Bruce Springsteen and THE Greatest Hits Album
19 Studio albums. 19 Greatest Hits. And how saying no to The Boss and the boxset below led me to a lifetime of fandom.
19 Studio albums. 19 Greatest Hits. And how saying no to The Boss and the boxset below led me to a lifetime of fandom.
I’ve been listening to Bruce a lot lately but then again I listen to The Boss a lot anyway. Recently, it’s been “Nebraska”, “Letter to You”, “The Ghost of Tom Joad” and “Darkness on the Edge of Town” and I was casting an eye over his “Greatest Hits” album and whilst great, naturally, and with the addition of songs like “Murder Incorporated” even greater, it still doesn’t feel like a greatest hits album to me. So I’ve devised my own.
Growing up I was always an “album man”. Individual songs could be appreciated and loved, but is that song on a fantastic album crammed full and a listening piece of art? I grew up adoring seminal 1980’s albums from U2, Simple Minds, INXS and towards the end of 1990’s I fell in love with the earlier albums from Depeche Mode and electronic music in general from the early 1980’s. At around this time I wasn’t even really aware of Bruce but from “Born in the USA” onward you couldn’t help but be aware of him and especially here and across the pond from our American cousins. But I still wasn’t sold and in the late 1980’s came the moment of truth whereby I dismissed Bruce altogether and said a very firm “no” to The Boss.
My friend Gareth permeates a number of my music blogs and wherever that wandering star is in our universe, I hope he’s still listening to Bruce. In fact I think it would be a cast iron guarantee. For growing up, Gareth was as big a fan of Springsteen as could be. Every album, saw him at Wembley and made a yearly pilgrimage to the “Badlands” or “Backstreets” memorabilia store in the UK. I can’t remember the correct name, but I can remember that in the mid 1980’s there weren’t any memorabilia stores for just one rock star. But there was for Bruce, and Gareth would return with all sorts of rarities, promotions and 12 inch singles. I have written about Gareth at length in other blogs but suffice to say he was a golden hearted fool at times but a tremendous human being with it and I was tight friends with him. He crossed the yard from his Mum’s house one day with a huge and heavy looking black boxset of Springsteen’s live albums (as per above) and promptly handed it to me. At this point it was purely on loan (he would later gift me the album boxset) but he simply said I’d love it and to go home and enjoy. So I returned home, didn’t enjoy, at all, and promptly handed the heavy box back to Gareth and probably said a friendly no thank you. “Listen to it again” he said and flatly refused to take the albums. Which left me in quite the quandary. What to do?
I have no need to elucidate further here as to what happened next otherwise we wouldn’t be here in the first place. But, ironically, the 5 album boxset that I flatly dismissed before falling in love with will not play any part of this particular selection of greatest hits. Bruce has released 19 studio albums and hence this will be a brief appreciation of my favourite song on each of his albums and I hope as I go I’ll provide a suggestion or two for you to consider as a Springsteen greatest hit you hadn’t perhaps thought of in that light before. Of the 19 albums, I return most regularly to “Nebraska” and “Born to Run” and they would constitute early career Bruce, “The Ghost of Tom Joad” and “The Rising” mid career, and his two most recent albums as the high watermarks of his lengthy, almost 50 year musical career. There are three albums I still don’t like at all and there are easily the same number of albums I detested before finding their secret. So here, decade by decade are 19 albums and the 19 songs I believe constitute a real greatest hits album as well as worthy mentions to the songs they beat to claim that honour.
The 1970's
(1) “Lost in the Flood” beats out the competition on Bruce’s first album from the likes of the highly renowned Springsteen classics such as “Growin’ Up”, “Blinded by the Light” and a personal favourite of mine in “Mary Queen of Arkansas” as the song itself has mirrored my love of the album upon which it sits. Both were a slow burner for me but this track stands out and even above the more recognised songs noted. Here is Springsteen at his lyrical story telling best of growing up, going to war and coming home to a desolate home land. It’s lyrically brilliant and equally lyrically difficult to equate one single interpretation, and that’s a trait of the very best artists.
