The nice people at W. W. Norton & Company have been kind enough to offer a copy of Marc Dolan’s wonderful biography “Bruce Springsteen and the Promise of Rock ‘n’ Roll” to one lucky winner on Greasy Lake.
The prize will be the new paperback edition of the book that was originally published in 2012 with an extra chapter thrown in that brings the story up to date. Readers of this site may remember that The Bruce Librarian had pretty high praise for the book when it was first published last year. It has a very unique approach to telling Bruce’s story, putting his music and career in a wide social and cultural context that sheds new light on both the man and the music.
The new chapter is not just an afterthought and an attempt to sell more copies. If anything, the original edition can actually be seen as premature. Because a lot happened between the original deadline of the book and the end of 2012: The E Street Band went on the road without Clarence, Wrecking Ball was released, Obama was reelected, and Hurricane Sandy devastated much of what is known as “Springsteen land”, all of which has influenced Bruce’s recent choices tremendously.
So if you’re looking for a little more insight into how Wrecking Ball came to be, or how Bruce and New Jersey governor Chris Christie became buddies, or you just want to read one of the best Bruce biographies in recent years, sign up for this contest.
All of you have to do is answer this question correctly: Which of these Bruce songs does Marc Dolan, in his book, refer to as “god-awful”?
To many Australians, Bruce Springsteen’s 2013 return to the land down under - as welcome as it was - had a feel of “it’s about bloody time”. It had been 10 years since the last visit, 10 years during which Bruce was just about an annual visitor to European and North American venues. And while Australia geographically and perhaps psychologically is a pretty remote place, Bruce’s relationship with Australia has been a troubled one from the get-go, which may have contributed to his hesitation to return.
It started the moment Bruce set foot on Australian ground for the very first time, March 18, 1985. The Born in the USA Tour was finally headed overseas after more than six months of shows in North America, and Australia was going to be the first stop.
But the Born in the USA frenzy was way ahead of the tour, and hundreds of fans were waiting for Bruce in the arrival section of the airport. Bruce’s security team, being equal to their task, tried to find another way out of the airport, but the airport staff refused to cooperate, forcing Bruce to go straight through the sea of excited fans. The bodyguards surrounding Bruce had to use some force to get him through, as they were hired to do. However, among the crowd were also press photographers and reporters, and the result was some rather unflattering pictures and headlines on the front pages of a few Sydney tabloid newspapers.
The Australian shows themselves were successful, except for a 30-minute delay of the first show in Sydney due to electrical problems. Little did Bruce know that electrical problems would haunt all his visits to Australia, except - for now - the current one.
What was probably more on Bruce’s mind was that after the six-show Sydney stand, it was time for the first real outdoor stadium show of his career, at the 37,000 capacity QE2 Stadium in Brisbane. He had played that size of crowd before, indoors at home in the US, but an outdoor stadium was the final threshold to be crossed after he had sworn way back in 1973 never to play anything larger than theaters. The show went well enough that Bruce in June set out on his first full stadium tour, in Europe, and the barrier to complete superstardom was broken.
Another first was achieved on that 1985 Australia tour when Bruce for the first time of his career performed with Neil Young. The Canadian singer was touring Australia at the same time as Bruce, and on March 22, between two of his own Sydney shows, Bruce guested with Young for a 20-minute version of “Down by the River”.
The ghost goes to Australia
Having established a connection with the Australian market, It would be a surprising 12 years before Bruce once again decided to take his music down under. He skipped Australia for the short Tunnel of Love Tour (he also skipped New Jersey so that hardly counts) and, more surprisingly, he skipped it for the 1992-93 Human Touch/Lucky Town Tour, just as Australia for some reason wasn’t included on the 1988 Amnesty International “Human Rights Now!” Tour, which claimed to cover all continents.
It wasn’t until the late part of his 1½ year solo acoustic The Ghost of Tom Joad Tour in 1997 that he ventured back to the Australian shores. He did so with ten intimate shows in Brisbane, Sydney, and Melbourne, in less than two weeks. The only way to do that was to scrap his rule since the late Seventies of only performing two nights in a row. In Sydney he played four shows in five days, and in Melbourne three shows in three days.
But it was during one of the Brisbane shows that the power gods once again played tricks with him. This time only the lights were affected. For 20 seconds during - of all songs - “Darkness on the Edge of Town” the stage went black. Bruce took it all in stride and kept on singing. “Man, when I said ‘darkness’ it went completely fuckin’ dark! That’s clever!” he commented afterwards to a laughing crowd.
The 1997 Australian tour was otherwise fairly unremarkable. Bruce was his, at the time, usual accessible self and reports of fan meet ‘n’ greets were numerous. The shows were well received by fans and press alike, although one newspaper made a point of telling its readers that Bruce was good, but Christy Moore, Loudon Wainwright III and Richard Thompson were all much better.
For a fine documentation of the two weeks in February 1997 that Bruce spent in Australia, dig out, download, or ask somebody for a copy of Crystal Cat’s Sydney Night bootleg, which features the entire February 12, 1997, Sydney show in great quality as well as tons of bonus tracks from the other Australian shows.
The Rising going Down Under
So, surely, after this positive experience, Australia would be a certain inclusion on future tours? No, that wasn’t to be. The Aussies were once again forgotten when Bruce reunited the E Street Band in 1999 and went on another year-long “world” tour of North America and Western Europe.
However, this time it would be only six years before a return visit. The Rising album and Tour were Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band’s big shot at another mega, worldwide commercial success a la Born in the USA, and as such, Australia had to be included. This time, however, only four shows were scheduled. As usual, they were placed during the Australian summer, in March of 2003.
