Bruce Springsteen: Born To Run - 1975
"I saw rock and roll future and its name is Bruce Springsteen" - Jon Landau
This was Bruce Springsteen’s shot at the big time, after more years gigging than people may have thought and a couple of impressive but not particularly well-known albums. He saw this as pretty much his last chance at meaningful success.
Together with producer Jon Landau, who was responsible for hyping Springsteen up with his now legendary quote and the newly-revamped E St Band )in to the line up that was the most well-known), he merged a full-on “wall of sound” musical backdrop with his romantic, optimistic yet at times fatalistic lyrics. His songs were often character-driven - “street operas”, featuring an array of names like “Magic Rat”, “Barefoot Girl” and various other non-nickname ones but heavily featured, such as “Mary”, "Wendy", "Terry" and “Eddie”. The imagery in his songs was almost cinematic. You could see the characters, feel the “soft summer rain”.
It really was a masterful piece of work. Hard to know how it could be bettered, certainly musically and lyrically. It was painstaking in its creation, however, with Springsteen frustrated at his "having sounds in his head that he just could not explain to the members of the band". He brought in Jon Landau as producer, a relationship that would continue on after this, and this helped, and the final product would seem to be pretty much perfect, apart from possibly one thing - the sound.
Despite all the album's many good points, the reproduced sound quality, (as opposed to the actual music) however, has always let the album down slightly in my opinion. It is, however many remasters are done, always somewhat muffled and tinny. For some, though, therein lies its appeal, almost like a “back to mono” thing. I would just like to have heard it sound better, although I appreciate now that will never happen.
The screen door slams.....
Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out is an inspirational, Stax-influenced slab of rock and soul that describes the initial meeting between Springsteen and saxophonist Clarence Clemons - “the change was made uptown and the Big Man joined the band”. A concert favourite for many years, with its singalong horn parts proving ideal in that respect.
Night's machine gun drum attack ushers in this frantic “wall of sound” rocker that tells of a blue collar working guy waiting for his weekend night out, a common theme in Springsteen’s mid 70s-early 80s output. "Get to work late and the boss man's givin' you hell..." was an archetypal line from this era, working hard all day for the relief of the night. Musically, Clarence Clemons' saxophone dominates the song. It is a relatively short number but it packs one hell of a punch and fits in well with the album's overall ambience.
The lengthy, slightly sombre Backstreets is a bleak organ and guitar driven lament and a final climax repeats the line “hiding on the backstreets” many, many times. It doesn’t detract from it though, and the song is most evocative and atmospheric - the line "sleeping in that old abandoned beach house, getting wasted in the heat..." perfectly exemplifies it. Now we get the "one everyone knows".
An infectious, shuffling Bo Diddley “Mona” groove backs the album’s most obviously romantic track, She's The One. It contains a supreme saxophone solo from Clarence Clemons at the end. The atmospheric Meeting Across The River provides a distinct change in mood. Jazzy trumpet backs a mournful Springsteen vocal concerning the tribulations of a small time criminal and his hope he will “throw that money on the bed”. This is the often-forgotten song of the album and makes for an interesting listen because of it.
Finally, the album ends with a true Bruce classic, Jungleland. It is the album’s A Day In The Life. A monumental closer, an atmospheric slow-building piano intro, a great guitar solo and Clemons’ extended jazzy saxophone solo before Springsteen’s poetic finale. "The poets down here don't write nothing at all" - an overblown lyric in many ways, but all of these type of lines just suit this album perfectly.
A nod to the iconic nature of the cover too. Eric Meola's photos have become almost as famous as the music itself, haven't they? Unbelievable as it sounds, in 1975, a white man and a black man together in friendship on the cover was not a regular occurrence.
In comparison with most of Springsteen's other albums there were only two songs recorded during the sessions for this album that didn't make it, firstly Linda Let Me Be The One, which is one of my absolute favourite Springsteen non-album "rejects". It is a marvellous piece of Spectoresque majesty, with an infectious Be My Baby beat and piano refrain. It is a street romance song about characters Linda and Eddie, the sort of thing he did so well in this period, with lyrics about "the midnight boys", "angels in defeat" and "empty homes and broken hearts". I love everything about it and feel that it would have made an ideal addition to the album, coming after She's The One, maybe.
Secondly, So Young And In Love was a vibrant, saxophone-driven rock 'n' roller with a bit of a funky soul guitar line underpinning it. Clarence Clemons's saxophone roars out throughout the song and the feel is a bit like that heard on The E St Shuffle, but much faster, with shades of Kitty's Back too. Max Weinberg's drums pound and roll all the way along. It is a lively, fun number, possibly too much so for a final inclusion on the album.
