Author: Tony

Least and Most: Letter to You

/ Tony / 20 Comments

Here we are at the end of the road with Springsteen’s final studio album.

At least, for now. Within a few days we’ll have seven previously unreleased studio albums to absorb and while Tracks isn’t included in this rundown, the albums that make up Tracks II: The Lost Albums are just that, full studio albums. There’s also confirmation that, along with Tracks III (ffs, that vault must have been huge) Bruce also has a new solo studio album ‘in the can’ earmarked for a 2026 release. It’s like he doesn’t read this blog with the amount of work he’s lining up for me.*

Where was I? Oh, yes, for now. Letter To You was an album that came by relative surprise in its timing mid pandemic (he’d managed get the band together for a week at the end of the previous year**) and in its absolute quality and power. Letter to You feels like a much-needed warm hug from an old friend you didn’t expect to see again —if that friend was a thunderous barroom preacher with a worn leather jacket, a telecaster slung over his back and a saxophone-wielding mate waiting in the car.

If this turns out to be the last E Street Band powered album, it’s one hell of a bow out; it’s a combination of everything that was and still is great about it with relatively minimal production or overdub. Springsteen calls back to his past magnificently – the record bristles with revisited old chestnuts like ‘Janey Needs a Shooter’, the mildly Dylan-esque ‘Song for Orphans’, and the swaggering ‘If I Was the Priest’ rubbing shoulders with new tracks like ‘Burnin’ Train’ and ‘Last Man Standing’ that bring the E Street Band’s stadium roar back in full force. While at times there’s an odd juxtaposition between songs written by Thesaurus Bruce and One-Phrase-Repeated-Over-and-Over Bruce, the combination is a winner. It’s like we’ve run into him at a bar and he just had to tell us one last story (or twelve).

Where this sits in the overall Springsteen album run-down I’ve yet to figure out but Letter To You is certainly his strongest and most consistently spot-on since Magic. That it’s the first time since The River that the band worked through songs without having had them demoed first is also clear – there’s a sense of spontaneity and freshness in the arrangements that hasn’t been heard in decades. There’s very little to nitpick about in Letter To You but…

Least: The Power of Prayer

While ‘Rainmaker’ hasn’t aged as well as it could have and ‘House of a Thousand Guitars’ is a little let down by the repetition of its title, ‘The Power of Prayer’ is absolutely the weakest link on an otherwise indecently strong album. Feeling more like it would be at home on Working on a Dream, Springsteen’s gospel inclinations here come off less like a heartfelt epiphany and more like a cliche-laden preacher hitting the stage unprepared. It’s an empty-cliche-ridden snoozer for me, it aims high and wants to hit that uplifting spiritual power of earlier efforts but leans on formula instead rather than feeling. I mean – when was the last time you ran your fingers through the hair of your significant other and thought ‘that’s the power of prayer’***? It may well be sincere but so is a 99p greeting card from Sainsbury’s.

Most: Ghosts

Hands down the album’s finest, Ghosts charges in on a revved-up E Street engine and never lets off. It’s a swirling elegy for lost bandmates and the magic they created together but manages to balance that sense of nostalgia with catharsis. Time passes and moves even for our heroes. You feel old, you feel alive but, for these glorious five and a half minutes you feel together with Bruce and the E Street Band.

What makes ‘Ghosts’ – and the best of this album – work so well in 2020 and 2025 is the sense that these songs didn’t spend too much time in gestation. There’s no feeling of over-working or heavy production. Bruce isn’t trying to venture into a different sonic direction here. He doesn’t need to reinvent the wheel, just crank up the Chevy and happily barrel down memory lane.

Letter to You is the grown-up version of Born to Run, with a few hands dragging in sentimental baggage. It’s occasionally corny, but mostly full-blooded and triumphant. And when ‘Ghosts’ kicks in, you remember why you climbed in the passenger seat in the first place: for the ride, for the stories, and for the shared scars of friendship and loss. Life ain’t always a beauty but, hey, it’s alright.

*Of course he does.

** Two thoughts – chronologically this places those sessions in the same year as the final Western Stars sessions as well as those for Twilight Hours on Tracks II. Secondly: these songs were written following a bout of writers’ block and after the death of his friend and on an acoustic guitar given to him by a fan after one of his “Springsteen on Broadway” shows. That’s one hell of a burst of creativity.

