentation. The star of course, is Bruce’s voice, which is never better in his career. He sings with an earnest, back-throated power, bringing the poetry of blue collar experience to life with a slow deliberateness.

Accompanying Bruce for the most part is Roy Bittan’s piano, which is the underappreciated co-star of the record. On other albums Clarence Clemons’ sax is the poignant counterpoint to Springsteen’s dirges, but here it is Bittan, tinkling the keys in a gentle almost meandering way, that punctuates the emotional touch-points of the songs.

Where the sax or (Steve Van Zandt’s excellent guitar) do rise up in the mix it is to deliver perfectly timed solos or riffs that add dashes of colour, but never overly saturate the canvas. Clemons’ work on “Promised Land” and Van Zandt on “Streets of Fire” are both fine examples.

Thematically, the album builds on Springsteen’s previous work, “Born to Run” (reviewed back at Disc 574). “Born to Run” is about being young and restless in a small, blue collar town, yearning to get out. “Darkness at the Edge of Town” is that same experience years later, when you’re still trapped by fate and circumstance. The opening track, “Badlands” characterizes the experience in this way:

“Workin’ in the fields

Till you get your back burned

Working ‘neath the wheel

Til you get your facts learned

Baby, I got my facts

Learned real good right now.”

“Promised Land” and “Factory” are two of the finest workin’ man songs I’ve ever heard. “Promised Land” develops the themes initiated on “Badlands” and pushes back as the worker bristles at his fate (“Mister, I ain’t a boy, no, I’m a man/And I believe in a promised land”) even as he revels in the quiet nobility it provides him. “Factory” is more resigned, the rolling cadence of the song capturing the day to day drudgery of shift work.

Like everything on “Darkness...”, “Factory” provides both sides to the experience:

“Through the mansions of fear, through the mansions of pain,

I see my daddy walking through them factory gates in the rain.

Factory takes his hearing, factory gives him life

The working, the working, just the working life.”

The factory exacts a toll, but the men who go there provide for their families and bear it all with a quiet stoicism. I’ve had such jobs, and to my chagrin I did not bear them so well as the overall-clad men featured in “Factory.”

Springsteen gives equal attention to the activities outside of the working life, where these same dusty, weary men find a small measure of solace in women and fast cars.

Women are the focus on “Prove It All Night” and “Candy’s Room” with these songs capturing the defiance that exists in finding someone and trying to hold on despite all odds. It is uncomfortable to hear the man in the song assume that Candy loves him more than the others, but worse still to hear Springsteen describe Candy herself:

“There’s a sadness hidden in that pretty face.

A sadness all her own, from which no man can keep Candy safe.”

In the past this song felt weak to me, but like the whole album, it has simply grown better and better with repeat listens.

The biggest escape in this little town, however, is the allure of street racing. These men don’t only love desperately, they race desperately. Themes first developed on “Born to Run” are fleshed out to their fullest extent on “Racing in the Street” which begins with Springsteen’s voice painting a perfect picture:

“I got a sixty-nine Chevy with a 396

Fuelie heads and a Hurst on the floor

She’s waiting tonight down in the parking lot

Outside the Seven-Eleven store.”

The song is supposedly about racing, but it is really about holding onto what is important. Our narrator wins his girlfriend in a drag race, but he can only hold onto her by giving up the sport. The song is also about how love changes over time. His girl ages, as she sits on the porch of her daddy’s house wondering when her man will come home from the road that has always claimed him. The song is beautifully constructed and ends on a message of hope, as he returns for his girl, picks her up and takes her on a drive down to the water; the car still being their common ground after all these years.

“Racing in the Streets” is the pivot to the whole record, and also the perfect setup for the album’s final song, “Darkness on the Edge of Town.” Here the street racer, desperate to give his life meaning on a ribbon of darkness, has in the process lost his girl. Again, the song begins by painting the perfect image, this one writ a little larger:

“They’re still racing out at the Trestles

But that blood it never burned in her veins

Now I hear she’s got a house up in Fairview

And a style she’s trying to maintain

Well, if she wants to see me

You can tell her I’m easily found,

Tell here there’s a spot out ‘neath Abram’s Bridge

And tell her, there’s a darkness on the edge of town.”

This invitation to darkness could be seen as desperate or destructive, but in the world of “Darkness at the Edge of Town” it is a force of renewal. We forge forward into the darkness, because even if you don’t know where you’re going, you know you’ve got to go somewhere that isn’t here, if only for a little while.

The world the album inhabits can be a harsh one, and the endings aren’t always good ones. The record pulls no punches, its characters working hard all day so they can find an ephemeral escape in their pastimes and passions and maybe hold out the hope that if they go far enough they can finally clear orbit and escape for good.

Usually, the effort fails, but like Sisyphus standing at the top of the mountain, watching the boulder roll back down the other side, there is still a recurring and timeless victory. Sisyphus knows he’ll just have to push the boulder up the hill again, but in that moment of respite, as he chooses his fate and accepts it, in that moment he is strangely free. And that moment is an eternity if you choose to view it that way.

“Darkness at the Edge of Town” reminds you that escaping life isn’t the goal, actively living it is. Despite all the grimness and disappointment you can never fully drive away from town, and nor would you want to. Because that place you think you’re leaving is really just a state of mind, and it gave you some of the values that you’re going to need out there in the darkness. Having a copy of this record in your car stereo can’t hurt either.

Best tracks:   Everything except maybe “Adam Raised a Cain” and even that isn’t too bad.