Despite the favorable season, the Australian tour would turn out to be a somewhat frustrating experience for Bruce. Not that the war against Iraq can be blamed (much) on the Australians, but the fact was that the first show of the tour down under, in Melbourne, took place just as a US led coalition (including Australia) started their controversial bombing and invasion of Saddam Hussein’s already ramshackle empire. Opening the show with a bitter acoustic version of “Born in the USA” and a powerful “War”, Bruce addressed the situation head-on, but it must not have been the easiest show he’s ever done.
It didn’t help that the VIP section of the venue had been placed right in front of the stage, and as we all know, VIP’s are there to be seen rather than participate. As a result, the immediate audience response that Bruce experienced was lackluster to say the least, causing him to chide the audience for their sing-along skills during “Waitin’ on a Sunny Day”, calling them “pathetic”.
Not the best start to the first E Street Band tour in Australia in 18 years. Things did not improve much with the next show, in Sydney. The technical problems that had affected shows on both of Bruce’s previous Australian visits, were taken to a whole new level. Three times during the Sydney show, in the middle of songs, the power failed, leaving Bruce to hand and facial gestures only, while drummer Max Weinberg, manning the only instrument that didn’t need amplification to be heard, tried to keep the audience entertained with drum solos.
When the technical problems were finally resolved, Bruce worked hard to make up for them by playing the longest show on The Rising Tour so far, and even breaking the 11 p.m. curfew by adding the tour premiere of “Rosalita” and a rowdy “Darlington County” for good measure. Most people left satisfied, and the show has achieved legendary status among fans, not just because of the power outages, but also due to the fact that it’s one of very few shows since 1980 that has never surfaced on either audio or video among traders.
After the problematic first half of the Australian tour, Bruce left nothing to chance when he wrapped up the tour with two shows in Brisbane. They were originally announced as one date at the ANZ Stadium, but had to be turned into two shows at the much smaller indoor Entertainment Center due to a scheduling conflict. By all accounts, both shows were smoking and ensured an overall victory for Bruce and the band as they moved on to New Zealand and Canada.
But back in Australia, the drama wasn’t quite over. The concert promoter Kevin Jacobsen had taken a $1.7 million loss (Australian Dollars) and had to file for bankruptcy protection in order to survive. This despite the fact that Bruce had done the two Brisbane shows for the fee of one show. But Jacobsen had overestimated Bruce’s popularity and chosen venues that were too large. And since Bruce had to get paid the same, whether the shows sold out or not, the losses all fell on the promoter.
Jacobsen’s company survived, but Bruce didn’t return to Australia for 10 years, and one of the reasons could very well be that neither Jacobsen nor any other Australian promoter dared make the gamble.
When it finally happened this year, with Jacobsen back in the saddle as the promoter, all fears were quenched. Bruce sold out not only all originally scheduled shows but also the several extra shows that were added. And at the time of writing, halfway through the 2013 Australian tour, it looks like for the first time Bruce may get back from Down Under completely unscathed and with the word “triumph” stamped on the cover of the tale.
And maybe, just maybe, he will finally include Australia in two consecutive tours? The next few years will tell.
“Bruce” by Peter Ames Carlin is one of the most talked-about Springsteen biographies ever put to print, and Greasy Lake must be the last publication with even the slightest interest in the protagonist to review it, and chances are, if you read this, you’ve already read a few other reviews. Heck, you probably already read the book and formed your own opinion.
Still, this column simply wouldn’t be complete without a piece on what is not only the most talked-about Bruce book, but also the most important one since Dave Marsh wrote his “Born to Run” book more than 30 years ago.
And now I already revealed that I liked it. A lot. Is it as good as it could have been and perhaps should have been? No, but it’s absolutely the best Springsteen biography that I have read, which, glancing at my two full shelves of all-Bruce books, actually says a lot.
If you have read the two books by Dave Marsh, “Born to Run” and “Glory Days” (later merged into one volume as “Two Hearts”), you know the basic Springsteen story. Very few books have added a whole lot to that. Sure, they’ve told it a little differently and added the missing years, albeit with very little true insight.
Enter “Bruce” by Carlin and that all changes. Even more than Marsh’s books, it relies on first-hand accounts from everybody from Bruce’s family to his bandmates and other associates, and, most importantly, from Bruce himself. Tons of interviews have been conducted. Carlin even hung out with Bruce on several occasions. The result is what appears to be the truest and most detailed portrait of Bruce Springsteen as a human being as we are likely to get until Bruce decides to write his own book.
While Dave Marsh’s books have been criticized for painting a somewhat rosy picture of Bruce, Carlin’s book reveals his flaws as well as his strengths. Much has already been said about the book’s disclosure of Bruce being on antidepressants, and we also learn that he’s not always the hearty pal to his band members and other employees as we may have thought.
But if you don’t like to read negative things about your hero, don’t let the above facts deter you. The reader is not left with an overall negative impression of Bruce at all. We may see him as more human, but that’s hardly a bad thing; on the contrary.
Perhaps the biggest strength of the book is its recounting of how Bruce became Bruce: his childhood and the years in Asbury Park before he became a star. Those first 25 years of his life take up almost half the book, and it’s not a page too much. With unprecedented detail and sense of authenticity, Peter Carlin writes about Bruce’s school years, his close relationship to his grandparents, his rebellion against his father. We even hear about his parents’ background, and not just because Carlin wants to demonstrate how much he knows, but because it actually matters to the story of how Bruce turned out. And reading these chapters, you don’t get the feeling that you’ve read it all a hundred times before. It’s the difference between reading a summary of a great novel and actually reading the novel. Reading Carlin’s book, it all falls into place: what it was like back then; what really happened and why; and what effect it had on the events that followed.