***as a Humanist the answer is ‘never.’

Least and Most: Western Stars

/ Tony / 7 Comments

Ok…. let’s get back into it. Western Stars is still the odd one in the Springsteen back catalogue – while it may well be that some of the albums on Tracks II: The Lost Albums will fill in some of the steps that Bruce to get here, it sits apart at the moment; neither the acoustic, bare-bones approach of his other ‘solo’ albums or as ‘rock’ as his other work with full bands. Much like We Shall Overcome.. this is vey much a one-off detour*.

Where this album sits in my own ranking of Springsteen’s albums will vary depending on the mood I’m in: with the passing of time this album’s single-sonic style has meant that it’s not one I reach for typically and if you’re not up for that sound, it’s a skip as very little on here that varies from the ‘Bruce goes big, full-orchestra Glen Campbell / Burt Bacharach / Jimmy Webb’. At times the stylistic choice with its over-emphasis on twang and orchestral pop feels forced (much like a lot that Ron Aniello ‘brings’ to Springsteen’s music of late) and weighs downs songs that, in another setting, might have bounced freer without the need to add them on.

There are, however, a bevvy of solid Springsteen songs on Western Stars that are not only strong enough to withstand the production treatment but flourish in their arrangements and Bruce’s sonic departure. ‘Sleepy Joe’s Cafe’, for example, wouldn’t work in any other context yet here is a great addition. Songs like ‘Western Stars,’ ‘Chasin’ Wild Horses,’ ‘Hello Sunshine’, ‘There Goes My Miracle’ and closing ‘Moonlight Motel’ feel like Springsteen had got a very good core of songs for this project.

Sadly, like a lot of his later-career albums at this point, there weren’t quite enough and so we get some reheated tunes – we know now that ‘Somewhere North of Nashville’ has been repurposed from a mid-’90s project – and heavy production to polish up the lesser tracks.

Take, for example:

Least: Hitch Hikin’

Given that some of Bruce’s previous album openers have been real strong jump-off points (think ‘Radio Nowhere’, ‘We Take Care of Our Own’ for recent examples or ‘The Ghost of Tom Joad’ or ‘Thunder Road’ or fucking ‘Born in the USA’), Western Stars gets off to a sluggish limp with a song that could’ve been fine were it not for the hammy production and slopping on of backing and orchestration that does nothing for it.

Most: Drive Fast (The Stuntman)

‘Drive Fast (The Stuntman)’ fits very firmly in the list of great Springsteen songs that work well in this album’s context and would actually work well elsewhere – here the orchestra joins and swells as Springsteen’s character piece – an injured stuntman recalling his glory days – unfolds, elsewhere it could just as easily be a Nils Lofgren slide. While this character – like so many on Western Stars – is past his best, Springsteen gives them a beautiful treatment.

*excluding the ‘film’ version of the same album that followed a few months later and stapled on a cover of fucking ‘Rhinestone Cowboy’.

Monday tunes: forgotten password mode

/ Tony / 4 Comments

For reasons various, I realise it’s been another month plus since I ventured toward the ‘Add Post’ button. Without going into too much of the detail, it’s been a strange few weeks – lots of venturing up and down the country and I’m pretty sure Record Store Day was in there too. Once again I sit here in a sort of recovery mode, this time thanks to the volley of anti-allergy stuff I had to take before and after tackling some intense gardening work of the machete through the undergrowth variety.

As such, I hope you’ll indulge me as I sit coffee in hand and take a walk through some of the musical stuff that I’ve been adoring of late, and I’m going to ease into it with one of my favourite songs.. with a little RSD-style twist.

Air – All I Need (feat Beth Hirsch) Vegyn Mix

I did certainly get up at silly o’clock in the morning again on Record Store Day but it was later in the day that we popped into a record store to have a ‘normal’ poke about that my wife saw the intriguing Blue Moon Safari album perched between the RSD boxes. Having had another Air record on my morning’s haul I’d completely forgotten about it – glorious in its presentation and sound, Vegyn’s remix of Air’s unimpeachable Moon Safari is more of a gentle re-imagining than a remix, a subtle tweak there and slight key change here and it’s a beautiful listen that’s already had a lot of turntable time.

