Bruce Springsteen
Born to Run (Columbia)
Casting a romantic glow on dissatisfied youth was hardly new territory
for Bruce Springsteen. His debut, Greetings from Asbury Park,
and its follow-up, The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle,
celebrated death-defying teenage bravado with Springsteen's incomparable
eye for detail. While the subject matter of 1975's Born to Run
didn't stray much from previous efforts, the sound of the record
did.
Inspired by the orchestral grandeur of Phil Spector's work in
the '60s, Springsteen created a rock-and-roll symphony. It was
finally the super-size production that his work deserved -- an
epic sound that matched the bigger-than-life mythology of the
lyrics. The results were big, too: Born to Run made Springsteen
part of the American vernacular, garnering the Jersey Shore Everyman
national news magazine covers and propelling him from the club
circuit to stadium status.
Combining the rock-and-roll derring-do of such '50s icons as Jerry
Lee Lewis and Gary "U.S." Bonds with the poetic lyricism
of Bob Dylan, Born to Run was a complex work that outlined the
American spirit -- gritty but glorious; cynical, desperate, but
brimming with hope. The title track perfectly exemplifies the
record's air of desperation. When Springsteen sings of his runaway
American Dream, it's with a bitter, gut-wrenching yearning: Set
against the symphonic equivalent of a tsunami, it's a snapshot
of back-burnered hopes that doesn't yellow with age. Twenty-six
years later, Born to Run is still as cinematic as it ever was,
the musical equivalent of a summer blockbuster with its souped-up
cars, long-suffering girlfriends, and reluctant heroes.
Springsteen's career would hit a temporary lull after Born to
Run, and it would be three years before he would release his next
album, the only moderately successful Darkness at the Edge of
Town. It would take the release of Born in the U.S.A. almost seven
years later to cement his superstar status. Every time it seemed
like Bruce was ready to fade away, he would return with another
critical or commercial success, demonstrating the kind of resiliency
that makes him -- and this album -- an demonstrating the
kind of resiliency that makes him -- and this album -- an American
classic.
Michelle Kleinsak