When all this is said, it is also undeniable that the second half of the book doesn’t maintain the same level as the first. Maybe it’s because once Bruce got his breakthrough and became a star, his life and career simply became less interesting and less dramatic. Or maybe the story is too well known to captivate us. But those things can’t be the whole explanation. What we would have given to hear about the breakup of the E Street Band, the “other band” tour, the confused Nineties, the superstardom of the mid-Eighties with as much detail and insight as the Steel Mill years! But we don’t. We do get lots of new information and it’s at a much higher level than in your average Bruce biography, but we’re still left wanting more. Could it be that the sources, who for the most part are still working with Bruce, became more protective of him and less inclined to share the goods as we approached the more recent times? Or was it just Carlin who couldn’t invest the same amount of energy and interest in the later decades if he was ever going to finish his project?
Those are just speculations, and whatever the case, it doesn’t deflect from the fact that this is the best Bruce Springsteen biography out there. And not just because of what we learn. All the interesting information in the world couldn’t make it a good book if the writing were bad. But that’s the thing. Peter Carlin writes so well, it’s hard to put the book down. The language flows like the lyrics of a favorite Bruce song, and altogether, the book is a joy to read on every level. Buy or borrow it, it doesn’t matter. If you have any interest in Bruce - and you wouldn’t be here if you didn’t - just read it. Now.
As someone who got to know Bruce around the time he was the biggest living rock star on the planet, Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ, was not an easy bite to chew. Just accepting the fact that it was the same person who bawled out bigger-than-life rock ‘n’ roll anthems at gigantic football stadiums as the bearded weirdo who stared back at you from the back cover of the Greetings album took years.
It didn’t help that one of the first Springsteen albums I owned - long before I got Greetings - was the Live 1975-85 box set. Live 75-85 contains three live versions of songs from Greetings. Unlike the studio versions, they all have that E Street Band punch and emotion that I had come to expect, and Bruce sounds like, well, Bruce. Okay, even on Live 75-85, “Saint in the City” sounded like a tuneless, confused train wreck to me, but still, drawing a line from “Growin’ Up” on side 2 of Live 75-85 to, say, “The River” on side 7 wasn’t completely unfeasible. It actually made sense.
So when I finally bought the Greetings album in order to complete my Springsteen collection, which back then was entirely on cassettes, my reaction was... there’s no other way to say it... disappointment. Who was that wimpy-voiced, bearded parody of my hero? Sure, I recognized those songs that I’d heard on Live 75-85, but boy, were they lacking in comparison!
The only redeeming factor was “Lost in the Flood”. I adored “Lost in the Flood” from the first time I heard it, and it’s still my favorite on that album. The rest was a pale mush that I only listened to because I wanted to hear “Lost in the Flood”, and with cassette tapes you couldn’t easily skip to the songs you wanted to hear.
From that low point on, my ascent to, first acceptance of, and then finally adoration for the Greetings album began. As Bruce grew from a musician I enjoyed listening to, to an all-consuming part of my life, things started to fall into place. No, Greetings From Asbury Park is not sonically Bruce’s best album, the production is neither fish nor fowl, his voice is very far from what it would become just a couple of years later, and he has released much better collections of songs since. But listen to it all the way through followed immediately by The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle, and then Born to Run, and you have a trilogy of albums that so beautifully reveals the making of an artist before your very eyes... or, in this case, ears. Leave out one of those albums and the story is incomplete.
While Greetings is the inferior of the three albums and does suffer from the above-mentioned deficiencies, its existence is of course justified by more than just being a piece of a puzzle. As decades of live performances have shown, the quality of the song-writing is there. In addition to “Lost in the Flood”, songs like “Growin’ Up”, “Spirit in the Night” (which provided the name to this very site), and “It’s Hard to Be a Saint in the City” all have enough focus and memorable imagery to stand tall among later, more famous songs. Even the under-appreciated “The Angel” has an atmosphere and an urgency that few artists can hope to achieve on their debut album. He even managed to include a song, “Blinded by the Light”, that would become a number one hit, if not for himself, then for Manfred Mann’s Earth Band a few years later.
Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ, will never win any “Best album” polls, but few albums are still remembered 40 years on. Of course, much of that owes to Bruce’s later merits, but I for one would like to think that if Bruce had never made another album, there’d still be a small place in music history for this quirky postcard album from a promising artist named Bruce something or other. We’ll never know.
So let’s just pop it in the CD player, or better yet, put it on the turntable, and enjoy it like it’s the first chapter in your favorite book. It would be a bad book if the first chapter was the best, but the same would be the case if the first chapter wasn’t there at all.
We survived the Mayan apocalypse, but if the tinfoil hats had been right and the world had gone poof from under our feet, 2012 wouldn’t have been such a bad year to be the last one. At least if you see it from a Bruce Springsteen fan point of view.
After a two-year hiatus, during which Bruce was never really that far off the radar (can you say Darkness box?), in 2012 he was back with a vengeance. The highlights were as high as they were plentiful, and the big question that fans had asked themselves and each other before the tour - is there life after the Big Man? - was answered with a resounding “Yes!”.
The year actually started in late 2011 when, out of nowhere, a tour for 2012 was announced. Usually tours are announced in connection with, or shortly after, an album announcement, but while the press release did mention an upcoming album, it would be months before the title and other details were revealed. So entering 2012, fans already knew the year would be a big step up from the traumatic 2011. However, not many dared hope it would be the kind of year legends are made of. But it was and it has been. You don’t think so? Well then, read this official Greasy Lake Top-10-Plus-1-In-Chronological-Order-List-Of-Highlights.