Elbow – Gentle Storm

S.G Goodman – Snapping Turtle

Who remembers the amazing ‘Cry’ video from Godley & Creme? It was a real game-changer of a vid from the ex-10cc duo who’re probably remembered more for the videos they made than their own musical work after that band. I was reading a piece about the making of the song and its vid and it mentioned how Elbow’s Guy Garvey was so blown away by it he asked them to recreate it for his band’s song ‘Gentle Storm.’ Now it had been many a year since I listened to Elbow but this track got me very much back into the work of their’s I’d missed since 2008 and I’be been really blown away. They’ve made some brilliant music, Guy Garvey very much a talented wordsmith.

Also a very talented wordsmith – S.G Goodman’s ‘Snapping Turtles’ is one that I found on this month’s Uncut magazine’s CD (ever the champion of physical formats) and had to restart a number of times in order to soak in the song’s vibe and lyrics. Brilliant stuff.

Public Service Broadcasting – The South Atlantic (ft. This Is The Kit)

Public Service Broadcasting’s concept album about Amelia Earhart’s fateful last flight has had many a spin since its release last year, including one last night. There’s something fascinating about the tragic journey and, unlike their previous works, it doesn’t hide from the terror of the dawning knowledge that things very much went wrong. 

Israel Kamakawiwo’ole – Over The Rainbow

Buffalo Tom – Roman Cars

Yeah… we’ve all no doubt hear Israel ‘Iz’ Kamakawiwo’ole’s take on ‘Over The Rainbow’ more times than we can count since every tv/film producer thinks they need to sneak onto a soundtrack but it remains a wonderful thing and up on the list of ‘things I can’t get enough of’ is the way Iz pronounces ‘chim-a-nee’.

Another entry on that list is the vocal harmonies of Buffalo Tom’s Chris Colbourn and Bill Janovitz. As Bill tends to be the principal songwriter and singer in the group those songs tend to be lower in count but have historically been strong – think ‘Postcard’, ‘Rachel’ and ‘Wiser’ – while ‘Roman Cars’ was initially one of those I’d not paid attention to from their supremely underrated 2018 album Quiet and Peace, I’ve been enjoying it a lot lately as it also features Bill’s delicious guitar tone.

Momma – I Want You (Fever)

Blondshell – What’s Fair

Couple of new albums that I’ve been enjoying lately. Momma’s Welcome to My Blue Sky is a very enjoyable blast of hook-laden, ’90s inspired alt-rock that’s got plenty of catchy tunes on it. Meanwhile the second album from Sabrina Teitelbaum’s Blondshell project is a real step-forward from her 2023 self-titled debut and definitely worth a bit of your time.

Anywho. I’ll leave you with one from Martha Wainwright who’s debut has just received a 20th Anniversary press and a song with a title that serves as an example of how not to get a great tune any radio airplay and hopefully get around to writing the last two of my Least and Most series.

Monday tunes: recovery mode

/ Tony / 1 Comment

It’s been a weird old couple of weeks. A long drive down to Cornwall – which I think is only ever a short drive from somewhere else in Cornwall – and back for work followed very quickly by the switch to BST knocked me a little for six.

As I sit here recovered and with a week to spare before I put myself through a similarly taxing schedule, albeit for pleasure this time , I thought I’d ease myself back into this (and before tackling the final two instalments of the Springsteen Least and Most series) and ask you to lend me your ears for a few tracks while I share a sampling of those tunes that have aided my return to sanity as much as the copious amounts of caffeine I’ve been mainlining.

Tess Parks – Somedays

Margaret Glaspy – Act Natural

There’s something satisfying about a good needle-drop in a film when the song is one you love and that’s the case with Tess Parks’ ‘Somedays’ which I was pleasantly surprised to hear pop up in ‘Beetlejuice Beetlejuice.’ It’s such a beautiful stroll feel of a tune. Margaret Glaspy’s 2023 album Echo the Diamond is definitely worth checking out – the New York based singer-songwriter came to my ears on a Wilco playlist somewhere or other as she’d previously toured with them. Speaking of Wilco..

Wilco – Handshake Drugs

The Beta Band – She’s the One

I’ve been on a real Wilco rediscovery kick lately, reabsorbing favourite albums – like the recently reissued A Ghost Is Born from which ‘Handshake Drugs’ hails – and spending time with those that I’ve missed. It’s been, and continues to be, a real pleasure especially as my son seems to be keen on them too helped by the fact that they wear their Fab Four influence on their sleeve.

