Bruce Springsteen Performs at Gateway’s Gala Benefit Concert

Ever wonder how to have a successful benefit concert? How about a Bruce Springsteen acoustic performance and a John Stewart comedic performance teamed up with superstar actors like Matt Damon and Robert DeNiro. Well, that’s what happened last night at Gateway’s Gala Benefit Concert; a specialized educative center in education for children with learning problems.. Last night, with his wife Patti Scialfa on the last two songs, Bruce performed acoustic versions of Adam Raised a Cain, Bobby Jean, The Promised Land, For You, Working On The Highway, If I Should Fall Behind, and Thunder Road. With For You, If I Should Fall Behind, and Thunder Road played on the piano.

Max Weinberg Steals the Spotlight From Springsteen, But The Birthers are Stumped by The Boss: Songs 120-111

RETREAT, NO SURRENDER

By Jim Beviglia
May 22nd, 2010 at 10:11 AM

The Ultimate Springsteen Countdown is almost half over and there hasn’t been a Born in the U.S.A song yet. That changes in this edition (but how far down?) And does Max Weinberg or Teenage Tramps in Skintight Pants steal more of the spotlight from Bruce Springsteen.

And while Springsteen will never cut off your beer sales at a concert like Van Morrison, he was definitely influenced by the man. Learn more in songs 120-111.

Song 120: “Fade Away”

Album: The River

“Fade Away” gets a bit of a bad rap in the Springsteen mythology. It was chosen as the follow-up to Bruce’s first Top 10 hit, “Hungry Heart,” but it failed to reach those same lofty heights, petering out at No. 20 on the U.S. charts. Thus it is also blamed for the fact that The River wasn’t the breakthrough megahit that Springsteen’s supporters wanted it to be.

That’s a lot of weight to hang on one song, let alone a modest one like “Fade Away.” Granted, a tender ballad with Springsteen basically on his hands and knees trying to get back together with his girl might not have been a commercial sure thing. But that doesn’t mean the song wasn’t executed well.

Indeed, the straightforward lyrics show Bruce at his most direct, one of the first signs of a more common style that would serve him well in the years to come. And the music is lovely throughout, spearheaded by Danny Federici’s lonely organ, which expresses yearning and desperation maybe even better than the songwriter himself. When you add the soulful harmonies of Bruce and Little Steven, you’ve got a pretty solid package, top-to-bottom.

All of the negative stuff is just a case of the right song at the wrong time.

Song 119: “The E Street Shuffle”
Album: The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle

First of all, this song wins points for yielding one of Bruce’s all-time great character names: Power 13. It sounds like some obscure Math theorem, doesn’t it? What do you call the guy for short? Pow? Teenie? Do you think his Dad was Power Sr., had 12 other sons, and just did a George Foreman thing when naming them? These are the questions that keep me up at night.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, we can get down to the business of praising “The E Street Shuffle,” the opening salvo off The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle, the Boss’ first true masterpiece. From the opening blast of horns, which betrayed a heavy Van Morrison influence, to the wild and woolly outro, it’s one of the band’s funkiest offerings, even 35 years down the road.

Springsteen’s fast-talking lyrics are marvels of interior rhyme and alliteration. Listen to this killer first line: “Sparks fly on E Street when the boy prophets walk it handsome and hot.” These hoodlums get into the same hijinks as some of the doomed souls of other Springsteen opuses, but the good-time music here makes it seem like there are little consequences for them to face.

Indeed, even as Bruce tells it like it is (“teenage tramps in skintight pants”), he finds the romance in the scene: “As the sweet summer nights turn into summer dreams.”

If there’s a negative for me, it’s that the wocka-wocka clavinet that stands out of the mix makes the song seem a tad dated, something you can’t say about much of the E Street Band catalog. We’d like to believe that “The E Street Shuffle” is a timeless dance that kids still do today. All you need is a little soul, a lot of time on your hands, and the indefatigable foolishness of youth.

Song 118: “Candy’s Room”
Album: Darkness on the Edge of Town

Springsteen plays the romantic underdog as well as anyone out there. Here he tells a tale as old as time, and certainly as old as rock and roll. Crooners have been trying to rise above penury to grab their girl away from a rich guy since the dawn of pop music. But Bruce has the E Street Band behind him, and that gives him an edge on the competition.

The band never wavers in the face of Springsteen’s high-tempo construction, as they milk every bit of drama from the situation. Max Weinberg obviously takes the spotlight here, starting things off with the tension-building high-hats before bursting into full sprint joined by his cohorts. Bruce himself tears off a searing guitar solo that rips through the edginess in thrilling catharsis.

The passionate descriptions of the lovers’ encounters are perfectly in sync with the powerful thrust of the music. The narrator knows that Candy is probably a dead end and that her rich suitors will only cause him trouble, but Springsteen’s genius is that he makes his argument so persuasive that you can understand the guy’s reckless pursuit. In that way, he takes one of the oldest song topics in the book and makes it new again.

Song 117: “I’m Goin’ Down”
Album: Born in the U.S.A.

Here we are, 83 songs into the countdown, and we’re making our first foray into the 1984 supersmash, Born in the U.S.A. You think Bruce was at the top of his game for that one or what?

“I’m Goin’ Down” was an unlikely Top 10 hit when it was released as a single in 1985, almost a year after the album’s release. Considering that the song can be considered a relative lark compared to some of the heavier material on the album, the chart success is a testament to both the momentum Springsteen had at that time and to the group’s recording experience of bringing out big things from little songs.

The bar-band swagger brought to Springsteen’s tale of sexual frustration is remarkable. It also helps to leaven what could have been an off-putting character; the guy comes off more like a sad-sack than a whiner, which is saying something if you just judged him based on the lyrics. Check out the little touches here and there which pull the song from the mundane, like the Latin lilt on the acoustic guitars at the start of the song to the vocals and hand-clap breakdown toward the end. This is a band, and an artist, that suddenly understood how to court the radio.

I’m sure a lot of people read some sexual innuendo into the oft-repeated chorus, and I don’t think Bruce would dissuade that reading, even though it’s probably reaching. After so many years of so many great songs going unheard by the public at large, you couldn’t begrudge Bruce pulling in listeners by any means necessary.

Song 116: “Long Walk Home”
Album: Magic

In “My Hometown” in 1984, the song ends with a father putting his son on his lap and letting him steer around the streets of their town. It was right of passage his father had done with him, trying to imbue pride in the boy for his home even as the Dad was considering leaving the place. In a “Long Walk Home,” recorded by the same artist 23 years later, it’s easy to imagine that kid, now grown, as the narrator, estranged from all that he loves and unable to recognize the place that he once toured with his father.

The artist, of course, is Bruce Springsteen; This isn’t a Foghat countdown, after all.

“Long Walk Home” is a fascinating example of how Bruce begins with a personal tale of alienation and disillusionment and spins it outward to reveal a bigger picture that is just as bleak.

What begins with a man losing his love widens into a look at America in decline. The man doesn’t recognize the values he grew up with in the residents, now all “rank strangers.” And what’s even more disheartening is that he doesn’t recognize his country anymore, the country that once knew “who we are, what we’ll do, and what we won’t.” By including the opening with the man and woman coming apart, Springsteen effectively shows how the breaking of bonds at a one-to-one level contributes, on some small level, to the deterioration writ large.