Wrecking Ball
As always, opinions were divided when Bruce’s first album of new music in three years was released in March. Although compared to the reception of Working on a Dream in 2009, it was hailed as a masterpiece. Whatever the case, a Bruce album is a Bruce album is a Bruce album, and a Bruce album will always be a year-highlight no matter what else happens that year. And his new mix of Seeger Sessions-style folk music and traditional rock sat quite well with most fans, just as the new depression theme resonated with a lot of people, with the exception perhaps of those who happened to work in banks.
Apollo Theater
Not counting a one-song performance at the Grammy Awards, the Apollo Theater show in March was the first real glimpse the world received of what The E Street Band looked and sounded like without Clarence Clemons. The Big Man’s sad absence was compensated by no less than a horn section (including his nephew Jake Clemons), background singers, and a percussionist. The radio broadcast show served as a warm-up for the tour as well as a benefit for Sirius XM radio, but Bruce didn’t refrain from acknowledging that this was his first performance at the legendary theater that fostered so many famous black soul artists. He even climbed onto a balcony and crowd-surfed his way back to the stage during a soul medley. But perhaps the most moving part of the night was the way he commemorated the lost members of the E Street Band with a video montage and chants of “If you’re here and we’re here, they are here”.
SXSW speech
When it was announced that Bruce Springsteen would be the keynote speaker at the SXSW music festival in Austin, not too many fans really knew what that meant. It turned out to mean an hour-long speech in front of a crowd of music industry people, media, musicians, and music lovers, and with a live stream on the internet for everyone else to enjoy. Bruce blew everyone away with his take on his own musical upbringing, the current state of music, and his advice to young musicians. He proved that if he ever loses his ability to sing, he can always make a career as a stand-up comedian or music lecturer; but most of all he drew a thick line under his status as the coolest elderly statesman of rock ‘n’ roll that the world has ever known.
Prove It All Night ‘78
We just have to include the resurrection of the 1978 version of “Prove It All Night” among the highlights of 2012. For decades the guitar solo that preceded the first verse of the song during the Darkness Tour stood as a symbol of that tour, which again, to most fans, towers above everything else the man has done on a concert stage, before or since. The resurrection of this holy, musical relic took place in Barcelona in May, and while the length of it and the guitar virtuosity demonstrated may not have been quite up to 1978 standards, it was still enough to make headlines on fan communities and blogs everywhere. While far from becoming standard, Bruce would repeat this version of “Prove It All Night” at several shows throughout the 2012 tour.
The pulled plug in Hyde Park
The event had all the ingredients of a British comedy show. Not many people know exactly what happened behind the stage on that fateful night in July, which is why it’s so tempting to picture it in your mind: a clipboard-carrying, John Cleese-like inspector from the London authorities, a few policemen with Bobby helmets, Bruce’s loud, cursing American tour manager, Paul McCartney’s personal assistant shouting threats... Whatever happened that night, the end result was a pulled plug and a show cut short while, not some young unknown punks were on stage, but two of the biggest rock ‘n’ roll stars in the world ever. Afterwards, the London authorities got ridiculed in the world press for their strict curfew rules, and Bruce got his revenge a few nights later in Dublin by reenacting the whole thing, but with himself, Steve, and the rest of the band as the triumphant victors.
“Jungleland” in Gothenburg
Since the start of the tour, fans had asked themselves and each other, “What about ‘Jungleland’? Can it be played without Clarence? Should it be played without Clarence?’” The question was answered one summer night in Gothenburg when, as the near-conclusion of an already epic show, Roy Bittan started playing those famous piano notes. Halfway through the song, Jake Clemons stepped to the front of the stage to receive the symbolic torch and thereby ensure the continued existence of this sacred piece of music that is the saxophone solo of “Jungleland”. He did a flawless job, then raised his saxophone toward the sky, and the transition was consummated. Afterwards people asked themselves why they had ever doubted it could work. It felt so right.
The longest show ever
For decades you could have woken any serious fan from their sleep and asked them, “What’s the longest show Bruce ever did?” and they would, without hesitation, have answered, “Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, New York, New Year’s Eve, 1980, 38 songs, approximately four hours long”. Until July 31, 2012, that would have been the correct answer. But no more. The honor now goes to a show in, of all places, Helsinki, Finland, a country that, for many, many years, Bruce and his management apparently didn’t even know existed, to the frustration of the quite substantial Finnish fan community. Unlike the 1980 show in Uniondale, and a couple of other very long shows in 2012, the Helsinki show broke the four-hour mark and thereby became the new record-holder. And those four hours plus didn’t even include the impromptu 30-minute acoustic set that Bruce did after his soundcheck in front of a stunned crowd of early arrivers in the pit.
Storm over MetLife
While Europe, to many fans everywhere, is increasingly becoming the place to see Bruce, now and then the US, and not least New Jersey, can still muster one for the history books. A fine example of that took place on September 22 at the brand new MetLife Stadium. A gigantic storm approached the stadium as the show was about to start, and thousands and thousands of fans had to be evacuated from the field and the stands for their own safety. They stood in hallways, they stood in lobbies, and they even stood in restrooms for several hours before being allowed back to their spots. It was 10:30 p.m. when the show finally got underway, and since Bruce is not one to cut his shows short just because it’s getting a little late, he did his standard 3½ hours and thus didn’t call it a night till 2 a.m., well into his own 63rd birthday, which he and the crowd didn’t fail to acknowledge.