The Beta Band are, hopefully, poised to enjoy a resurgence as they’ve rallied together again after their initial gentle collapse in 2004. Back with tour dates booked and a reissue campaign ready to go included their The Three E.P’s – yes, as referenced in ‘High Fidelity’.

Buffalo Tom – one of Boston’s many fine musical acts – are also in the process of reissuing many of their ’90s albums and, judging by their social media posts, it looks like Sleepy Eyed is about to be next as it hits its 30th anniversary this year.

Buffalo Tom – Sunday Night

Bruce Cockburn – Lovers in a Dangerous Time

It’s funny where you discover music isn’t it? ‘Lovers in a Dangerous Time’ came up as track one some ‘heardl’ challenge or another. I hadn’t heard it before, so I failed that one. But I did love the tune and have since been enjoying his 1984 album Stealing Fire of which a bulk of the material is inspired by his travels in Central America.

Something a little more up to date…

Lissie – Into The Great Wide Open

I don’t spend a lot of time watching television – well, streaming that it, that is. There are couple of other shows that aren’t called ‘Reacher’ that I’ve enjoyed recently and ‘Bad Monkey’ was pretty solid. Its soundtrack of Tom Petty covers (as it’s based in Florida) was an added bonus. ‘Into The Great Wide Open’ has never been one of my favourites yet Lissie – who also appeared in my other recent binge, ‘Loudermilk’ – does a great job of turning it into a regular spin.

Matt Berninger – Bonnet of Pins

The National’s front-man has a new solo album on the horizon and I’ve been pretty taken with ‘Bonney of Pins’, really enjoy the way this one builds into a frenzy (well, by the self-proclaimed ‘Sad Dads’ standard, at least) of sorts.

Thanks for sticking around, hope you found something to enjoy.

Least and Most: High Hopes

/ Tony / 7 Comments

Reviewing High Hopes as a studio album feels unfair, but as Springsteen insisted on referring to this reheated plate of leftovers as just that – so be it.

Arriving in the resurgence that followed Wrecking Ball and its tour, High Hopes is Springsteen’s most scattershot album to date, there’s no narrative, no theme, no intent other than putting out an album that’s made up of covers, out-takes and re-imagined versions of songs from various points of Springsteen’s then-recent recording past. Songs like ‘High Hopes’, ‘The Ghost of Tom Joad, and ‘American Skin (41 Shots)’ had been recorded (much better) and released previously while tracks such as ‘Heaven’s Wall’, ‘Down in the Hole’ and ‘Hunter of Invisible Game’ were outtakes from somewhere between ’02 and ’08 while ‘Harry’s Place’ was an outtake from The Rising. As Tom Morello sat in with the E Street Band during the Wrecking Ball Tour to replace Van Zandt (who was spending time in Lillyhammer), he’s also all over this album in, unfortunately, negative ways. Aniello’s production values on top of songs that Springsteen had previously thought not good enough for release isn’t a winning combination and while there are a few solid cuts it’s mostly ‘meh’ (or ‘bof’ as the French would say). Perhaps Bruce knew it was gonna be a while before we got another new album from him and wanted to get some product on the shelves ahead of another tour. They can’t all be The Darkness on the Edge of Town after all.

‘Hunter of Invisible Game’ sums it all up for me. This is a song that’s got a good idea, it’s got pretty decent melody and Springsteen and Co thought so much of it that they even had Thom Zimny create a ten minute short film around it. But, like the album as a whole, the thought is there, the motions seem right but there’s no substance to it. The song doesn’t actually say anything and I still scratch my head as to what this fucking invisible game is that Bruce is hunting – is it relevance in the modern musical world? Is that why he’s wearing a Canadian tuxedo on the cover? It feels like he came up with what is, frankly, a fucking great title, but it ran out of legs. Don’t get me wrong; I’m glad we get to hear it but that’s as far as it goes.

Still, that’s one of the better tunes…

Least: Heavens Wall

Wasn’t there anything else in the vault? ‘Raise your hand’ gets repeated thirty six times. Springsteen sings like he’s scrolling through Deliveroo trying to chose dinner at the same time.