Favourite Lyric — “With wolfman fairies dressed in drag for homicide”
(2) “Incident on 57th Street (Part 1) Just and only just beats out “Sandy” on this album and it’s an album for me that I’ve never completely warmed to (I dislike the first four tracks particularly) and this is bitter sweet in many ways as his ode to his “Sandy Girl” was the first song of Bruce’s I truly “got”, appreciated and then knew for certain I was going to like his stuff more and more from then onwards. But “Incident” just pips it as it’s the quintessential love song that reduces me to tears every time I listen (there’s a live version from Barcelona that is ridiculously good) and it just evokes the early Springsteen trope of two lovers wanting escape amidst the working class societal carnage around them. I also interpret this beautiful song as having very dark undertones of escaping the darker side of a societal underworld, but regardless, this song deserves a place on any of Bruce’s greatest hits albums.
Favourite Lyric — “I want to drive you down to the other side of town. Where paradise ain’t so crowded”.
(3) “Thunder Road” I realise this is hardly a left field choice as this incredible piece of musical perfection will be a favourite amongst many, however, and perhaps you too dear reader, I’ve absorbed this song over the years so much that I’ve basically worn it, lived it, quoted it and adored it. This song is poetry to me and I can’t praise it any higher than that and it’s been my long standing favourite song of his, and just a smidgen ahead of a song about rivers, young love and questioning “Is a dream a lie if it don’t come true? Or is it something worse?”. But Thunder Road pips it for so, so many reasons and primarily I’ve always held it close to my heart for the reference to Roy Orbison and “singing for the lonely. Hey that’s me, and I want you only”. The big man in the dark shades was a huge favourite of my dear old Mum’s and I think about her whenever I hear this stunningly beautiful ode to love. It really is poetry and the album version is just that, almost spoken word poetry over a real, honest to goodness, full E-Street Band song. I quote it endlessly. The live versions at gigs over the years have risen to Godlike zeal and a full “Bruuuuuuuuuce” sing a long ensues where everyone plays their part because everyone, from the writer down to the amateur writer writing about a Boss here, we all hold this song very near to our hearts and for our own reasons. It’s sublime and an obvious inclusion here.
Favourite Lyric — “They scream your name at night in the street. Your graduation gown lies in rags at their feet”.
(4) “Something in the Night” This is perhaps the perfect juncture at which to sum up everything that is quintessentially Bruce, to me, for me, and as a way of showing my love for him and his band and as a prelude to the remainder of this blog. “Something in the Night” is stunning but it’s not better or more accomplished than “Racing in the Street” (WHICH IS STUNNING) but as with the spirit of me as a contrarian individual and the spirit of the blog and of trying to outline more unloved “greatest hits”, I include it here. But the album on which it features (Darkness on the Edge of Town) is almost as perfect as the perfect album that precedes it and so it’s difficult to claim a greatest hit out of 9/10 album greatest hits. From “Badlands” to “Darkness on the Edge of Town”, with “Candy’s Room”, “The Promised Land” and “Prove it All Night” squashed in between, and alongside the majesty, sheer majesty of “Racing in the Street” and a song I adore alongside “Thunder Road”. “Racing” has a lyric that tears me pieces with “She stares off alone into the night. With the eyes of one who hates for just being born” and the song strips me bare every time I listen and I listen to “Racing” a lot. I listen to my choice here at Number 4 of my greatest hits compilation too, and for the same reasons as I listen to a lot of Springsteen, for “Professor” Roy Bittan’s tinkling piano and background keyboards, for Max’s impeccable drumming, for Garry and for Steve, Clarence and Patti, Nils and now Jake. And for The Boss out front and the painfully, bittersweet tales he weaves of love, loss, growing up, inner and outer exploration and the “stuff running ‘round my head. That I just can’t live down”. Racing is better than Something, but this track needs more love and so appears here as the greatest hit from the “Darkness on the Edge of Town” album.