The music is a bit generic; it’s like the heartland rock of contemporaries like Bob Seger or John Mellencamp, but there isn’t any bite. Only Clarence Clemons’ sax solo gets through, beautifully conveying both nostalgia for times gone past and sadness that the promise of that past has been broken time and again.

Song 115: “Local Hero”
Album: Lucky Town

Inspired by an actual occurrence in which he spotted a wall-hanging of himself in a local gift shop between those of “a Doberman and Bruce Lee,” Springsteen tackled his mid-life identity crisis head-on in this enjoyably lighthearted track off Lucky Town. It’s somewhat reminiscent of “Glory Days” in both its sing-along chorus and its preoccupation with former triumphs.

It must be a truly odd moment to see your younger self on display. It also must have been especially weird for Bruce considering that he saw the picture in Jersey at a time while he was living in L.A. (hence the shopkeeper’s reply, “He used to live here for a while.”) The rumored price of the picture by the way: $19.99. That’s how much heroes are valued if they’re a tad past their prime.

There’s nothing very memorable about the music save the uplifting melody. The pretty female backing vocals really help to buoy the choruses though, and Bruce’s lack of any vanity about the situation keeps the song a lot of fun all the way through. Only a guy as modest as Springsteen could be as successful as he is and still be surprised to be a collector’s item.

Song 114: “Darlington County”
Album: Born In The U.S.A.

When the first sound you hear is a cowbell, you know you’re in for one hell of a road trip. Written back in 1978, “Darlington County” wasn’t revived until the 1982 sessions that produced a large chunk of 1984’s Born In The U.S.A. (There will be a quiz on this later, and with Bruce’s crazy recording process, if you pass you immediately earn a Masters.)

Give credit to Jon Landau for exerting his influence and helping convince Springsteen that these kinds of good-timey songs deserved a place on the album right alongside the tougher stuff. The album might have still been great without them, but it wouldn’t have had the populist edge that made it such a smash and elevated The Boss to new heights.

“Darlington County” is in South Carolina, which means that the narrator and Wayne had a lot of time to get into trouble on their journey from New York City to find work and females more amenable to their advances. Of course, things don’t work out the way they planned. The narrator ends up deciding to leave Darlington for greener pastures, while Wayne ends up incarcerated as his former road-trip buddy leaves him behind.

It still sounds like they had a good time, though, thanks to the E Street Band’s amazing chemistry. From Bruce’s Southern-fried licks on guitar to Clarence doubling up the “sha-la-la” chorus with his booming sax, it’s a killer effort. “Darlington County” may not have been the right destination, but it’s the getting here that counts.

Song 113: “Mansion on the Hill”
Album: Nebraska

Although they never made it to an album that way, you can imagine many of the songs on Nebraska being turned into full band performances. (Over the years, the band and Bruce have done just that to some of them in performance.) But it’s hard, for me anyway, to imagine “Mansion On The Hill” in anything but the stark, chill-inducing form of the original “Nebraska” recording.

Springsteen based the song on true-life trips he actually took with his dad. Of course, by the time he wrote the song, he was rich enough to be the one on the inside looking out, and to see the “steel gates that completely surround” being as confining to those inside as it was foreboding to those outside.

What makes the song is that Springsteen sings it reverently. Had he allowed irony or the hint of a sneer into his vocals it would have shattered the balance and distorted the reality of the situation. In the final verse, years have passed and the boy, now a man, still looks out at the mansion, still in awe. The boundaries remain unchanged.

“Mansion On The Hill” boasts one of the prettiest melodies on the album, and although it’s a bit of the same thing verse-to-verse lyrically, it almost has to be to convey the level of obsession this character has with the life he’ll never enjoy. Bruce may be playing it close to the vest vocally here, but his sad harmonica conveys all of the longing of those who remain forever in the valley in thrall of a life they can only admire from afar.

Song 112: “Nothing Man”
Album: The Rising

It might be the most harrowing song Bruce has ever released, and that state of despair doesn’t really reveal itself until the final lines. At first glance, it’s a tale about survivor’s guilt, but it doesn’t take much power of deduction to realize that the narrator is a 9/11 responder who was lucky enough to make it out alive. Although, considering the mood of the song, lucky doesn’t seem to be the right word.

After all, this is the tale of a man going through something to which no one could possibly relate, save the few who share his experience. (Hence, his repeated calls for his mate to “understand.”) As if she could.

What makes his predicament worse is the way he is hailed as a hero while carrying around this extreme burden of memory. The world outside stubbornly remains the same while his inner turmoil continues. Even the sky refuses to cooperate, hanging above him in “unbelievable blue.” What a perfect choice of words.

The last verse lays bare the pain so cleverly hidden by Bruce’s straight-faced vocal. When cornered at his local bar by a well-wisher offering thanks for his courage, he snaps back: “You want courage, I’ll show you courage you can understand/The pearl and silver restin’ on my night table/It’s just me lord, pray I’m able.”

The hope so prevalent in Springsteen’s work is absent here, momentarily shut out by the reality of the situation. It’s a chillingly honest portrayal.

The music is just for atmospheric background, and it was wise of Bruce not to pile on a sentimental melody. It’s very to-the-point, Max Weinberg’s rim shots breaking through the fog like a countdown to some unthinkable outcome. When Bruce allows his character some falsetto “sha-la-lys” at song’s end, it’s a well-deserved reverie. The other alternative, expressed by that last verse, is the ending few could possibly understand, nor would they want to.

Song 111: “She’s the One”
Album: Born to Run

OK, so they stole the groove from Bo Diddley. You could make a pretty great countdown of rock songs that have done the same.

The point is that the E Street Band play that groove with gusto and force that they just hadn’t shown at all on their first two albums. If there was any doubt that Bruce had locked into a great band lineup on Born to Run, “She’s the One” answers it decisively.

The thunder that they create is so powerful that it sounds like they’ve got about 20 members instead of the five that actually contribute to the track. Weinberg is fabulous again here, all touch and feel in the open and then crunch and boom for the rest. Roy Bittan is all over the place as well, both in the introspective opening verse and then finding open spaces to add flavor once the heavy guns kick in.

And Springsteen’s guitar-playing, always overlooked, is nothing short of incendiary.

All of that power helps to overcome one of the most trite standbys in the rock songwriter canon, the femme fatale who’s too hot to resist but too wild to keep.

Bruce pays her a bunch of back-handed compliments that may be eloquent but not too sympathetic. She doesn’t ever feel like a three-dimensional character; as rendered, she’s just a finely detailed cliché. But, then again, who cares about the lyrics when you’ve got such compelling rock and roll right in your face?

The Springsteen Family: Off Limits?

Our recent post citing a babble.com item about Jessica Springsteen and her famous dad drew a lot of interest — including this response from Friend of Blogness Maria on our Facebook page:Can I just say that I find this a little silly? Surely this wasn’t posted because Jessica Springsteen is a promising equestrian, but because this promising equestrian is “the daughter of.”

If Bruce Springsteen is on stage, sure: all bets are off. Post about HIS career all you like. But when he’s off stage: let not only him enjoy his free time, but above all: let his kids have him all to themselves.

