I'm just a lonely acrobat, the live wire is my trade/
I've been a shine boy for your acid brat and a wharf rat of your state.
The singing and the wail of the harmonica are as tormented as the words. Although Springsteen would later produce more stories of defeat and gloom ("Thunder Road", "The River"), these early ones aren't protected by a surer, steadier hand at the production panel and a more mature musicianship.
Which leads me to feel that this record was Springsteen's Purgatory. To play a heavenly blues guitar, you need to first cleanse your soul, by selling it to the devil. To launch into that type of rock & roll that makes you walk on air, you need to come to terms with the angst. Bear it, share it, and let the force of it propel you into musical proportions you've never known before.
In later works, you feel like you're sitting next to Springsteen in the front of a pick-up as he takes you along on his rock & roll road trip. On Greetings, - you're in the next car peering in at the car rolling slowly down the dirt road, the driver's hand gripping the steering wheel tight, tears at the corners of his eyes. When the record closes with "It's Hard To Be A Saint In The City," you already know that in Springsteen's world, it's hard to be a saint anywhere.
The devil appeared like Jesus through the steam in the street/
Showin' me a hand I knew even the cops couldn't beat/
I felt his hot breath on my neck as I dove into the heat/
It's so hard to be a saint when you're just a boy out on the street.
In so many ways, the picture of a skinny Springsteen grinning like a monkey on the back of the record is really apt. Not yet beefed up like the Boss days of the 1980s — and years removed from the emotional trauma of divorce — Springsteen is almost like a happy-go-lucky troubadour who got caught in troubled waters ever so often.
The music is sparingly simple when compared to the "Wall of Sound" effects on Born To Run. At the time of this record's release, Bruce Springsteen had not yet met Jon Landau, and Landau had not yet heard or seen Springsteen play. Thus, the "future of rock and roll" would not yet be discovered. But his legacy was only just beginning.
Article comments
1 - Glen Boyd
Welcome to Blogcritics Desiree. I have just one question for you:
Will you marry me?
-Glen
2 - Christopher Rose
Bruce sure was a power back in those days. Good article!
3 - Matthew T. Sussman
Glen, everyone knows you're not supposed to propose until at least the second date.
4 - Jon Sobel
A very nice tribute!
5 - Mark Saleski
great stuff desiree.
mmmm, 35 days....
6 - Al Barger
I dig the spiritual devotion of this essay, but I'ma have to go ahead and disagree on this too-many-words theme. Not that Springsteen might not be accused of such things at some points later on, but not here.
The author specifically uses "Blinded by the Light" to make the point. Now, the song did NOT need that many words to tell the story. Mostly, it's not a story any way, but poetic sounding gibberish as a lyric. But he DID need every one of those syllables to carry that outstanding and intricate melody. Indeed, I get a strong sense that the tightly wound melody of those intricate verses came first, and that he was engineering words to fit the tune, not the other way around.
7 - Phillip Winn
Great article! Despite the difficulty, somehow I'm looking forward to this album now.
8 - JC Mosquito
Hi DK - a nice article, but I'm going to respectfully disagree with your view of the purgative nature of the music on this record.
I don't know if you've ever heard any of Springsteen's early Steel Mill material - I belive the line up was: Bruce, Stevie van Zant on bass, Danny Federici on organ, and Vini Lopez on drums (I'll stand corrected if I got any of that wrong). I've heard a live recording of them, and they were rock hard and heavy. I don't think Bruce was going through a cleansing "purge" on Aabury Park - I think he could've hit the rock and roll anytime he wanted. But I do think like all artists, he goes through cycles, so maybe what you see as purging I see as a natural aritst rhythm. Or maybe we're just expressing the same thing in different ways.
Yeah, if you're any kind of Bruce fan, stick around - I think there'll be lots of things said before and after Oct 2 this year.
Skeeter.