Favourite Lyric — “And left us running burned and blind. Chasing something in the night”.
The 1980's
(5) “Drive All Night” is the 19th song on “The River” double album and an album, whisper it, I don’t particularly like and the reason is so abstract I could either be making it up or it’s very much a singular view. The thing is, it just doesn’t sound like Bruce and I know it was released 41 years ago but even when I first listened to the album in the mid 1990’s I thought it too “pop” and lacking of a real mix and deepness to the sound. At the very least the album needs engineering and re-mixing because there are songs on this album (Two Hearts/Independence Day/Cadillac Ranch/Hungry Heart/Point Blank/Stolen Car/Wreck on the Highway as well as the titular River and these all became huge fan favourites and especially so live. I almost went for Point Blank for my own album here, but I’m in love with “Drive All Night” as it’s kept me wonderful company for a long time now, as has Max’s simple drums, Gary’s bass, Clarence booming sax, The “Professor’s” beautiful piano and The Boss wringing the sheer emotion out of yet another stunningly beautiful, somewhat mournful yet still uplifting love song.
Favourite Lyric — “And I just wanna sleep tonight again in your arms”
(6) “My Father’s House” I struggle to pick a single track to represent this astonishing album as I adore 9 of the 10 tracks, the only exception being “Open All Night” but with an album containing three life time favourites (Atlantic City, Johnny 99 and Reason to Believe) I’ve gone for “My Father’s House” as I adore the lamenting lilt of the song, the unobtrusive acoustic guitar and Bruce’s signature harmonica and the rising and falling of a majestic song that if it didn’t have to beat out the 3 songs above as well as umpteen others would and should make it into a greatest hits package.
Favourite Lyric — “I ran with my heart pounding down that broken path. With the devil snapping at my heels”
(7) “Bobby Jean” As much as I love the titular “Born in the USA”, drift into a reverie and stare longingly into the distance at “My Hometown” and smile at the ridiculousness of “Glory Days”, it’s yet another tale of trying to break free or trying to be with someone that life will simply not permit, maybe even an unrequited love he’s saying goodbye to, but a song that along with “Jersey Girl” on the live boxed set albums that I originally turned down, I fell in love with “Bobby Jean” and finally “got” Bruce. In old school language it’s a 3 and a half minute “rocker” and full tilt band rocker too as Max propels the frenetic pace of the song throughout before Clarence sooths the painful ending as we say goodbye, and good luck, to Bobby Jean. I have shed the occasional tear to this song, but then again, the same could be said for so many of Bruce’s song and indeed, the next one.
Favourite Lyric — “And I’m just calling you one last time, not to change your mind. But just to say I miss you, baby. Good luck, goodbye, Bobby Jean”
(8) “Valentine’s Day” From the gentle acoustic and bass beginning through to the introduction of Roy’s organ and to Bruce’s lament and plea at the end of this beautiful song, I’ve adored this from first listen and I myopically believe it a better track than “Tougher Than The Rest”, “Spare Parts” (which I adore) or “Brilliant Disguise”. This is a lamenting love song for the very centre of your being and to be held by, loved by and told “you’ll be my lonely valentine”. The song also evokes the misty eyed view of a rugged American in the 1980’s and the nature, wildlife, country and “that great jukebox out on Route 39” that make up a lyrical, and very Bruce Springsteen painted, picture of America.
Favourite Lyric — “They say he travels fastest who travels alone. But tonight I miss my girl mister. Tonight I miss my home”.
The 1990's
(9) “I Wish I Were Blind” As you may have noticed, I’m a bit of a sucker when it comes to a twisted and painful Bruce love song, but I’m also partial to a Bruce guitar solo too and so this fits the bill perfectly as well as making me peer into the wistful distance and think of lost loves every time I hear this beautiful song. Just sneaks ahead of “57 Channels and Nothing On” (which I adore) for the “Human Touch” addition of my greatest hits.