Once you start a Blogness on the Edge of Equestrian: fine. But that’s not what this Blogness is about, is it?
It’s a great response, and speaks to something I’ve grappled with since I started this blog — when is it appropriate to veer from the professional into the personal when it comes to Springsteen coverage? His wife’s in the band, of course, but should kids be off limits? How about coverage of personal situations like Springsteen’s mention in a New Jersey woman’s divorce suit last year?

Sometimes (as in the case of the divorce story) it’s almost impossible to ignore, even if it’s just to note the coverage stories like that get around the Web. (A Springsteen affair accusation will always get more press than an album rumor — so much for the biased liberal media!) Other times, when it involves family vacation pictures or other personal situations, I tend to feel a little stalkerish. (Full disclosure: Posts about Evan, Sam and Jessica Springsteen get TONS of traffic. Hmm … That probably makes it even more stalkerish.)

The general guidelines I’ve set up are, if the people know they’re being filmed and seem to be happy about it (or are on stage or a similar public setting, obviously), I might make a mention; if it looks like it was shot surreptitiously or is invasive, no way. But is that the way to go? Tell me in the comments and take the poll below.

So Springsteen Says to Sting …

Funny couple of moments between Bruce Springsteen and Sting during last weekend’s benefit at Carnegie Hall, as reported by The New York Times:

The concert’s unannounced performer, Bruce Springsteen, joked that when Sting had told him the theme was ’80s nostalgia, he had responded, “Sting, we’re ’80s nostalgia.” He turned a jovial, well-intentioned evening into a flat-out rock concert. He cued audience shout-alongs in his 1984 hit “Dancing in the Dark” and gamely chose a 1980s hit: Bryan Adams’s “Cuts Like a Knife,” from 1983. Mr. Springsteen improved that compendium of clichés a hundredfold, turning it into a soul buildup as he preached a story about betrayal, pain and release: “If it hurt, let me hear you holler!”

Sting said that Mr. Springsteen also chose the concert’s all-star finale — a song, Sting said, that he didn’t know. “Everyone in the country knows it but you,” he was told. It was Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’ ”: a 1981 arena crowd-pleaser once scorned as cheesy corporate rock. Now, from its appearance in the finale of “The Sopranos” to a best-selling version from “Glee” to a Springsteen endorsement at Carnegie Hall, it’s well on its way to rehabilitation.

Bruce Cheers On Daughter Jessica Springsteen at Equestrian Event

Bruce Springsteen was spotted over the weekend cheering on his daughter, Jessica Springsteen, at the Old Salem Grand Prix, at Old Salem Farm in New York. Apparently, that’s some sort of equestrian horse race thingy, which is completely out of my wheelhouse of knowledge. Until now, that is. Because now that I know that this is how the Boss spends his weekends, I will be packing my husband and kids in the car and heading out to these events faster than you can say “Thunder Road.”

In all seriousness, I wouldn’t say I am THE biggest Springsteen fan on the planet. I’ve only been to a couple of dozen Bruce shows, which is a minor commitment compared to that made by other people. And while I did consider naming my daughter Wendy, Mary, Sandy, Candy, Kitty or Janey—I didn’t actually do it. Yes, I have several photos of the man hanging in my living room. But who says grown women don’t tack up posters of rock stars on their walls? Where is that written in stone?

More photos of Bruce Springsteen doing what he does best, looking way cooler than the rest of us—oh, and cheering on his kid—on the next page. And yes, I probably included more photos than I needed to. You’re welcome.

Roy Orbison Now Playing on EOS Music

Eos Music pens licensing deal with Orbison Records Inc.

Clearwater, FL, May 16, 2010 –(PR.com)– Eos Music, a provider of background music for business, home to more than 100,000 tracks of both major and independent artists, is excited to announce a licensing agreement with Orbison Records Inc. With artists like Roy Orbison, Bruce Springsteen and Elvis Costello; Eos Music is very excited to include the entire library of Orbison Records Inc. into its playlist. Content Manager for Eos Music, Justin Lollie affirms, “This library is comprised of songs like the famous ‘Blue Bayou,’ ‘Pretty Woman’ and ‘Only the Lonely’ and make excellent additions to our many tracks currently in rotation.”

The library of Orbison Records Inc., includes works with Bruce Springsteen, Glen Danzig, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Will Jennings and Elvis Costello. Roy Orbison, lead artist on Orbison Records Inc, was an American singer-songwriter. He was very well known for his distinctive vocals and fervid ballads. In the 1960’s Orbison reached an prodigious milestone where 22 of his songs were placed on the US Billboard Top 40 list. Of Roy Orbison, Eric Clapton says, “He could do things with his voice that I could only dream of doing.”

Eos, the lowest-cost business background music service on the market at $19.95 per month, features 65 channels of pure, uninterrupted business music, free of commercials, DJs and station IDs. No contract is required, and all music royalties are covered. Eos licenses music from a multitude of independent artists across the globe, ensuring the music is always fresh and new. For further information, visit www.eosmusic.com

###

The Boss Bungles? Springsteen Songs 160-151 An Imperfect Bunch

By Jim Beviglia
April 24th, 2010 at 6:34 AM

Song 160: “Black Cowboys”
Album: Devils & Dust

Nobody loves a good sad song more than I do. But there is something about “Black Cowboys” that is just too painfully sad. On an objective level I think it’s one of the finer songs on Devils & Dust, a fully realized production filled with acoustic guitar, tasteful piano and understated, but effective production.

The lyrics are much smoother than on some of Bruce’s story songs, and he sings it without a hint of the gnarled accent that mars some of this material.

But, oh, that story just breaks your heart. The saga of Rainey Williams, a mama’s boy who loses that mama to her own weakness, just kills me. When he wordlessly says good-bye to her at her bedside by simply brushing her hair aside and kissing her eyes, well, it’s just brutal, man. And his loneliness at song’s end as he rides a train under an unforgiving moon is palpable.

The thought of an innocent bereft of a mother’s unconditional love doesn’t just pluck at the heartstrings, it stomps on them.

Springsteen’s tactics with these songs is to humanize the characters with sharp details in order to shed light on the bigger picture, and he achieves that well enough here. But, honestly, I can listen to “Black Cowboys” maybe a once a year.

I need that long in between just to recover.

Song 159: “I’ll Work For Your Love”
Album: Magic

Is there any other instrumentalist as instrumental to the sound of Bruce’s band as Roy Bittan? Clarence Clemons presence is unmistakable, Stevie Van Zandt and Max Weinberg have the high profiles, and the band has always been greater than the sum of its parts because of its street-gang swagger. Still, Bittan’s piano is at the heart of the E Street sound, and I don’t think any of the other band members would argue that too vehemently.

That piano is the sweetener that draws ears to some of Bruce’s more complex, wordy compositions. This track on Magic is just one example; Bittan’s opening is chill-inducing, recalling the history of so many band classics while still managing to stake out fresh territory.

It sets up the melody and a catchy chorus, compensating for Bruce’s lyrical imagery, which is a tad too intense here. At its core, the song is an ode to devotion and how the mysteries of the world are revealed in the simple details of a woman’s body. But all of the verbosity strains a bit to fit into the 60’s-rock frame of the song. Better is the workmanlike refrain, which is effective in a direct way.

It’s no great blight on the song, though, to say that it goes downhill once that piano intro gives way to the rest of the band. It’s more a compliment to the wondrous work of The Professor, Mr. Roy Bittan.