CD Odyssey Disc 574: Bruce Springsteen

I started writing this on Saturday morning, but it has been an eventful weekend, and I’m only now finishing it off.  Saturday night I went to a Christmas party where I had a great time, but sprained my thumb attempting to do a Russian dance during Boney M’s “Rasputin” (note to self – you are not 25 years old anymore).  I guess it was only fitting given that experience that I review an old album that reminds you of being young.

Disc 574 is…. Born to Run

Artist: Bruce Springsteen

Year of Release: 1975

What’s up with the Cover? Bruce, looking cool with his guitar.  Also, some other dude’s back.  I have no idea who, although I’m sure this cover is famous enough that someone has researched it.  Go ahead and Google it – I’ll wait…

How I Came To Know It:  Welcome back! I can’t remember exactly how I came to this album.  Either Sheila bought it or it was me drilling through Bruce’s collection.  Either way, it’s not much of a story, so let’s move on to the next category. 

How It Stacks Up:  We have ten Bruce Springsteen albums.  I like all of them in different ways, but despite “Born to Run’s” reputation, I have to put it further down than most.  I’ll say it is sixth best, just ahead of “Greetings from Asbury Park” (reviewed at Disc 506).  If you think it should be higher, then go ahead and gripe, gripers, but it is my blog, so it’s my order.

Rating:  4 stars

For many, “Born to Run” is Springsteen’s greatest album. I like a lot of his other work more, but it definitely has some great moments.

The record has a common theme of being young and restless in a nowhere town that is so cohesive it borders on being a concept album. For Springsteen, spiritual survival in those circumstances translates into a desire to get out of town as soon as possible.  If you can’t get out, then you want to find some release – girls, booze, or minor adventure – that help the days go by quickly, and the night to give you some form of release.

I am from just such a blue collar town, and I think that Bruce Springsteen will always resonate deep inside of me because of it.  “Born to Run” does a good job of dragging all that up when I listen to it.  It isn’t the masterpiece that “Darkness at the Edge of Town” is, but I’ll give it credit for creating some of the same tone.

The first song, “Thunder Road” is a classic rock song of rebellion.  It starts off slow with piano and harmonica, the measured tempo reminiscent of the walk down the graduation aisle that the song’s protagonist sees represented as driving out of town and never heading back.  The song is light on plans and heavy on hope, where leaving home might be the only thing left to give him and his girl a chance.

“Thunder Road” builds beautifully, and the music has a feel that lets you feel the speed of the car that will take the two young lovers out of town, and even more so, the urgent need to go.  I know exactly how that feels, but if you’ve never felt the need to be somewhere else this badly, listen to the song and you’ll know exactly what it is like.

The next track, “Tenth Avenue Freeze Out,” doesn’t hold up the same emotional resonance but I like the change of pace, discussing what it is like living alone in the city.  That’s right, sometimes you leave town with a girl, but end up on your own.  Don’t be upset about it – at least you both got to where it was you were going, even if it wasn’t the same place.

Midway through the record, following more songs about desperate love and hard-working day jobs, we come to the title track, a song filled with the joy of the muscle car.  “Born to Run” is rife with powerful images of the powerful machines that still give me a thrill when I see them.  This is the land of the Dodge Charger, the Chevy Camaro and the Pontiac GTO.  I love those cars, and it is easy to love this song, as Springsteen sings:

“In the day we seat it out in the streets

of a runaway American dream

At night we ride through the mansions of

glory in suicide machines

Sprung from the cages out on Highway 9

Chrome wheeled, fuel injected

And steppin’ out over the line

Baby this town rips the bones from your back

It’s a death trap, it’s a suicide rap

We gotta get out when we’re young

‘Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run.”

The song races like the cars in it, and feels like it will crash as it climbs up the scale, before it is perfectly rescued by a Clarence Clemons saxophone solo that grounds everything again.  “Born to Run” is a song about racing, and it is a song about love, but more than anything it is a song about people with little to look forward to finding a way to make life have meaning, through the very act at driving unsafe vehicles and unsafe speeds just to approach the edge of the line where they finally feel alive.

“Meeting Across the River” is the one song that I don’t love.  It feels a bit too jazzy, and has a style that feels like a Tom Waits song gone slightly wrong. Leave boozy lounge singing to the master, Bruce.

The album ends with “Jungleland,” another classic song about both coming of age and escaping youth (similar, but different things, trust me).  The song is over nine minutes long, but it never drags.  Best line:

“Barefoot girl sitting on the hood of a Dodge

Drinking warm beer in the soft summer rain.”

“Jungleland” sums up the whole album.  It manages to be about humble beginnings and also the promise of a new adult life, in a place that is both grander than where we start, and in many ways disappointingly the same.  There’s the ubiquitous car racing, rock and roll, desperate love being made in the shadows, and someone even gets shot (or at least his dreams are gunned down); proof that not all adventures end like we’d like them to.

Listening to “Jungleland”, I wasn’t sure if our “Thunder Road” hero at the beginning of the album had actually gotten out of town, or just realized that town was a lot bigger and full of adventure than he’d realized.  At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter – our jungles will always be part of us, whether we drive as fast as we can away from them or just settle down and offer that barefoot girl a cold beer and the promise of a tender night.

I came into this review expecting a three star experience, but for making me appreciate the taste of warm beer in my mouth, and reminding me how great the wind feels in your hair the first day you truly drive somewhere, I give “Born to Run” the full four.

Best tracks:   Thunder Road, Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out, Born to Run, Jungleland