Most: The Wall

Hello? (Hello, hello, hello) Is there anybody in there? Oh, no; not that Wall. This ‘The Wall’ was written in 1998 – thanks to an idea from Joe Grushecky – after Springsteen visited the Vietnam Memorial and memories of New Jersey musicians, including Walter Cichon, from Bruce’s youth who never returned from the war. While Springsteen having another great Vietnam song this late in his career wasn’t on anyone’s bingo card, The Wall’ is one of his most personal and affecting and – with the bitingly bitter “I read Robert McNamara says he’s sorry” – is one of his finest songs. It’s all the more baffling that it’s ended up on an album with so muck cack.

Least and Most: Wrecking Ball

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It must have been a strange time for the man they call The Boss as 2012’s Wrecking Ball arrived. Entering into his fifth decade of releasing albums, two members of his E Street Band having passed, his albums still hitting the top spot on release but quickly dropping out of view of the charts. Meanwhile he’s a very wealthy man while so many of his fans are facing the brunt of the then-economical issues America was facing. Some, if not all, of these themes are tackled on Wrecking Ball which marked a departure from Brendan O’Brien and the start of his work with Ron Aniello.

Since the comeback of The Rising, each of Springsteen’s albums had something to say about the times in which they were released. From that album’s 911 backdrop came the war-protesting Devils and Dust, Magic‘s swipe at Bush and even … The Seeger Session‘s choice of protest songs was clearly pointed while Working On A Dream seemed a celebration of Obama’s arrival. Wrecking Ball adds the plight of the downtrodden into the mix and seems to aim for a sound that touches on each previous but falls a little short and seems to have forgotten the sense of fun that had been present on so many of his previous albums and replaced it with too many songs where it feels that the words took more focus than the tune and Aniello’s stapled-on effects take the place of a full-band sound; Wrecking Ball contains contributions from several E Street Band members (notable absences include Nils Lofgren, Garry Tallent and Roy Bittan) on a couple of tracks but with most instruments handled by Springsteen, Aniello and various session players.

It’s not a bad Bruce album, though. The songwriting is stronger than Working On A Dream, there’s more consistently good songs and the mix of performers – putting this somewhere between a ‘solo’ album and his ‘other band’ albums of the early ’90s in that respect – works well. There’s a lot to enjoy despite a few howlers, and listening back to it for this I’ve enjoyed it more than previously. Of course, I’ve still go no time for..

Least: Easy Money

Here I could go for the neutering and mangling of ‘Land of Hope and Dreams.’I could swing for the dour trod of ‘Jack of All Trades’. But, ‘Easy Money’…. it just feels so false. It’s an example of Aniello’s production choices that feel tacked-on and, despite the summon-the-masses, foot stomp approach of the song it’s too bloody slight in its substance. There are some heavy handed takes in the first verse but the most frequent lyric in this, literally, ‘(Na-na-na-na-na) Whoa! Whoa! (Na-na-na-na) Whoa! Whoa!’. This and ‘Shackled and Drawn’ sit together as what happens when the dourness of Aniello’s production sucks the air out of songs that aim for …The Seeger Sessions‘ lightness of foot.

Most: We Take Care of Our Own

It was almost too obvious a choice for Obama to use this in his re-election campaign. This is Springsteen at his best – a real call to arms that doesn’t hammer any point too hard but packs plenty of punch. It sounds fresh, akin to his then new-found friends in Gaslight Anthem or Arcade Fire, and relevant. Much like ‘Born In The U.S.A’ it’s an fist-pumper with a bitter current beneath it but that doesn’t overshadow it. Here Aniello’s touch is light and, released as the lead-off single for the album, it felt like a promise of more to come. Also worth paying attention to are ‘Death to My Hometown’, ‘This Depression’, ‘Rocky Ground’, ‘We Are Alive’, ‘This Depression’ and ‘Swallowed Up (In The Belly of The Whale).’

We don’t want the loonies taking over – Five from Radiohead

/ Tony / 2 Comments

Another brief deviation from Springsteen…. having spent a couple of days out and about last week including a day revisiting Oxford, I thought it fitting to put together a few of my favourite songs from that city’s most famous – though of course, not its only – bands: Radiohead. Having already pontificated about OK Computer plenty of times here, I’m putting this one together in Hard Mode* and not including anything from their finest.