Singing for Obama
Whether you voted for Obama or not, and whether you thought it was a good idea for Bruce to go out there on the campaign trail for him, those performances are still a big part of what 2012 will be remembered for. Bruce and his acoustic guitar were utilized in swing-states dominated by white working-class voters, the segment that Obama’s campaign strategists thought Bruce would have the best odds of reaching. No one knows if he changed any minds, and his performances won’t go down in history for their quality and grandiosity, but he enthusiastically did what he could and drew plenty of attention from the media. And he debuted a new ditty called “Forward” that we’re not likely to hear ever again. He ended his mini-campaign tour in Des Moines by warming up for Obama himself and, if nothing else, securing his own spot in the soon-to-be re-elected president’s iPod.
Bruce, the book
If you’re a fan of Bruce and a fan of books, 2012 was a spectacular year. Not only did we see several new Bruce biographies, but also, most of them were of a really high standard that didn’t just repeat what we’d already read before. But towering above them all was the new book by Peter Ames, simply titled Bruce. It’s not an official biography, but it’s close. Ames had access to both the protagonist himself, several of his family members, and lots of his friends and collaborators. The result is a cornucopia of new revelations about the man and tons of little details that make this the most interesting and truest portrait of our hero that we are ever likely to get, unless Bruce decides to write his own book. Even then, it probably won’t be written half as well. Look for an official Greasy Lake review of this book in the beginning of 2013.
Sandy Relief concert
On a terribly bleak background came the last of this year’s Bruce highlights. When Hurricane Sandy ravaged the East Coast of the United States, and New Jersey in particular, in late October, it was a call to arms for Bruce, the likes of which hadn't been seen since September 11, 2001. He first did “Land of Hope and Dreams” for NBC’s telethon shortly after the disaster, but it was the highly publicized 12-12-12 Sandy Relief concert in Madison Square Garden on, well, December 12 that stood out. Opening the show and backed by the E Street Band, he set the tone for the evening with a four-song set that saw the intertwining of an emotional “My City of Ruins” and “Jersey Girl” as well as duets with Jon Bon Jovi for “Born to Run” and Jovi’s “Who Says You Can’t Go Home?”
And so 2012 came to an end, leaving quite a challenge for 2013 to surpass it, or even come close. The fact that Bruce joining the Rolling Stones in Newark a few days after the 12-12-12 concert didn’t make our list of 2012 highlights says it all about the kind of year this has been. You may also wonder what happened to his heartfelt appearance at a tribute in Oslo for the victims of the Utøya massacre in 2011. And his first show in Mexico? Or his two nights on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon in the spring. Heck, why do you think we had to make this a Top 10+1 list of highlights rather than just a Top 10? Well, because we just couldn’t prune the list any further without losing something truly essential.
Happy New Year to all of you out there, and see you in 2013!
2012 is turning out to be a great year for Springsteen books. I recently reviewed Marc Dolan’s excellent The Promise of Rock ‘n’ Roll; November will see the release of the authorized biography “Bruce” by Peter Ames; and in between those two we now have “Bruce Springsteen FAQ: All That’s Left to Know About the Boss” by John D. Luersson.
What separates “Bruce Springsteen FAQ” from most other Bruce biographies is the characteristic format of the FAQ series, which to date also includes a “Neil Young FAQ”, “U2 FAQ”, “The Doors FAQ”, and several others (not all written by Luersson). It’s a cross between a biography and an encyclopedia, and it can be read either from start to finish, as a regular biography, or as a handbook for quick look-ups. But rather than being alphabetical, it follows a chronological structure interspersed with thematic sections, such as “Artists Springsteen opened for”, “Girlfriends and wives”, and “Benefits, charities and causes”.
The sections are short, which makes it bliss to those who only read during short bus or train commutes. A fine index, contents section, and clear typography make it relatively easy to find the information you need.
And information is what this book excels in. The purpose of the book seems to be to simply stuff as much information into one book as possible. While this is a great objective, it does make the subtitle somewhat misleading. Rather than “all that’s left to know about the Boss”, it should perhaps have been “all that’s known about the Boss and then some”. The thing is, long-time Bruce geeks will only find a few things they didn’t already read before, but in return, they’ll get a book where all they know is gathered in one handy place.
People who are new to Bruce or just haven’t studied him much, on the other hand, will find this to be a treasure. In fact, it may be the one Bruce book you should choose if you are a serious fan and want to know the facts, but don’t have a desire to read several books. It will also make you well dressed for passing Greasy Lake’s popular Bruce quizzes, which is not a thing to be sneezed at!
My only complaint about the book is that it does contain a few errors here and there; that, and the lack of source notes. The errors are, as far as this reader can judge, few and far between and nothing that should deter you. In fact, with the amount of facts this book contains, you would almost expect more errors than you see. The lack of source notes is not a major flaw either, but once in a while, when you come upon a new piece of information, it would have been nice to know where it comes from so that you could do a little more research on your own.
Altogether, “Bruce Springsteen FAQ” is a worthy ingredient in the trinity of important 2012 Springsteen books mentioned in the beginning. Read it from start to finish or just use it as a reference book. Whatever you choose, it’s well worth the space in your bookshelf.
The best part is that it can now be yours for free. Greasy Lake has a brand new, unread copy available for one lucky winner. And unlike our usual practice, you don’t have to answer geeky trivia questions to win. All you have to do is send us a review or comment of more than 50 words about a Bruce album of your own choice. We will make a random draw among everybody who submits an entry, so it doesn’t even have to be well-written or insightful. We do reserve the right to publish all reviews on Greasy Lake.
Greasy Lake confucted an email interview with the author of Bruce Springsteen FAQ, John D. Luersson. Here are his replies to our questions.
Greasy Lake:Why does the world need another Bruce Springsteen book?
