All the redemption I can offer, girl, is beneath this dirty hood…
I want to know if love is wild, girl I want to know if love is real…
Man there’s an opera out on the Turnpike, there’s a ballet being fought out in the alley…
It’s chapter three. In which our hero gives the E Street a shuffle, welcomes back an old confidante and gains a new one to boot, sharpens his street poetry to make it more universal, plucks his characters from their boardwalk hideouts and puts them into something chrome wheeled and fuel injected so they can bust out of Asbury Park en route to becoming rock and roll future. That’s right; it’s the Catalina fucking wine mixer Born To Run.
Once again – and certainly for the next few posts – I’ve placed myself in a tricky spot: citing a track that I find my least preferred on an album that’s easily one of Springsteen’s finest and no doubt a favourite album of many. Born To Run has become one of those albums – you know: an instantly recognisable cover that’s been parodied countless times, one that’s stuffed full of killer songs and tracks that delight night after night after night after night… one that routinely tops magazine ‘best of this or that’ polls etc.
Does it even have a track that I don’t love as much as the others? Well, perhaps not but that’s not really what we’re looking at here but there is one song that I certainly listen to and recall less than others and that means that..
Least: Night
AGAIN – this isn’t a slight of ‘Night’ but I can’t recall much about it even now after having run through the album again yesterday. It’s a great tune and on any other album wouldn’t be here – hell even Bruce’s least memorable cuts are better than many artists’ highs… but it has the misfortune of being a three minute blast of good stuff in between two fucking great cuts; ‘Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out’ and ‘Backstreets’. It’s like the definition of a filler slot, it would have to be a really remarkable track to stand its own there and it’s to the song’s credit that it’s still bloody good… but there’s nothing stand-out about it for me. That’s all.
Picking a ‘most’ from Born To Run is almost as challenging to be honest. I mean, there’s ‘Thunder Road’ which is one of his finest, there’s the title track itself and the the previously mentioned ‘Backstreets’… but there’s nothing really like..
Most: Jungleland
It’s beyond compare, really. It’s like everything great on this album was building up to the magnificent epic that straddles nearly ten minutes of pure delight at the end and manages to encompass everything great that Springsteen had hinted at in his music to come and would for decades yet to arrive. The street poetry is there, the surging hope for better tomorrows, the ridiculously moving saxophone break, the builds and release and powering along, and the fact that, somehow, he manages to make the whole thing still feel like an anthem to be blasted to a stadium full of fans giving as much passion as they can ‘tonight…. in… JungleLAND’.
Fuck yes.
Mumbling About... 
I feel you, Tony. I love the “Born to Run” album as well. That said, I didn’t remember “Night” based on the title, so I guess you’re on to something here! 🙂
“Jungleland” is a superb track to call out as the best. In my case, I think I’d go with “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out,” a song I’ve absolutely come to love over the years.
Sometimes Meeting Across the River is my favourite, it’s such a weird, cryptic little song. She’s The One and Night are the weaker tracks for me.
Agree 100% – Meeting Across The River is a favourite, I’m surprised that it doesn’t get as much love but then it probably suffers from its placement
The worst track on an album is often tucked away second-to-last, but it’s the right place for it I think, before the epic ‘Jungleland’,
So, I’m getting a vague feeling that you quite like this Brice Steenspring chap?
I think his brother Rick was better at crafting the hit singles though
All the songs are just part of the album’s feel for me. I think old Bruce had a certain sequence in mind setting up the feel. I remember anticipating this release. Bit of a game changer I would say.
Buying a pair of jeans in a shop the title song of the album came on and the young woman who was helping me select the proper fit to CB’s bottom half stopped the transaction to say “I hate that song!” Made my day and I have a story to tell. Good stuff Tony.
It’s one of the few of his albums that is pretty much faultless start to finish – there were only a few outtakes from the sessions but none of them that I’d listen to and say ‘that should’ve been there instead of X’
Amazing how an albums sequence get imbedded in your head, remove or skip a cut and it jimmies the the feel. For me anyways. I have been an album guy since I can remember. If Pinks Floyds ‘Meddle’ isnt played in order I’ wrecked for the whole day.