Favourite Lyric — “Oh these eyes that once filled me with your beauty, now fill me with pain”
(10) “Better Days” I wanted to choose “If I Should Fall Behind”, “My Beautiful Reward” or especially “Living Proof” (and what a towering song that is) but this song has kept me good company for so many years and despite my favourite lyric below there’s a redemptive rocking love song at the beating heart of this track and how luck, fate or destiny has a way of finding you even in the darkest of hours. Eminently quotable and no doubt a huge favourite of any Springsteen fan for inclusion on a greatest hits album, but I hold this song very, very dearly to my heart.
Favourite Lyric — “But it’s a sad man my friend who’s livin’ in his own skin. And can’t stand the company”
(11) “The Ghost of Tom Joad” See above! Another no doubt fan favourite but another song I can’t resist as it tells the tale of the human condition again, but far more starkly than perhaps ever previously by Bruce as the song tackles homelessness, depression, desperation, redemption, help and human kindness. The song feels reminiscent of a track he could have included on the “Nebraska” album as it’s soft, acoustic and harmonica with just the underbelly of a slide guitar. I love Bruce’s raised intonations (and intentions) with the choruses, a rallying cry against the bleak song and underworld vista he paints, of preachers, pillows of “solid rock” and the people left behind by “the new world order”. This is Bruce near his bleakest but also near his most lyrically beautiful and outspoken too.
Favourite Lyric — “Shelter line stretching around the corner. Welcome to the new world order”.
2000–2009
(12) “Waitin’ on a Sunny Day” The Rising album from which this song comes from was clearly Bruce’s reaction to the atrocity of 9/11 and his angst ridden and heart broken wail in song writing form. It’s an astounding album with so many personal highlights from “Into the Fire” seeking strength and hope, the ghostly howls of a “Nothing Man” and an “Empty Sky” and a “City of Ruins”. But Bruce rallies all of us to see “The Rising” and the joy from “Mary’s Place” and especially the throwaway brilliance of this song. It’s so untypically Bruce yet he’s made it into himself and over the years the song has taken a life of it’s own with the thunderous audience reaction whenever he plays it live. It’s not my style of music or indeed of Bruce but I fell in love with this song on first listen and it never, ever fails to move me when I listen and sing along.
Favourite Lyric — “I’m half a party in a one dog town. I need you to chase these blues away”.
(13) “Long Time Comin’” This album (Devils and Dust) is a mournful collection that always reminds me of “Nebraska” in the early 1980’s but whereas I adore that album, this one leaves me a little lukewarm aside from the title song and “Maria’s Bed” which almost, almost pipped my choice here. Aside from that, the album is one I rarely turn to when I want to listen to Bruce and perhaps I need to invest more time in it as it resides towards the bottom of my favourite albums of The Boss.
Favourite Lyric — “Now I’m going to get birth naked, and bury my old soul”
(14) “Devil’s Arcade” Honourable mentions fall to a number of tracks on an album I love and so consequently I could’ve gone for one of Radio Nowhere/Livin’ in the Future/Girls in their Summer Clothes/Last to Die or Terry’s Song, but I’ve plumped for Devil’s Arcade as it’s yet another song I immediately fell in love with on first listen. It’s musically so different and just stunningly beautiful with, I presume, Soozy Tyrell’s amazing strings behind a song that Bruce essentially narrates and builds with the increasing tempo of the song and a song I’ve always associated with the lament of war against the human horrors it creates and “the beat of your heart”. This is a song that really ages with repeated listens. An absolute gem.
Favourite Lyric — “You said heroes are needed, so heroes get made. Somebody made a bet, somebody paid”.