Song 158: “Good Eye”
Album: Working on a Dream

Much of Working on a Dream is devoted to the florid pop music and pretty melodies that enticed Springsteen as a youth. But “Good Eye” ain’t florid and it ain’t pretty. It’s as bluesy as the band has gotten in their 2000s output.

The lyrics are kept to a minimum here, just three verses which consist of one line repeated, in blues fashion, followed by the ominous refrain, “I had my good eye to the dark and my blind eye to the sun.” Bruce yelps them as if he’s calling out through a rusty megaphone, creating a nifty effect that gives a pretty straightforward track some flavor.

Other distinguishing characteristics includes Bruce’s sampled shriek at the start of each musical line, some fiery harmonica, also courtesy of the Boss, and what sounds like a saloon piano. The band plays the heck out of the song, treating it like an A side rather than the somewhat inconsequential lark it is. It is a good excuse for the band to get down and dirty after cleaning up so nice for the rest of the album.

Song 157: “Let’s Be Friends (Skin to Skin)”
Album: The Rising

Coming directly after a run of dark, even harrowing, songs on The Rising, “Let’s Be Friends” sounds like it was accidentally placed on the album in some sort of pressing mishap. Starting with a hip-hop beat and some lush keyboards, it is definitely on the lighter side of the spectrum for that release.

Thus it is that it sounds pretty alluring in that context, especially when the refrain kicks in with those sweet harmonies. Elsewhere, Springsteen actually trades lines in the chorus with Soozie Tyrell, making it one of the closest approximations of a boy-girl duet in the Boss’ history.

Essentially a plea for a little sexual healing, the song does get mired in a rut by the end; Bruce sings “Let’s be friends” so often that you get the feeling the girl might agree just to get him off her back. But, as out-of-left-field diversions go, it’s harmless fun.

Song 156: “Spare Parts”
Album: Tunnel of Love

“Bobby said he’d pull out and Bobby stayed in/Janey had a baby and it wasn’t any sin.” So begins “Spare Parts.” That unflinching opening, surrounded by some back-porch acoustic guitar and squawking harmonica, creates a lot of expectations which the remainder of the song only partially fills.

Bruce sets the scene effectively, building up anticipation with pinpoint descriptions (“Mist was on the water, low run the tide”). Alas, I’ve never bought the ending, in which Janey second-guesses her decision to pull a Moses and send her baby adrift. Instead she goes home and hawks Bobby’s engagement ring. That always felt more Hollywood tidy than psychologically accurate to this hombre, rendering the song a bit more trivial than the subject matter warrants.

The acoustic opening also outshines the electric remainder, which has a bit of a tinny sound that hampers its impact. Bruce does get to let loose for a feral guitar solo at the end which expresses a rage that the happy ending squelches. “Spare Parts” is an excellent set of lyrics that don’t quite come together, a near-miss that still displays Springsteen’s prodigious songwriting gifts.

Song 155: “It’s Hard to Be a Saint in the City”
Album: Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J.

This song holds a special place in Springsteen lore because it was one of the tracks he played in his legendary audition for John Hammond in 1972 that earned him his recording contract. (Some accounts claim it was the first.) There is no doubting that the talent was already there by the bushelful, although this song makes it clear that it still needed some molding.

“Saint” betrays the fact that it was written lyrics-first; as often happens in songs like that, the melody is an afterthought. There’s not even a real hook to grab you. It just sort of rumbles along, hampered by the muddy production prevalent on Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. The drums sound muffled, the acoustic guitar disappears early, and the bass never comes through clear. Only David Sancious’ tinkling piano asserts itself throughout the entire track.

But the lyrics are undeniably great, a patchwork of quotable lines that still add up to tell a memorable story. There is an undercurrent of melancholy amidst all the braggadocio. Notice that much of the tale is told in the past tense, as if the streets that the narrator owns throughout the song finally pushed him to the brink, to the point where he can see the toll it’s taken. The first two verses show the player at the top of his game, but the final stanza leading into the chorus, now in the present, depicts the losers, zombified subway denizens clinging to the rails.

Springsteen’s narrator seems to have made it out before meeting his fate, but it’s clear that, for a guy who would romanticize the streetlife so well in the years to come, Bruce could already see the downside.

Song 154: “When You’re Alone”
Album: Tunnel of Love

So much of Tunnel of Love consists of songs portraying the things that break a relationship apart. “When You’re Alone,” the penultimate track on that album, shows the couple after the bomb has dropped, sifting through the detritus and searching for the truth.

What the Boss’ character finds here is the realization that maybe all the little things that tore them apart weren’t worth the resulting drama, because, as the chorus bluntly puts it, “When you’re alone you ain’t nothin’ but alone.” All of the bitterness and “hard feelings” are gone; left behind is hard-earned wisdom and a hint of forgiveness. Bruce even tosses in what seems like autobiography in the second verse to drive his message home.

I just wish the track could have been a little less sleepy. Playing all the instruments himself, Bruce lays the organ on thick and washes everything else but the vocals out. Take the keyboards on the fade-out of “My Hometown,” multiply them by five, and you get the picture. Only the sweetly sad refrains, aided by backing vocalists Patti Scialfa, Clarence Clemons, and Nils Lofgren, stand above it all.

Musical limitations aside, “When You’re Alone” is a mature testament to the irony of realizing what’s most important only after it’s gone.

Song 153: “My Lucky Day”
Album: Working on a Dream

Even if it’s a little bit paint-by-numbers E Street Band, Bruce and the gang play “My Lucky Day” with such enthusiasm that you can forgive the formulaic nature of it all. It’s just wonderful to hear them still able to rip out material like this after all these years. Check out the relative lifelessness of similarly-themed Springsteen tracks from the early 90’s for a comparison.

It’s all there from the get-go: The snap of Max Weinberg’s drums, the propulsive gusto of Garry Tallent’s bass, and Roy Bittan, charging hard through the gaps with his piano chords. By the time you get to Clarence’s brief blast in the bridge, it’s all gravy. You’ve already been transported to rock heaven via that humble yet prodigious thoroughfare known as E Street.

The lyrics are just your typical love-conquers-all sentiments, with some of the autumnal shadows that hang over Working on a Dream seeping into the mix. The melody is buoyant enough to let the bright colors of the music shine through radiantly. Early on in his career, Bruce often had excellent tracks hidden by poor recordings; here is a case of the opposite, a relatively pedestrian song raised to another level by the chemistry of his backing group.

Song 152: “Soul Driver”
Album: Human Touch

If you can get by some of the elements that Bruce tries to shoehorn into the mix here, you’ll find a hidden gem in this forgotten song off Human Touch. Why Bruce felt the need to add the distracting clanking percussion is a mystery; the same could be said for the odd flute-like sound effects peppered throughout.

Only the soulful organ work of old buddy David Sancious hits home. It’s the proper backdrop for Bruce’s gut-wrenching ruminations on love and loss. The imagery is razor-sharp. Listen to this killer opening: “Rode through forty nights of the gospels’ rain/Black sky pourin’ snakes frogs and love in vain.”

Elsewhere, Bruce urges on his companion to pull together, the future be damned: “Does fortune wait or just the black hand of fate/This love potion’s all we’ve got/One toast before it’s too late.” It doesn’t matter if they go down, as long as they go down together: “Here’s to our destruction.” If only the mediocre backing track didn’t threaten to overwhelm all else, “Soul Driver” might be more than a worthy obscurity.