Blow Out

Holy crap, a song from Pablo Honey that isn’t ‘Creep’?! Yup. While their first album wasn’t that strong a clue as to what they were capable of there are a few songs on it that really come together – the ever over-played ‘Creep’ being on of them, ‘Anyone Can Play Guitar’ and this track which I’m particularly fond of for its sheer volume and wall of guitar moments.

Fake Plastic Trees

The massive fucking leap to The Bends is amazing. This album is so far away from Pablo Honey it’s almost a different band. This song in particular is a highlight for me – one that initially gave the band trouble recording. Having started life as a “joke that wasn’t really a joke, a very lonely, drunken evening and, well, a breakdown of sorts” and dealing with label pressure to follow up ‘Creep’, there was a ‘November Rain’ style, pompous version of it and then the band took a night off and saw Jeff Buckley performing alone at The Garage in London and Thom Yorke found the ‘key’ to unlock the arrangement, sang alone and played acoustic alone, collapsed into tears and the band recorded their parts over Yorke’s performance.

The Trickster

My Iron Long EP should really be considered a mini-album. I remember grabbing this in eagerness after OK Computer lead me to The Bends and being astonished that these were basically scraps from that album’s sessions. They really were on a tear and ‘The Trickster’ feels like it could fit on either The Bends or OK Computer.

Go To Sleep  (“Little Man Being Erased.”)

Hail To The Thief is one of those albums that seems to get overlooked. I can see why – it falls after the sonic experimentations of Kid A and Amnesiac and before the pricing and release experimentation of In Rainbows. It’s also a bit on the long side (their longest to date). This, their last for EMI, was billed as a ‘return’ to a more traditional sound at the time but it’s probably fairer to say that while it’s got enough of guitars that sound like guitars etc, it’s still got enough experimental bite to feel like forward momentum and it’s grown on me more as years go by.

Weird Fishes / Arpeggi

Cutting away all the hype and debate surrounding the pay-what-you-want method of release In Rainbows is one of Radiohead’s finest albums. There’s nothing on here I skip. It feels like a real song-oriented album for the first time in a while from the band, probably down to the fact that Nigel Godrich stepped in after protracted series of rudderless sessions and forced them to make decisions rather than constantly alter tracks.

*say no more, squire.

Least and Most: Working on a Dream

/ Tony / 2 Comments

Coming in hot off the back of writing for Magic, Springsteen dropped Working On A Dream a little over a year after that album – his shortest gap between albums for some time. ‘What Love Can Do’ was written toward the end of sessions for the former, but not fitting there and feeling like it was the start of something ‘else’, Brendan O’Brien encouraged Bruce to keep writing for a new album with another handful of songs arriving over the next week.

Working On A Dream is definitely a different beast to Magic. While there Springsteen’s approach to recording with O’Brien and the E Street Band – working with a core group of himself, Max Weinberg, Gary Tallent and Roy Bittan and with additional parts added on later – worked for the leaner, meaner sound that suited the theme of Magic, the songs on Working On A Dream are made for bigger stuff, a painting with more colours with Springsteen trying to use less of a ‘rock’ voice and while the E Street Band could make these songs sound as huge as they presumably were in the Boss’s head, the process here means that band has never sounded quite so constrained and tiny.

Least: Queen of the Supermarket

Not only does this song emphasis the above points of production flaws – all the tacked on layers sound too much like veneer when a big, unbridled band sound could’ve made it soar – it’s just a naff song: our hero has literally gone from singing songs of chrome-wheeled, fuel injected love with Fuelie heads and a Hurst on the floor to actually singing about pushing a fucking shopping cart and finding “a dream (that) awaits in aisle number two.” FFS, Bruce. And someone had the bright idea of having the fucking barcode scanner ‘bleeps’ in the fade out. Thunder Road has been swapped for a fucking Sainsburys.

Best: My Lucky Day

My Lucky Day is a relatively fast, blistering tune that sounds like a blast was had recording it. Plus, in the context of this album, its fast, rawer sound – at odds with the layers of overdubs etc that blight the aimed-for sound that drapes so much of the album – means its one of the songs on Working On A Dream that works from a production / sound perspective. It’s also surprisingly – given its faster tempo – a wonderful little love song complete with both a guitar and sax solo.