John D. Luersson: Bruce Springsteen FAQ is designed to be an entertaining reference book – one that hardcore fans can enjoy as much as passive fans. When I was quoted as saying “It’s the only Bruce book you’ll ever need” by Backstreets, it might have sounded a little pompous but what I meant is that was my goal in writing it. Want to settle a bet over what year Bruce crashed his motorbike into a tree? Pick up Bruce FAQ. It happened at his Holmdel farm in April 1979.
When did The Boss first encounter John Cafferty and Beaver Brown? August 25, 1978, at Toad’s Place in New Haven. It’s there on page 218.
GL: What makes you qualified to write a Bruce Springsteen book? How big of a fan are you yourself?
JDL: I have been writing about rock and roll for 27 years. My first record review – of The Smiths’ Meat is Murder – ran in my Westfield High School newspaper in 1985. I’ve interviewed some of my heroes – Joe Strummer, Iggy Pop, Paul Westerberg – and some of my current favorites like Ryan Adams, Pete Yorn and Josh Rouse – during an active music journalism career writing for the likes of Billboard, Rolling Stone, Spinner and American Songwriter. I’ve written two other books – one on Weezer that I wrote about a decade ago – and one for Backbeat’s FAQ series on U2 that came out in 2010. In that sense, I’d say I’m pretty qualified to write books.
As for Springsteen, I’ve been a devoted fan since October 1980 when I first heard the Boss on WPLJ as a seventh grader. I had been aware of him before that time, but I hadn’t really heard him. Between Christmas 1980 and Nebraska two years later, I was an ardent student. But from there I became a student of all things rock and roll and while I appreciated
Bruce from afar, I didn’t get back into his clutches as an obsessive until 1999’s Reunion tour and the ’98 Tracks box consumed me.
I consider myself to be a big fan, but the handful of shows I’ve seen cannot compare to the likes of some. I have a friend from Westfield named Mitch Slater who has seen a staggering 235 shows since 1976. The guy has an encyclopedic knowledge of those shows. He’s like a Springsteen savant. I’m not in that league but I appreciate his devotion to Springsteen.
GL: It must have required a tremendous amount of research to write Bruce Springsteen FAQ. How did you go about it and what were your main sources?
JDL: As mentioned above, I had written U2 FAQ, in which I found my way through the process of delivering the kind of book that Backbeat/Hal Leonard was looking for. I was mentored through the process by Robert Rodriguez, the Series Editor and the man behind Fab Four FAQ and FAB Four FAQ 2.0.
As for the research, I did a ton of reading early on, delving into every Springsteen book I could get my hands on. I also found great information online via Brucebase and, of course Greasy Lake, not to mention a staggering number of periodicals. The Bruce Springsteen Special Collection at Monmouth University is a sight to behold. From there, it’s like putting together a huge complicated puzzle. It requires a lot of organization and time. I started the book in December 2010 and finished it this past May.
GL: Bruce Springsteen FAQ is stuffed with information, but what information that is unavailable to the public would you have liked to dig out and publish?
JDL: I asked to [interview] Bruce and hoped to talk to him about some facet of his life. I’d hoped to find out for sure if the band name Bruce Springsteen and the Incredible Jersey Jukers was the precursor to The Asbury Jukes moniker. I, of course, wanted to know if there will ever be a second volume of Tracks. As a sometime golfer, I wondered if he ever golfed and if so, did he hit the links with his original drummer, Mad Dog Lopez, who was, of course, a Golf Caddy for New Jersey’s Mark McCormick at this year’s U.S. Open.
Those are just the tip of the iceberg. Anyway, I wrote to his publicist, Marilyn Laverty in August 2011 to ask but I was told he wasn’t doing any interviews that year (except, I presume, with Peter Carlin).
GL: You also wrote a U2 FAQ. How would you compare Springsteen and U2 in terms of how their careers developed and the legacy they will leave behind?
JDL: I think they are both amazing acts that have stumbled a little at various points in their careers but both have grown and evolved respectively as artists. Both acts struggled commercially around their second studio albums and nearly got dropped by their record labels only to come back and conquer the world.
Of course, Springsteen has an extra decade on his biological odometer and yet he’s still capable of out-performing Bono every night. U2 does a two hour show; Bruce does double that on many nights. I do love both acts very much and appreciate their humanitarian approaches, but some of Bono’s venture capitalist activities seem greedy to me. How much do you need, you know? I have always respected Bruce more, especially because of his efforts for veterans, and his ongoing Food Bank initiatives.
I also believe that there will never be another performer in our lifetime to endure at the same artistic and commercial levels as Springsteen. Dylan comes close from an artistic standpoint but Bruce is an American Icon.
GL: Can you talk a little about the way you have chosen to arrange the book, making it sort of a mix between a reference book and a traditional biography?
JDL: That’s a pretty standard approach for the FAQ series. Bear in mind, the book is striving to multi-task. It is biographical, it is a reference point, it is a source for trivia and in some cases it offers a little opinion. I will say this – the book was too big – I was forced to cut four chapters. I had sections about Springsteen’s Jersey Shore Haunts, a look at his B-Sides and a couple others.
GL: Do you have a favorite Springsteen period that you secretly wish he would return to?
JDL: If you’re asking me what my favorite period is, it has to be ’75 to ’85. Those songs still speak to me. Those songs still speak to all of Springsteen’s fans. But I also think The Rising is still arguably the best rock album of the post-millennium.
GL: In your opinion, how has Bruce done so far in regard to bringing his music and the E Street Band into the post-Clarence world?