Song 151: “Drive All Night”
Album: The River

Anyone who’s ever seen Bruce Springsteen live knows that he understands the power of repetition. He can stretch a line of music out indefinitely, slowly and subtly building on it with incremental variations in volume from the band. When they break out of that rut into a new section of the song, it’s an exhilarating moment.

He tries something similar on his recording of “Drive All Night” off The River. The song drags out for over eight minutes, and it’s essentially the same basic structure throughout — spare to begin with some extra touches coming in like some sumptuous organ and soulful saxophone. But, basically, you’ve got Max Weinberg and Garry Tallent locked into a slow groove, and Bruce testifying on top.

I suppose you’re feelings for the song depends on how much you like this sort of construction.

It does have a certain raw power to it, especially toward the end when Bruce lays it all on the line with some braying vocals. Those vocals are deliberately unschooled, the perfect way to portray his characters’ powerful emotions. The moving tunnel vision of Springsteen’s protagonist, who focuses in on his love in the face of all the distractions, the “fallen angels,” the “calling strangers,” waiting in the street to do them harm, is even more poignant when you consider that he doesn’t even have her any more, according to the first line of the song.

My, does it go on though. Some true believers get off on this stuff, but I could have lived with a shortened take just fine. Just because he’s willing to drive all night to get to his girl, it doesn’t mean we have to be with him for the whole trip.

Springsteen’s Forrest Gump Beef and Death Row Wishes, The Countdown Screens to Songs 140-131

NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER
Springsteen’s Forrest Gump beef and death row wishes, the countdown screens to songs 140-131
By Jim Beviglia
May 8th, 2010 at 11:41 PM
The Bruce Springsteen countdown rolls on, gathering almost as much momentum as Betty White on Saturday Night Live. If you’ve always thought that movie talk is the one thing that’s been missing from The Boss’ career this is the edition for you.

Song 140: “What Love Can Do”

Album: Working On a Dream

A solid piece of mid-tempo rock on “Working On a Dream,” “What Love Can Do” is played and performed well, solidly written and constructed, just a good effort all around. It might be ultimately forgettable due to its lack of bold strokes, but it makes a good impact while you’re listening.

Bruce has noted that he actually wrote the song while the band was making “Magic”, but ever the thematic stickler, didn’t feel like it quite fit. Instead he used it as the jumping-off point for the album to come. Personally, I don’t hear it either as a huge departure from the stuff on “Magic” or a linchpin for “Dream”, but the albums both worked just fine, so it’s all good.

Springsteen’s lyrics feature some powerful imagery, although some of it is a bit strained. I do like the urgent bridge a lot. The song is about love’s power in the face of all of life’s external pressures, which are rendered by Bruce in almost apocalyptic terms. Even though love isn’t a cure-all, Bruce seems to say, it does offer something. In that way, “What Love Can Do” manages healthy doses of realism and optimism all at once.

Song 139: “Kitty’s Back”
Album: The Wild, The Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle

A song that has earned quite a reputation as a live warhorse, this long effort from Bruce’s second LP in 1973 doesn’t quite live up to that billing as a recording. It has its moments of brilliance, which make it a fun listen, but there just aren’t enough to sustain the extended running time.

Springsteen probably understood the trade-off with songs like this, that you run the risk of sounding self-indulgent on record to give the song what it needed to be a concert showcase. Still, the playing in the longer instrumental sections is universally fine, from Bruce’s elegiac guitar work at the start, the high-speed organ solo from David Sancious, and a little strut from the Big Man himself, making one of his first spotlight appearances in the group.

Actually, the music carries the song a long way, and Bruce wisely keeps the band sections at a high tempo only to slow it down for the verses so that the attention span never lags. Unfortunately, all of the motley characters in the song only contribute to a meager tale of a spurned lover unable to resist Kitty when she returns. It’s as if Bruce knew all this, hence the hep-cat slurring which makes the lyrics so hard to decipher.

All is forgiven once we get to that adrenaline-rush of a refrain, the whole band chipping in like some rough-and-tumble street doo-wop group. It’s a bumpy ride to get there, but that alone makes “Kitty’s Back” worth the price of admission, even when you’re not surrounded by 35,000 other Bruce fans.

Song 138: “Youngstown”
Album: The Ghost of Tom Joad

Bruce addresses a topic here that back in the day might have been fodder for one of Robbie Robertson’s topical takes on America. When I hear the song I can almost hear Levon Helm embodying the main character. (The Band actually did do a darn good version of “Atlantic City” in the early 90’s, but I digress.)

Some of The Band’s instrumental virtuosity might have come in handy to spice this one up a bit, as the track, as found on “The Ghost of Tom Joad,” is a touch dreary. Springsteen has since juiced the song up electrically in concert with the E Street Band; you can check out those results on the “Live In New York” release. But other than some probing violin from Soosie Tyrell and flashes of pedal steel from session man Marty Rifkin, there’s nothing too exciting going on in the original.

The lyrics, however, are strikingly good, telling what seems like an entire history of the steel industry in amazingly economic fashion. Yet by telling it through the eyes of a disenchanted worker, he never loses sight of the human drama at the heart of the story.

In an industry that spanned hundreds of years and numerous wars, the greed of the business owners is eventually what brings it all down, and the hurt that fact engenders registers in Springsteen’s vocal turn.

Bruce subtly adds layers to the story. His narrator reveals the pride he had in his job with florid descriptions of sights that other people might find ugly: “Them smokestacks reachin’ like the arms of God/Into a beautiful sky of soot and clay.” And when he makes his complaint, it’s not to a woman; the “Jenny” in the song is actually the nickname of a blast furnace.

Only this machine can possibly know the betrayal he’s been dealt by his bosses: “Once I made you rich enough, rich enough to forget my name.” It’s a credit to Springsteen that he hasn’t forgotten these people, and the disenfranchised workers of the steel industry couldn’t have asked for a more eloquent spokesman.

Song 137: “My Beautiful Reward”
Album: Lucky Town

A quick look at the title and the song’s placement on “Lucky Town” might lead you to believe that this was another of the many happy marriage-inspired tunes cropping up around that time from Springsteen. The music, all warm keyboards and perky acoustic guitar, fuels that speculation even further.

But closer inspection reveals unease at the heart of the song, which, considering its placement at the end of the album, sends “Lucky Town” out on a fascinatingly ambivalent note. All of the contentment that Bruce had displayed up until that time is momentarily set aside. After all, the song says that he’s “searching,” present tense, for his reward.

I would even venture a guess that the song was more inspired by his failed first marriage than his successful second one. The bridge talks about him briefly finding salvation, only to crash back down to reality. It’s as if he was retracing his steps to make sure he didn’t make the same mistakes.

Even more mysterious is the final verse, in which Bruce transforms into a large bird to survey the territory. The music might lead you to believe that he’s already found what he covets, but the words will tell you that the search continues.

Song 136: “Leah”
Album: Devils & Dust

In past years, when the Springsteen express was an unstoppable force and received airplay for every utterance he made on record, a song like “Leah” would have been swept up by the momentum of it all and possibly found a spot on the charts. It is an expertly constructed and good-hearted to its core, full of touching but never treacly sentiment.

