Back in 1975, when I was a High School Senior, it was easy for me to ignore Bruce Springsteen's masterpiece album "Born to Run". Several of my friends told me about how great Springsteen was and how that album was fantastic, but I didn't pay any attention to them. That's because I was from Texas, not New Jersey, and Bruce's previous albums had tunes that I simply could not relate to. Plus, being from Texas, I was listening to ZZ Top's "Fandango" that came out the same year. It had terrific songs, that spoke to my local interests, "I Heard It On the X", "Balinese" and "Tush". Moreover, at the time, I was working part-time at a grocery store and, whenever we were able to play the rock radio station over the store's PA system, all we ever heard was The Eagles' "One of These Nights", Elton John's "Someone Saved My Life Tonight", or, if we were lucky, Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody". Never Bruce Springsteen.
Eventually, the tidal wave named Bruce Springsteen finally reached my small town. There he was on the covers of Time magazine and Newsweek. He had arrived. But I still wasn't listening. Why not? Because 1975 was an amazing year for great rock albums. Here are just a few of the now classic LPs that I bought new in 1975: "A Night at the Opera" by Queen, "Wish You Were Here" by Pink Floyd, "Toys in the Attic" by Aerosmith, "By Numbers" by The Who, "Blood on the Tracks" by Bob Dylan, "Horses" by Patti Smith, "Young Americans" by David Bowie, and for me the topper of them all "Physical Graffiti" by Led Zeppelin. So, you can see how "Born to Run" got lost amongst so much great music.
Making the transition from High School to College life was a revelatory time for me, as it is for most young people. What am I going to do now? Time to get serious. I'm not a boy, I'm a man. That's when I heard Bruce Springsteen's next album "Darkness on the Edge of Town", which had a song called "The Promised Land" which contained the line "I'm not a boy, no, I'm a man". All the songs on that album spoke directly to me at that time. "Badlands" struck a nerve:
"Baby I got my facts learned real good right now
You better get it straight darling
Poor man wanna be rich, rich man wanna be king
And a king ain't satisfied till he rules everything
I wanna go out tonight, I wanna find out what I got
Now I believe in the love that you gave me
I believe in the faith that could save me
I believe in the hope and I pray that some day
It may raise me above these Badlands"
Despite the poverty and turmoil I was enduring at that moment of my life, I was embarking on a new life, escaping the small town, going into the big world, finding out about love and life. It was at that time that I started dating the woman who would become my wife and, I am lucky to say, has put up with me for over 30 years. It was at that time that I started my life's mission. Bruce Springsteen was instrumental in helping me find myself. It was as thought he opened his car door and said, "Get in...we're going for a ride". I got in.
Only after many listens to "Darkness" did I buy "Born to Run". By that time, I had a real appreciation for the title track. It told me to get out while we were still young, and that someday we would "get to that place where we really want to go and we'll walk in the sun". I believed Bruce, and I was along for the ride.
When you are a fan of someone's music, you can't wait until their next album. Before Springsteen, I had been that way with Led Zeppelin; eagering awaiting each album and being the first person in the record store on the release date. Now, I couldn't wait until Bruce's next album to come out. He did not disappoint us with "The River". It was a double album, like the Beatles "White Album", similar in many ways in its scope and majesty. There were dark brooding songs, rockers, and funny songs, just like the "White Album". It is one of Bruce's best works and, not surprisingly, it had many songs about cars, such as "Stolen Car", "Drive All Night" and "Cadillac Ranch". One particularly funny song about driving his girlfriend's mother to the unemployment agency every monday morning was "Sherry Darling". Here's a snippet:
"You can tell her there's a hot sun beatin' on the black top
She keeps talkin' she'll be walkin' that last block
She can take a subway back to the ghetto tonight
Well I got some beer and the highway's free
And I got you, and baby you've got me.
Hey, hey, hey what you say Sherry Darlin'"
The highway's free, Bruce reminded us that we should get free and drive on. Bruce celebrated that freedom by exploring new landscapes and new styles in the stark "Nebraska" and the nostalgic "Born in the USA", which became his most popular album and permanently fixed him as a rock icon. "Born in the USA" clearly must have been a difficult act to follow creatively, because Springsteen has since dabbled in a variety of musical styles from pop to folk, always interesting and compelling songwriting full of rich imagery and universal themes. Cheers to the American Dreamer, Bruce Springsteen! He is clearly still "Working on a Dream" and ready to take us all along for the ride.
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