JDL: I think Springsteen said it best when he posted, “Clarence doesn’t leave the E Street Band when he dies, he leaves when we die.” He took the same approach when Danny died. The songs continue to grow with The E Street Band and he continues to bring his A-game on most nights. As for the material, Wrecking Ball is a strong album that has grown on me more and more over the past seven months. Sometimes those records turn out to be the best. You peel back a little at a time and come to appreciate a song like “We Are Alive.”
GL: The fan world is eagerly awaiting the new authorized biography by Peter Carlin. Why should they buy your book too?
JDL: A friend of mine was admiring a promotional copy of the book while we tailgated recently for one of the Met Life shows. He had a few beers and was feeling pretty loose. He stands up on a cooler and starts reading out trivia about past New Jersey shows to people who were heading in. He was preaching the gospel of Bruce. After a few minutes he had people standing around. I realized I had something cool that would resonate with fans.
With that in mind, I think Bruce Springsteen FAQ makes a great companion piece to a more cerebral Springsteen read like Carlin’s. Put his on the bookshelf when you’re done and leave mine in the bathroom. You can pick my book up and open it to any page, time and time again, and it should entertain. It’s by no means inferior, just a different approach to the subject matter.
GL: Are you worried about obsessive, geeky fans such as myself pointing out errors in Bruce Springsteen FAQ? (e.g. David Sancious wasn’t part of the E Street Band when they played in London in 1975, as it says on page 94)
JDL: The reality is people make mistakes. Even Bruce. Who can forget his geography flub on November 13, 2009 when he said “Hello, Ohio” to the Auburn Hills, Michigan audience?
I’m pretty sure I was thinking of how Sancious played on the studio version of “Kitty’s Back.” Anyway, if there wasn’t at least one error in these 400-plus pages, I would really be worried about myself.
GL: Can we expect more FAQ books from your hand and if so, about whom?
JDL: I am currently at work on NIRVANA FAQ for Backbeat and I have a couple of other projects in the works. I like to keep busy.
Which was the bigger surprise is hard to say, but yesterday two announcements were made that were both rather unexpected. One was that Bruce has added a final show for 2012 in Mexico City, and the other was that this Thursday he will once again take time out of his calendar to perform in support of Barack Obama, in Ohio and Iowa respectively.
Bruce Springsteen has never played in Mexico in any shape or form. The country has never seemed to exist on Bruce’s personal world map, but that is all about to change. The show will take place December 10 at the 20,000 seat indoor Palacio de los Deportes and will round out the Wrecking Ball Tour for 2012. Whether the tour will be resumed in 2013 remains to be seen, but plenty of rumors suggest that it will.
As is the case with several other major cities outside of North America and western Europe, Bruce has been fairly alone among the world’s top live attractions in neglecting Mexico City, the largest metropolitan area in the western hemisphere. U2 has been there, Rolling Stones have been there, Madonna has been there, Coldplay has been there, and the list goes on. But then again, based on album sales, Bruce hasn’t had much reason to reward Mexicans with a show. Wrecking Ball has sold fewer than 2,000 copies to date - in a country of more than 100 million people - and that’s not unusual for Bruce’s releases in Mexico at this point in his career.
But maybe his appearance there will help increase Mexicans’ desire for Bruce music and give Bruce a taste for more shows south of the US border, including shows in South America, which is one of the above-mentioned rumors for 2013.
Bruce’s decision to lend his voice to President Obama’s reelection campaign is hardly shocking, but goes against previous statements he’s made about sitting this campaign out. Obviously, the recent decline in Obama’s polling numbers must have made him reconsider, or someone within Obama’s campaign must have flattered him enough to convince him he can make a difference.
As most fans will remember, Bruce made similar appearances at Obama campaign rallies in 2008, and he was even more involved in John Kerry’s bid for president in 2004. The latter resulted in the Vote For Change Tour, with Bruce being the opening act for John Kerry himself before a few of the candidate’s speeches. None of that is in the cards this time around, but Bruce’s renewed political stance is bound to make a few fans shake their heads. A recent weekly poll here on Greasy Lake showed that more than half of the respondents said they preferred he stay out of the presidential campaign, whether they supported Obama or not.
In return, everybody is probably more comfortable with Bruce once again appearing at the Stand Up For Heroes benefit in New York City on November 8. The benefit will support the Bob Woodruff Foundation, which helps provide resources and support to injured service members, veterans and their families. Bruce is expected to sing a few songs backed by the Max Weinberg Big Band.
Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band are about to hit New Jersey again. When that happens these days the whole state knows it and a couple of percent of the population are present (all right, that would require no repeat customers and no out-of-staters, but still...) . Of course, it wasn't always so. Guest writer and photographer James Shives takes us back to a time when things were very different: the September 22, 1974 gig at Kean College and shows us some of his famous and not quite so famous images.
It was the first day of autumn in New Jersey - September 22, 1974 – but the weather hinted of an Indian summer that afternoon at Kean College, Union. When these now infamous photographs of Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band were created, I was obviously unaware of their future historical value or that right across the river, some 15 miles away in New York City, “Born to Run” was in its final struggle of being recorded. Now, as I hold that film in my hands, it’s plain to me – and it seems to a lot of others - that the Rock Gods blessed me that day as I photographed Bruce and the Band on the very eve of their very meteoric rise.
Max and Roy, the E Street Band’s two newest members, were just beginning to find their footing. I, too, was just starting my own journey as a rising rock photographer. I was only 18 years old. Bruce was 24; Clarence would have been about 30. Today, I can still recall small flashbacks from that day. In particular, the one song that stood out to me through all these years was "Spirit in the Night" - Bruce opened the show with it. I also remember seeing “someone” shortly before the show with an electric guitar sitting on an old couch. He was wearing an open shirt with the image of a peacock on the front in bold colors, a cross dangling down his chest, and a flat cap on his head. If he hadn’t had the electric guitar, he could have been a student in a scruffy beard and black jeans, but he wasn’t – he was “The Boss.”