That’s because Springsteen always has a firm hand on the tiller and knows how to balance the gooey stuff like love and redemption with the darker corners you have to navigate to get to those lofty heights. Thus, his narrator here lays his mistakes bare: “With this hand I’ve built/With this hand I’ve burned.”

And Bruce also knows that even domestic contentment takes vigilance: “I wanna live in the same house, beneath the same roof/Sleep in the same bed, search for the same proof/As Leah.”

Set to a ringing acoustic guitar and featuring a distant trumpet part by Mark Pender, “Leah” also hits the musical pleasure center much more accurately than some of the less tuneful numbers on “Devils & Dust.” All but the diehards might have missed it the first time around, but it’s worth searching “Leah” out if you haven’t made her acquaintance.

Song 135: “Better Days”
Album: Lucky Town

After years of turmoil, Bruce was beginning to feel pretty good about himself in the early 90’s. Maybe some of his fans weren’t ready to celebrate though, because they greeted his double-release of “Human Touch” and “Lucky Town” with a shrug compared to the rapturous reception for most of his other work. “Better Days” is the poster child for this happier Springsteen, and, as such, sometimes gets a bad rap.

If there is a flaw with the song, it’s that it seems calculated to be the kind of big anthem that Bruce tossed off with little effort throughout the 70s and 80s. Some of that strain is audible, but a radiant chorus goes a long way to hiding it. Extra credit should go to the backing vocals of Lisa Lowell, Patti Scialfa, and Soozie Tyrell, because they really send the refrain skyward.

It’s also easy to miss some of the self-reproach inherent in the lyrics if you focus on the uplift. “It’s a sad funny ending to find yourself pretending/A rich man in a poor man’s shirt,” Bruce sings, a line that speaks volumes about his ambivalence toward the fame and fortune his superstar status has accorded him.

So maybe “Better Days” never became the anthem it was intended to be. Maybe it never stood a chance. At the very least Bruce earned the right to sing about the good stuff for a change, no matter what his audience might have wanted.

Song 134: “You’ll Be Coming Down”
Album: Magic

Bruce could just as easily be speaking to a young pop star as he is to a former love. That’s how malleable the lyrics are in “You’ll Be Comin’ Down,” a catchy bit of mid-tempo balladry off “Magic.” The message is the same: Be careful when things are given to you easily, because just as easily they can be taken away.

I’m not sure that the mix does this song a lot of credit. It’s all a bit jumbled once you get into the heart of the song, and that’s too bad because there are certain elements which deserve a clear listen, such as the bell-like acoustic guitars at the start and the rumble-and-snap interplay between Garry Tallent and Max Weinberg. At times, even Bruce’s even-tempered vocals seem to get buried.

If Bruce’s message is a bit trite, the methods he employs to convey it carry the song out of the hum-drum. Color seems to be the main motif here, as just about everything in the crayon box short of Burnt Sienna can be found in Bruce’s descriptions. He also does a nice job of interweaving the mundane details of a dreary life with fantastical elements that portend bad tidings.

“You’ll Be Comin’ Down” is yet another example of Bruce taking what could have been a mediocre track and imbuing it with enough forceful personality and dazzling talent to push it across.

Song 133: “Working On a Dream”
Album: Working On a Dream

Springsteen’s affection for Roy Orbison is well-documented and easily detected by listening to certain songs. The title track and lead single off his 2009 album, “Working On a Dream,” rises and falls acrobatically like some of Orbison’s best, and you can only wonder what that supernatural voice would have done wrapped around this excellent offering. Still, the soaring harmonies of Bruce and Little Steven aren’t that bad of a substitute.

As all singles should, the song goes down smooth and grabs you at first listen, even if it isn’t the meatiest offering in the man’s catalog. Crisp and clean, there isn’t an ounce of flab on the song, and the whistling solo is something new.

A lot of folks tried to tie the song to the ’08 election, and Bruce’s vocal support of President Obama did nothing to dissuade this reading. While the tenor of the song might have fit in with the prevalent mood, in the literal sense it’s more a song of longing than anything else. The narrator is toiling away at some sort of back-breaking manual labor while dreaming of his love that’s far away.

Though ultimately hopeful, there are elements of sadness and desperation in those harmonies that can’t be denied. Those elements linger with you even after the feel-good power of the music dies away.

Song 132: “Dead Man Walkin’”
Album: The Essential Bruce Springsteen

I saw it a long time ago, but I recall being pretty impressed by the film “Dead Man Walking.” Considering it was coming from Tim Robbins, I was expecting a pretty heavy-handed diatribe against the death penalty, but instead the film simply told a story and let everyone else do the judging if they wished.

When Sean Penn admits his guilt to Susan Sarandon right before his execution, it’s a pretty powerful moment.

No, I’m not auditioning for Roger Ebert’s job, just simply making a point that Springsteen’s theme song for the film is treated in a similarly restrained, yet still potent fashion. I’m always a little leery of movie themes that try to work the title of the film into the song, and I have to say I’ve never been able to fully put that aside with this song.

Bruce repeating the title seems a bit forced to me, and it also deprives the song of some of its meaning out of context.

But I will say he keeps the rest of the lyrics vague enough to evoke emotion for people other than death-row inmates. The line, “Between our dreams and actions lies this world,” is a pretty concise summation of the way that the circumstances of life can derail the best intentions.

The spare acoustic rendering certainly brings chills. So, while it might not quite be up to the level of some of his other soundtrack work (which does set the bar pretty high), “Dead Man Walkin’” gets this reviewer’s thumbs-up.

Song 131: “My Best Was Never Good Enough”
Album: The Ghost of Tom Joad

An oddly sarcastic and funny postage stamp stuck on the somber envelope of “The Ghost of Tom Joad,” this song finds Bruce taking umbrage with all vapid bromides designed to make us feel good about our miserable existences. I’m particularly grateful that he took aim at Forrest Gump because I’m still bitter about that piece of tripe winning best picture over Pulp Fiction — even if it did happen way back in 1994.

Outrage, I say. Still, 16 year later. (I know. You’re thinking, “Again with the movies.”)

This is the kind of tossed-off, humorous trifle that Dylan might have thrown on one of his early albums with a throwaway title like “Cliché Blues #27” or something like that. Bruce deepens it a bit by adding the romantic angle. The reason he’s hearing all of these one-liners is because he couldn’t hold on to his girl, which probably makes the sappiness of those sayings even more infuriating.

Or maybe this is Bruce’s way of saying that the social ills he had categorized in the album’s previous songs were all too easily dismissed by such tired slogans. Whatever the case, “My Best Was Never Good Enough” is a strikingly odd way to end things, and yet somehow ironically apropos.

“Queen of the Supermarket” is Underrated, “The Rising” is Overrated: The Truth in Springsteen Songs 130-121

By Jim Beviglia
May 16th, 2010 at 2:24 AM
When Bruce Springsteen turns his vocal cords on supermarket fantasies, Sept. 11, the silliness of sudden fame and an Al Bundy-type character, you can probably expect the results to be mixed. That’s what the Ultimate Springsteen Countdown reveals as it reaches songs 130-121.

