Coming in at number 40 on the Best of the 70's list is this classic from Springsteen. Though this has some of his best moments, "Adam Raised a Cain," this has never been a favorite of mine. I was a huge Bruce fan from age 16 to 19 and this was never a go to album for me.That being said this album is crucial to the growth of Springsteen and is really the key to the anger that sits behind so much of Born in the USA. Where Born to Run is an album of passion and youth, this is an album of anger and disappointment, and the loss of that youth and passion.
If your 23, single, and you just got home from spending a day drilling holes in plastic cups to plant hydroponic bib lettuce and you are going that night to a bachelor party for a guy you kind of know who is marrying a girl you were nuts about, then this is a great album to play while you shower and get dressed.
Following the Rhapsody rating method I give it 3 out of 5 stars for Pretty Good.
This is my favorite Springsteen album of all time. I think Bruce does his best work when he's feeling desperate, and I don't think he ever felt this desperate ever again.
ReplyDeleteLove the reference to hydroponic bib lettuce.
ReplyDeleteOh, and the concert shown in this clip -- the one Springsteen did in September 1978 that was broadcast on the radio in New York -- is the greatest rock concert of all time.
ReplyDeleteThat was a terrific suggested-application sentence.
ReplyDeleteNow some folks are born into a good life
ReplyDeleteOther folks get it any way, any how
Yeah, I lost my money and I lost my wife
Them things don't seem to matter much to me now.
Tonight I'll be on that hill, cause I can't stop
I'll be on that hill with everything I've got
Lives on the line where dreams are found and lost
I'll be there on time and I'll pay the cost
For wanting things that can only be found
In the darkness on the edge of town.
That is just so, so, good. On this album, Springsteen does everything that all of the punks in the late 1970s were trying to do -- to capture the misery and unease resulting from the decline of Anglo-American manufacturing, and the disappointments arising out of the failures of the 1960s -- but he's able to do it in a controlled and balanced form that doesn't require you to paint your hair, join a cult, smash guitars, or do drugs. And Springsteen's art was also accompanied by a commitment and a work ethic that allowed his fans to trust him because they knew he would always do his best for them. You can't ask anything more from an artist than that. It is very, very fitting that of all the people who will appear in this countdown, he and Michael Jackson were the only ones selling out football stadiums in the 1980s -- because they were the two greatest musicians of their generation.
Springsteen is an interesting artist in a lot of ways. One which I think makes him very unique is that the stuff he did when he was his youngest is his most upbeat stuff. The obvious difference between him and punk was that punk was all about youthful anger. Springsteen on Darkness and later as he matured funneled his anger through real issues and real problems not just the frustrations of being young. I can't really think of anyone else that fits that mold.
ReplyDeleteWell, he had a much more sophisticated understanding of what was going on. The punks were, for the most part, silly drug addicts who believed that life in England sucked because old white men were really mean. Springsteen was a smart guy, and a thoughtful guy, and a guy who wanted to be fair. He had a much more nuanced understanding of why so many young men in New Jersey in the late 1970s were really unhappy. He understood it wasn't just that Nixon was a bad guy and that America was played out -- although that was part of it. He could see that some of it was global economic forces, some of it was stupid decision-making by the young men themselves, some of it was caused by the women they were dating. He also understood that simply saying that life is awful and we're going to die is not an appropriate response to the frustrations of being a young man. Life is often wonderful, and to simply ignore that fact cramps your art. Because he was also a great craftsman, he was ultimately able to put all of this together in a way that allowed him to broadcast a message to his listeners that convinced them: I understand your problems. And his listeners responded.
ReplyDeleteIronically, there was one other person who was really great at telling a narrative about life in America in the 1970s and who also rode that ability to become a beloved icon in the 1980s. His name, of course, was Ronald Reagan.
The current time, to me, is very similar to the late 1970s. And I believe it should be a great time for artists and politicians, because Americans are truly hungry for someone to explain why everything is such a mess. Whoever can do so will sell out football stadiums or get his name put on airports. But so far no one has really stepped up to the plate. I thought Obama would do so -- and I'm sure that's what Obama thought as well -- but I'm now convinced that he is simply too deeply grounded in the U.S. establishment to truly capture the frustration of outsiders and losers in the way that both Springsteen and Reagan (in very different ways, of course) were able to do.
You're whacked. President Obama totally gets it.
ReplyDeleteYou wait and see. Obama can't stop being that kid who made straight A's and pleased all his teachers.
ReplyDelete