Least and Most: Magic

/ Tony / 6 Comments

There’s little competition for Magic as Springsteen’s finest ‘post reunion’ albums, in my opinion at least. Yes, The Rising has the joy of a rekindled E Street Band and more than many an album’s share of good tunes but Magic is the album that captures the sense of an artist and band now confident in their ‘second wind’ and an established relationship with produce Brendan O’Brien working at strength.

The other element that sells it for me is that while some dismissed this album as ‘just another collection of songs’ these songs are all tied together with a sense of foreboding, a distaste and often anger at the then-current state of America (which probably seem like the halcyon days now) with lines like “Who’ll be the last to die for a mistake/Whose blood will spill, whose heart will break” or “tell me is that rolling thunder or just the sinking sound of something righteous going under” – all backed by the muscular heft of the E Street Band.

Least: Girls In Their Summer Clothes

I know this is probably among the least popular of my ‘least’ takes – at least considering it’s the second most streamed track on the album by a long way – but there’s something about ‘Girls In Their Summer Clothes’ that’s just never sat right with me. It feels too stodgy to be the lighter ‘fun’ song on the album -like ‘Mary’s Place’ or ‘Waitin’ On A Sunny Day’ on The Rising – and Springsteen’s vocal take sounds surprisingly flat or almost disinterested… with a little less heavy a sound it would probably fit better on Springsteen’s next album. Which in itself isn’t a good thing either…

Most: Gypsy Biker

In which Springsteen takes his Vietnam-vet song ‘Shut Out The Light’s “Bobby pulled his Ford out of the garage and they polished up the chrome” line and updates it for a more modern war. In keeping with the heavier-hitting bitterness with which Magic bristles against the decisions of the US, this time instead of the relief of “I’m so glad to have you back with me,” it’s a coffin that’s come home and the cycle is being pulled from the garage to be burnt in the foothills with the kiss-off ” now all that remains is my love for you brother, lying still and unchanged. To them that threw you away, you ain’t nothin’ but gone.”

Least and Most: We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions

/ Tony / 3 Comments

Left turn? More like a different road entirely. Springsteen, clearly relishing his career’s rebirth, released three studio albums that varied from each other more than at any other phase of his career. A new E Street Band album was surely on the cards after the success of The Rising but Bruce had a few things to tick off the list first and even that came about via a change in plan.

While putting together material for a planned second Tracks collection, Springsteen found a few songs that he’d cut for a Pete Seeger tribute album. Enthused by the quality and feel of these songs Bruce and Landau wanted to put them out as a stand alone album, except that there weren’t enough. So around the tour behind Devils & Dust, Bruce got the group of musicians that he’d used in ’97 back together for a couple of sessions and cut a shit load more tunes for what was not only his first collection of covers (of folk songs popularised by Seeger) but probably the least obsessed-over album of his career. A volley of great folk tunes – that manage to sound neither entirely Seeger or Springsteen in its approach – that’s not only rough and rowdy but actually sounds like a huge amount of fun was had in recording it.

Least: Froggie Went A Courtin’

‘Froggie Went A Courtin’ closes my copy of We Shall Overcome – as I picked mine up on day of release rather than the later ‘American Land’ version or bonus-track heavy one that’s on the streaming services. There’s nothing wrong with it, it’s still imbued with the same loose-but-fun and solid vibe as the rest of the album but at the end of an album imbued with tunes that lean into work songs, protests tunes and narratives that not only fit in with the general Springsteen ouvre but could also be taken to be deliberately selected based on America’s then-current events… it feels out of place. That’s all. At least it’s not ‘The Frog Chorus’.

Most: Mrs McGrath

I can’t really judge any of these songs on anything other than their handling as ‘a Springsteen song’ – though I’ve heard a few versions of this one since – rather than against the originals. For my money ‘Mrs McGrath’ feels so suited to Bruce and his arrangement and handling of it is so total that I wouldn’t have been surprised to find he’d written it. Given that his own writing – both with ‘Devils & Dusht’ and the central theme of Magic was already pushing in the direction covered by this Irish folk song it shouldn’t really be that unexpected. He inhabits it and delivers it with more passion than anything else on here and I’ve often found myself wondering how it would be handled by him outside of the Seeger Sessions Band.