You’ll probably be surprised to see “The Rising” this far out of the Top 100, but the truth is that critically-aclaimed monster force was a near miss. Of course, you might even be more shocked when you discover that what some reviewers dubbed. “The worst Springsteen song of all-time” ranks only one spot worse than “The Rising.”

Hey, this is a countdown for the thinking man. Toss out those preconceptions and listen again. Then, let us know if you still disagree.

Song 130: “Queen Of The Supermarket”

Album: Working On a Dream

A lot of reviewers went a bit apoplectic when this song arrived on “Working On a Dream”, giving some WTF reactions and pointing it out as an example of Springsteen losing touch. I think they misinterpreted it and took it straight; if you can imagine Bruce singing it with a nod and a wink, then you’ve got the spirit.

Bruce was supposedly inspired by a trip to his local megamart, which apparently is an infrequent journey for him (imagine seeing Springsteen in the produce aisle!) Anyway, Bruce equated all of the products on display with a sort of garden of earthly delights, and even saw something sexual in the way a customer’s every desire, for food, that is, can be met.

Those of us who’ve had to deal with a line 10 deep when all we have to buy is a loaf of bread might not feel so randy, but artists just see things differently, I guess.

And so Springsteen imagines a working-class schmo who becomes enthralled with one of the checkout girls, further intermingling the desires for food and sex. (George Costanza would understand.) He never confesses his ardor, content to catch a fleeting glimpse and a smile. Anyone who could miss the humor in a line like “A dream awaits in aisle number two” isn’t listening close enough.

It helps that Bruce packages it in dream pop accompaniment. The groove sounds like it was borrowed from the Drifters, circa 1961.

And hearing the tinkling chords of Roy Bittan accompanying a shopping cart instead of a street race is quite a jolt. “Queen Of The Supermarket” is filled with amusing little quirks like that; it’s just a matter of opening both the mind and the ears to hear them.

Song 129: “The Rising”
Album: The Rising

Very few Springsteen songs have been so honored. “The Rising” nabbed a pair of Grammys in 2003 and was favored to take the illustrious Best Song trophy before getting waylaid by the Norah Jones express. In the end though, I think the song can be appreciated and admired more than loved.

The subject matter is so overwhelmingly potent that right off the bat the song almost has to be perfect to do it justice. I’d say that the lyrics come pretty damn close. Springsteen takes a subtle approach here, imagining a 9/11 firefighter’s ascent in both literal and spiritual terms.

The first verse is a blow-by-blow of his climbing the stairs up into the burning building, but he veers away from this description in the second verse, relating instead how what began as an idyllic day turned into a nightmare in seconds, a telling reflection on the fragility of grace.

The final verse is when Springsteen really hits his stride, as the firefighter begins to see visions of his afterlife, religious imagery everywhere. In the last build up to the refrain, the sky flashing in front of his eyes is a juxtaposition of wonder and sorrow. There is an uplifting feel to this final verse, and this is the point when the song really feels like it achieves the Herculean feat of honoring its topic.

Unfortunately, those lyrics are tied to a melody that is stubbornly earthbound. The muscular rock that Bruce and company chose for an arrangement also feels a bit ill-suited to the task.

In that last verse you get a feel for what might have been when the instruments fall away save for a low hum behind the vocal, only to have the music ratchet up the drama into the chorus. More of this would have gone a long way.

As it is, “The Rising” always feels like a bit of a struggle for all involved. Then again, a near-miss on an attempt with such a high degree of difficulty is still a notable achievement.

Song 128: “Fire”
Album: Live 1975-1985

Unable to record due to a legal battle with former manager Mike Appel, Bruce Springsteen spent a portion of the late 70s attempting to write songs for other artists.

Freed from the constraints of having to write material that might fit into whatever thematic kick he was on while still meeting his extraordinarily high standards, Bruce started writing songs that had the immediate appeal that some of the 60s music he worshipped as a kid possessed.

“Fire” was one of those songs, originally composed with Elvis Presley in mind (and there’s a lot of The King in Bruce’s version, don’t you think?) Alas, Elvis left the earthly building before laying it down, and it ended up in the hands of The Pointer Sisters, who turned it into a No. 2 smash.

Springsteen started playing it live, as he says on the version on “Live 1975-85,” “for all the girls out there.”

That version isn’t the most dynamic, and he doesn’t really ham it up like he has done at other times, which is too bad. The song itself has all the attitude and swagger in the world however, and Bruce puts that across without breaking a sweat.

“Fire” is a lot of fun, but the subtle shift it and other songs of its ilk helped to bring about in The Boss’ songwriting was no joke. It would pay off big dividends when Springsteen’s own recordings started dominating the pop charts themselves.

Song 127: “Ain’t Got You”
Album: Tunnel of Love

When it was released in 1987, “Tunnel of Love” wasn’t yet the “divorce album.” For all the world knew, things were rosy between Bruce and Julianne Phillips. In that context, “Ain’t Got You” seems like a rollicking ode to an unrequited love, with Springsteen hollering out the lyrics while battering his acoustic guitar and chugging away on his harp.

Maybe keen observers would have noticed the prevalent mood of the rest of the album was mostly dark, and then they could have surmised that Bruce, ever the stickler for unity, maybe had more in mind for the opener. But it was really only with hindsight that the song took on weightier implications. Knowing how his marriage turned out, the “you” he lacks suddenly doesn’t refer to an unrequited love, but instead to the supposed love of his life.

The song is also notable for Springsteen’s blunt observations on fame. Don’t forget that his own notoriety was at its zenith at the time of “Tunnel of Love,” fresh as he was off the mega success of “Born In The USA” and the legendary concerts to support it.

Bruce pokes a hole in any pretensions in cutting fashion, seeing right through the silliness of fame: “And folks wanna kiss me I ain’t ever seen before.”

You can debate all you want if Springsteen’s marital woes are audible in “Ain’t Got You,” but his view on celebrity is crystal clear: “Well you’d think I might be thrilled but baby I don’t care.”

It sounds like he’d take his chances on love over fame any day of the week.

Song 126: “Last to Die”
Album: Magic

Springsteen has often talked about wanting his songs to co-mingle the personal and political, and the effort to do just that is pretty overt on this grinder off “Magic.” Propelled forward by outstanding bass work by Garry Tallent, “Last To Die” captures the E Street Band pounding out some brawny rock without missing the drama of Bruce’s construction.

The title phrase comes from a John Kerry speech about Vietnam. Bruce initially uses it to describe the casualties of a loveless relationship: “We don’t measure the blood we’ve drawn anymore/We just stack the bodies outside the door.”

As the song progresses however, it becomes clear that there’s more on the narrator’s radar than his crumbling romance, as the local news jars him to the core: “A downtown window flushed with light/’Faces of the dead at 5.” In the final refrain, Bruce is as obvious as he will ever get in his condemnation of warmongers: “Darlin’ will tyrants and kings fall to the same fate?”

It’s a delicate tightrope on which Bruce balances these disparate elements, and at times it does seem to tip over. In the end though, the momentum of the band and the conviction of Springsteen keep things together and “Last To Die” reaches the other side just fine.

Song 125: “Lonesome Day”
Album: The Rising

When fans heard that the E Street Band would be reunited for “The Rising,” they probably expected a little of the old anthemic magic, the scene-setting piano followed by the big guitars and drums, eventually leading to The Big Man on sax with the final word. They were probably a tad surprised that “Lonesome Day,” the first song on the album, sounded a bit more like a gospel hoedown.