(15) “Outlaw Pete” Well I adore the album “Working on a Dream” so it’s been another difficult decision to put just one track forward, from Clarence’s whistling on the title track and the song that precedes it “My Lucky Day” and my choice here. And that’s just the first three tracks and I could easily interchange between the three of them, and there’s 10 more tracks to go yet! “Queen of the Supermarket” is a mis-step but we’re back with a run of wonderful songs from “What Love Can Do” to “Kingdom of Days” before the album closes with the soundtrack to the film “The Wrestler” which is an astonishing song, but I have to go for “Outlaw Pete” as although I’m repeating myself, it was love at first listen. This 8 minute behemoth tale is ostensibly about an outlaw but I’ve always presumed it may allude to ghosts of the past too and is yet another storied Springsteen tale as he lyrically weaves a beautiful story set against a soaring, full band accompaniment. The opening two lines of lyrics below immediately caught my attention and I was hooked.
Favourite Lyric — “He was born a little baby on the Appalachian Trail. At six months old he’d done three months in jail”.
2010–2020
(16) “Jack of All Trades” comes from a brilliantly juxtaposed album of human contradictions from the downbeat sounding titles of “Shackled and Drawn”, “Death to my Hometown” and “Depression” to the upbeat, resistance seeking defiance of “We Take Care Of Our Own”, “Land of Hope and Dreams” and even the titular “Wrecking Ball”, which encompasses both of these themes as it ostensibly tells the simple tale of the dismantling of a football stadium (society? family? life? sarcastic sideswipe at his own career?) yet Bruce implores the ball to “take your best shot, let’s see what you’ve got” in an act of defiance that thrills his fans at live gigs and it almost topped my choice here but, a 1,2, a 1,2,3,4……..
I adore “Jack of All Trades” for it’s sheer simplicity and for it’s ever present record (pun intended) of moving me close to tears every time I listen to it. It’s just a repetitious and mournful piano ballad (with added horns mid-way) and as with the theme above, it’s soaked in love, defiance, being ok, being “alright” and being at peace. Amen to that.
Favourite Lyric — “The banker man grows fat, the working man grows thin. It’s all happened before and it’ll happen again”.
(17) “American Skin (41 Shots)” One of Bruce’s most overtly political and hard swipes at an American society embroiled with racism, police violence and indiscriminate violence when simply trying to live in an “American Skin”, be a good citizen and human being amid these societal overtones and a society always seemingly 1 shot of a gun away from unrecoverable breakdown. The song openly breaks down the heart breaking tale of a citizen by the name of Amadou Diallo who when pressed by police in the vestibule of his apartment by local Police reached to produce his wallet confirming his identity and was shot 41 times.
Favourite Lyric — “You can get killed just for living, in your American skin”
(18) “Stones” Well, where to start with “Western Stars”? I have listened to this album in particular a lot since it’s release in 2019 (always in the car and often when not) and it’s a flawless joy and one of his very best studio albums he’s ever created. Ostensibly it’s a western American audio tale that’s been brilliantly produced with added strings, horns and a full band to magnificently bring to life 13 tracks I struggle to pick a favourite from. So for the purposes of this appreciation blog I’ve plumped for “Stones” as it encompasses so much of the humanity of the album as well as the best of the human journey it portrays and the wonderful production additions too. It’s a magnificent song that I loved immediately but then again, I could say that for every one of the twelve others.
Favourite Lyric — “I pulled my collar to the wind and spit them on the ground. You said those are only the lies you’ve told me”.
(19) “House of a Thousand Guitars” and quite simply we’ll end where we came in, with Bruce reunited with the E Street Band (sadly minus Danny Federici and “The Big Man” Clarence Clemons) and a full band number giving “The Professor” another chance to shine so blooming brightly on his piano, Max with his thumping drums and Nils, Patti, Stevie and Garry all playing their part in somewhat of a triumphant and resolute song that could be construed as being about Bruce and the E Street Band themselves as “from the stadiums to the small town bars. We’ll light up the house of a thousand guitars” and boy did they, and with a dash of good luck, they’ll do so again very soon.
The song itself is obviously an overt attack on the game show host who ridiculously became Commander in Chief of the USA but let’s not end on such a sour note. This is a band song. Bruce’s band song. And a celebration of their musical history making journey.
Favourite Lyric — “The criminal clown has stolen the throne. He steals what he can never own”