Now, 38 years later – and almost to the day – after all the concerts that I have had the privilege of photographing Bruce and the Band; after all the publications and appearances my photos have been shared among, Bruce will take to the stage again in New Jersey, this time at outdoor arena holding tens of thousands of fans.
The below images from the show 38 years ago stand out among my most-prized possessions. It was a unique time and place back then, as unique as Bruce and the Band. In fact, it was in 1974 that Jon Landau made that prophetic statement, "I saw rock and roll future and its name is Bruce Springsteen."
[Note: this review is based on a preview copy of the book. It is therefore possible that some of the information referred to in the book is not part of the published version.]
When you’ve read as many Bruce Springsteen biographies as this Bruce Librarian has, you don’t often come across one that is full of new information and interesting facts and analysis. There’s rarely much true insight, and a lot of them contain more than a little repetition of Dave Marsh’s semi-official works, Born to Run and Glory Days (since republished in one volume called Two Hearts).
But Marc Dolan’s recently published Bruce Springsteen and the Promise of Rock ‘n’ Roll truly has something new to offer. While it does chronologically cover Springsteen’s career, it’s not the usual “Bruce-Springsteen-was-born-on-September-23-1949-in-Freehold-NJ-and-his-father-was-a-bus-driver”. The book’s main virtue is the way it puts Bruce’s song-writing, career moves, and even details like his choice of cover songs into a much larger context than what we’re used to. Marc Dolan demonstrates exactly how local events, national events, world events, cultural events, and personal events all helped shape Bruce’s artistic choices and actions. Dolan doesn’t hide the fact that one of his main research sources was bootlegs. He often refers to specific moments during concerts, things that Bruce said from the stage, or songs that he chose to sing on particular occasions, all of which would only be possible by extensive listening to those unofficial preservations of sometimes not very well-documented times.
And it is especially the chapters covering the early pre-E Street Band years that offer insight, detail and analysis that I haven’t seen better anywhere else. For most Springsteen biographers that period is something that just needs to be mentioned briefly before the real story can begin. But in The Promise of Rock ‘n’ Roll the author pays as much attention to those early years as the later ones, again with the use of rare recordings of early live performances as important documentation.
But also Dolan’s description of the period from 1989 to the E Street Band reunion 10 years later is fascinating reading with many pieces of information that this reviewer at least can’t recall hearing before. And it’s not always pleasant reading. While Dave Marsh has often been accused of painting a rather rosy-red picture of Bruce in his otherwise must-read biographies, Dolan is not afraid to expose some of Bruce’s less flattering sides or pointing out the inferiority of much of his work from the Nineties. But there’s never any question that Dolan is a fan who treats his subject with great respect and admiration. Although Bruce’s personal life is in focus, especially in connection with his marriages and fatherhood, this is not a gossip book or an attempt at slandering. The information is consistently used for the higher purpose of putting Bruce’s work in perspective, in which the book succeeds.
If one must point out weaknesses, it would be that the chapter dealing with the Darkness album suffers from apparently having been written before the release of The Promise, the 2010 box set and documentary. The details we learned about the whole era from not only those releases, but also the interviews and articles that followed, would no doubt have been useful for Dolan.
Also, in some cases, especially in dealing with Bruce’s personal life, the author resorts to qualified guesses, but at least he doesn’t state things as fact when he can’t support them. Most of the time, the information in the book is well-documented in a long “Sources and notes” section at the end of the book.
The Promise of Rock ‘n’ Roll covers Bruce’s career up to and including the Working on a Dream Tour, so there’s no info on Clarence’s death, let alone Wrecking Ball. But with Dave Marsh’s main works only covering the ground up to the late Eighties, Marc Dolan’s book is as good as anything I’ve read in bringing us up-to-date in an authoritative manner, at least until the highly expected (official) biography by David Remnick, is released later in the year. But that shouldn’t stop you from checking out Dolan’s book. The Promise of Rock ‘n’ Roll will always be an important book in Bruce literature because of its unique approach to its subject and the fact that it’s simply a well-written, entertaining read for anyone with an interest in Springsteen’s music.
If you're interested in purchasing the book, you can get it here. Use the promotion code WN216 and get a discount.
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The new chapter is not just an afterthought and an attempt to sell more copies. If anything, the original edition can actually be seen as premature. Because a lot happened between the original deadline of the book and the end of 2012: The E Street Band went on the road without Clarence, Wrecking Ball was released, Obama was reelected, and Hurricane Sandy devastated much of what is known as “Springsteen land”, all of which has influenced Bruce’s recent choices tremendously.
So when I finally bought the Greetings album in order to complete my Springsteen collection, which back then was entirely on cassettes, my reaction was... there’s no other way to say it... disappointment. Who was that wimpy-voiced, bearded parody of my hero? Sure, I recognized those songs that I’d heard on Live 75-85, but boy, were they lacking in comparison!
What separates “Bruce Springsteen FAQ” from most other Bruce biographies is the characteristic format of the FAQ series, which to date also includes a “Neil Young FAQ”, “U2 FAQ”, “The Doors FAQ”, and several others (not all written by Luersson). It’s a cross between a biography and an encyclopedia, and it can be read either from start to finish, as a regular biography, or as a handbook for quick look-ups. But rather than being alphabetical, it follows a chronological structure interspersed with thematic sections, such as “Artists Springsteen opened for”, “Girlfriends and wives”, and “Benefits, charities and causes”.