Soosie Tyrell’s violin certainly drives the action with that probing main lick, and the backing vocals do seem to be testifying. But old fans will notice the familiar E Street style of spare verses leading to big refrains still holding sway. Just some of the stuff around the edges had changed.

Springsteen also makes the wise choice of laying off the more overtly 9/11-themed material on the first song, serving up one that doesn’t require such heavy emotional lifting right off the bat. Still, some of it does seep into the last two verses. The second verse seems to hint at bigger problems than just a broken love affair. And the final verse asks the listener to be mindful of making quick reactions to the trauma:

“Better ask questions before you shoot/Deceit and betrayal’s bitter fruit/It’s hard to swallow come time to pay/That taste on your tongue don’t easily slip away.”

Those lines turned out to be profound, on-the-mark, and also way ahead of the tide of public opinion on the whole retaliate-or-not matter. Give Springsteen credit for his insight and for the restraint to keep his feelings within the context of the song, rather than haranguing the audience until they deliberately avoid the message.

Song 124: “I Wanna Marry You”
Album: The River

Springsteen’s habit of peppering his live shows with cover versions of songs from all over the musical spectrum really started to pay off when his own material began to more clearly reflect his influences. On a song like “I Wanna Marry You,” for instance, the E Street Band transcends all of these past echoes and makes the song uniquely theirs.

It is fun to hear all of the different elements coalesce here. The driving force is clearly Danny Federici’s Italian wedding organ, bobbing and swaying like a tipsy uncle. Roy Bittan’s piano fills in some of the gaps, while Bruce’s tremolo-laden guitar sleepily plays in the background. Garry Tallent’s bass is part “Under The Boardwalk,” part “Stand By Me,” and the backing vocals take their cues from both doo-wop and The Beach Boys.

The music is the right fit for Springsteen’s down-to-earth, yet hopelessly romantic tale of a guy trying to do right by a lonely single mom. The narrator is refreshingly realistic about his hopes: “To say I’ll make your dreams come true would be wrong/But maybe, darlin’, I could help them along.”

His heart is so far out on his sleeve it might as well be an epaulet: “There’s something happy and there’s something sad/’Bout wanting somebody, oh so bad.”

We never find out if the girl says yes. But with a proposal this romantic, backed by a band so persuasive, she’d be a fool to say no.

Song 123: “Jesus Was an Only Son”
Album: Devils & Dust

A fascinating and at times downright beautiful offering off of “Devils & Dust,” this song ignores the divinity of Christ and instead focuses on his humanity, particularly his interaction with his mother. There is a touching tenderness to these scenes, and Bruce shifts back and forth between quiet moments like Jesus reading as a boy or being tucked into bed by Mary, and the moments on which much of Christianity is based, such as his walk up Calvary hill with the cross.

The penultimate verse is the most curious, as it deviates from the specifics of the scene to make general ruminations about loss and wasted lives. My guess is that this was Springsteen’s way of saying that Jesus was someone’s son, just like all of the sons whose lives are being cut short due to violence or war. The inclusion of this verse, interrupting the narrative, equates the tragedies.

Bruce handles all the music here, and he does a great job with the lovely organ work and the tasteful piano. His instrumental abilities have always been the most underrated part of his game, but they’re on full display here. The lyrical stuff, which he once again swats out of the park, well, that’s a given.

Song 122: “Surprise, Surprise”
Album: Working On a Dream

It may be the sunniest sounding song in the history of the group. Blasting out of the speakers with ringing guitars and in-your-face hooks, “Surprise, Surprise” may come as just that to unsuspecting longtime E Street Band followers.

There’s a little bit of “Rubber Soul”-era Beatles in there, a lot of Byrds, and a dash of any one of a million one-hit wonders with spectacularly garish names that came down the pike in the 1960s.

The lyrics, what lyrics there are outside of the oft-repeated refrain, are warm-hearted and gracious, the sound of a man loving life and wanting his partner to share in the joy. Essentially, it’s a birthday song, but the well-wishing it does is clearly meant to be a lifetime thing.

You have to love the final refrain, when Nils Lofgren, Soosie Tyrell, and Patti Scialfa each take a turn singing “Let your love shine down” amidst the day-glo orchestration. Would you believe a psychedelic E Street Band? Maybe that’s pushing it, but “Surprise, Surprise” was clearly born in the ’60s.

Song 121: “Highway 29”
Album: The Ghost of Tom Joad

The lovers on the run at the heart of this song could just as easily have been found rumbling through Springsteen’s Nebraska. This pair feels less like victims of circumstance than some of the other tortured souls on “The Ghost of Tom Joad.” This pair has nothing to blame but their own self-destructive tendencies.

As you might expect, the instrumental backing is kept to a minimum here, just Bruce on gently plucked acoustic guitar with some atmospheric synths in the background. He sings the song almost abashedly, as if his protagonist is afraid to speak up and tell the world about his actions.

That protagonist appears to be a shoe-store clerk (Al Bundy jokes accepted and welcomed here) who meets a femme fatale and follows her lead.

The two stick up a bank and eventually attempt a getaway across the border, but crash while being chased. It seems to be a fatal accident for the woman (“She wasn’t sayin’ nothin’”), and the song ends with him in the middle of his fleeing, possibly as he’s being gunned down for his crimes (“I closed my eyes and I was runnin’/I was runnin’ then I was flyin.’”)

What’s telling about the narrative is the senselessness of it all. The characters never reveal their reasons for their behavior.

The man can’t even articulate his weakness, but he knows it’s there: “I told myself it was all something in her/But as we drove I knew it was something in me.” The road is usually a source of freedom in Springsteen songs, but here, “Highway 29” represents a road to nowhere, the final resting place for two souls whose demise hauntingly offers no moral and no answers.

<<SONGS 140-131

Kate Hudson: Almay’s newest Global Brand Ambassador With Bruce Springsteen

Kate Hudson was announced this week as ALMAY’s newest Global Brand Ambassador. Celebrity makeup artist Leslie Lopez created a fresh-faced and flawless look for Hudson at the ALMAY Concert to Celebrate the Rainforest Fund’s 21st Birthday.

Leslie Lopez breaks down her look:

1. Apply ALMAY smart shade makeup with your fingers and blend into the skin for an even tone

2. Under the eye and on the lid use the multi-tasking ALMAY bright eyes, eye base and concealer to help brighten eyes and keep shadow in place

3. Fill in the brows with ALMAY brow defining pencil

4. Apply ALMAY intense i-color eye shadow in trio for browns using the medium shade for the crease, and the darkest shade across the lid

5. Line the inside of the eye using ALMAY intense i-color eyeliner in brown topaz

6. Add just a touch of glitter to the eyelid for a radiant finish

7. For maximum impact, use ALMAY one coat dial-up mascara in its highest degree

8. To create a sunkissed look, apply ALMAY touch-pad blush in peach to the apple of the cheeks

9. For the lips, start with the ALMAY ideal lipliner in bronze which will make the lip appear fuller

10. Add ALMAY hydracolor lipstick in nude

11. Finish the lips with ALMAY pure blends lipgloss in natural just the center to add shine

Find ALMAY at Duane Reade and CVS locations throughout Manhattan or online at ALMAY.com.