Born to Run - Springsteen, Bruce (CD 1987)

How many dogs does it take to change a light bulb?



Border Collie: Just one. And then I ll replace any wiring that s not up to code.

Rottweiler: Make me.

Lab: Oh, me, me!!!!! Pleeeeeeeeeeeze let me change the light bulb! Can I? Can I? Huh? Huh? Huh? Can I? Pleeeeeeze, please, please, please!

Cocker Spaniel: Why change it? I can still pee on the carpet in the dark.

Golden Retriever: The sun is shining, the day is young, we ve got our whole lives ahead of us and you re inside worrying about a STUPID BURNED OUT BULB?




We ve all got stories about us and albums that have influenced our lives. Today I ll tell you mine. My story starts in the summer of 2003 in Chicago. Foxy (still learning English, barely a week upon American soil) is browsing used cassettes at a Tower records store. Then it happens: he notices Springsteen s Born to Run . He picks it up, and later on that evening pops it in his walkman on the way to his temporary home in Lake Bluff. The train ride from Chicago to Lake Bluff takes about forty minutes so he gets to hear the whole danged thing in one sitting. He steps off the train a different person.


Wait, that s a crap story. Besides, I actually didn t get it on the first listen. Let s move on to those late August days when Foxy is (rather unwillingly) preparing to leave America. He hangs out with this girl who s about to do the same, only she will go to a different part of the world. As a farewell gift he gives her this cassette and, interspersing his speech with erms and ums, expresses hope she was born to run just like him. You re welcome to make up the ending for that story.


With all of that being said, the actual story I m going to tell my kids the day they ask me about Born to Run may sound as follows. Leaving America in 2003 Foxy almost went back to the music store to replace his copy of Bruce s fabulous album. And then it occurred to him that he probably wouldn t be able to listen to Jungleland once he d come home. Even worse, he realized that listening to the whole record wouldn t make any sense in a place other than Jungleland. So he walked by the store and promised himself he d be back the next year. And then he would replace his copy.


Two weeks ago, as I turned off the light in my room and let the opening chords of Thunder road (1975) ring into the night I knew that that year in my life was over. I had it with me again.


What I didn t know was how I was going to hear this album now. Most of all I was afraid it wouldn t feel the same way again this time, or it would sound as just a distant memory, a romantic flashback to the days when I started to believe in miracles.


It s a town full of losers
and I m pulling out of here to win.


Surprises started from the very opening chords you see I had forgotten Thunder road was supposed to start off with a piano, I thought it was going to be a guitar taking the lead from Bruce s harmonica after the intro. I also had completely forgotten about the closing minute when the whole band kicks in, backed by Clemons s gorgeous sax. Finally, only now have I actually realized what exactly the dean of the university of musical perversity (that s how Bruce rightly calls him) Roy Bittan does with his piano in this song. Another flashback, Tenth avenue freeze-out follows and is fun, it s a funky song and a year later I m still loving every bit of it. Night may actually be one of my two least favorite moments of the record, but boy does it drive. Backstreets was another surprise my memory had wiped out the fact the opening seconds were this amazing. Then again, maybe I simply wasn t able to grasp the beauty of this song a year ago. Now each time I hear professor Roy intro the song backed by Garry Tallent s bass it just sends them shivers down my spine.


Four songs, and four more to go. Lying alone in a dark room I was enjoying every bit of the record, but it didn t feel the same as a year ago. Backstreets fades out, Born to run is up next. I felt that this song was going to make it or break it. I had many times in my life reached a moment when I d outgrow a once favorite record of mine, so no big deal there. Then Bruce s guitar kicked in, and already during the first chorus he had got a hold on my heart again. I mean, all of a sudden the sense of reality just crashed down on me, reminding me of a dream come true, and bringing along with it the tears


Baby this town rips the bones from your back
It s a death trap, it s a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we re young
Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run


The song may have some pretty bleak lyrics, but I ll tell you this: singing with Bruce that night two weeks ago I was the happiest man on the planet. Because, if I had to sum up the last year in my life, it d probably be one sentence long: I got out and hell I m still young.


So yeah, when you dig deeper this song as the whole record is not bleak at all. Because it just wasn't written about losers. Quite the opposite, it was written about fighters. And one has only to hear Clemons s decade defining sax solo to become a believer.


Someday girl, I don t know when,
we re gonna get to that place
Where we really want to go AND WE LL WALK IN THE SUN
But till then tramps like us
Baby we were born to run!


She s the one is another song I like less that the rest of the stuff here. That being said, I wouldn t have this record without it. That might tell you something about how good a song it is.


A lot of people consider Meeting across the river filler, and I have to agree in the sense that this monolog of a criminal doesn t really become Born to run . In fact, the song fits Bruce s next album ( Darkness on the edge of town ) much better. However, when the Boss and his band have a musical miracle, maybe small, but a miracle nonetheless I have no cons. Seriously now folks, this is one of Bruce s most haunting pieces.


It only pales somewhat because Jungleland follows. The song is exactly what you thought it was about and it still belongs here of all places in the world. From Suki Lahav s opening violin to Roy Bittan s piano in the first two verses, to (also his) organ on ...from the churches to the jails... to Bruce s electric guitar in the subsequent verses, backed by all of this activity strings, pianos, organs finally exploding into a series of triumphant guitar chords, that soon enough becomes an astounding solo you still with me, aren't you? This song is a musical feast.


But oh, here comes the lovers verse:


Lonely-hearted lovers, struggle in dark corners
Desperate as the night moves on
Just one look and a whisper, and they re gone


Now, this. This is where the song slows down the tempo, and Clarence Clemons steps out to deliver the greatest sax solo of all time. Really now, people, if you have a thing about rock music and yet you haven t heard this you ve missed some of the sweetest minutes of your lives. When it fades out, you re all worn out and barely breathing, there s only so much a listener can take. But Bruce has two more closing verses, taking the song to its real crescendo, first gently, then building again, finally summing up the 10 minute epic with, possibly, the greatest verse of his career:


Outside the street s on fire, in a real death waltz
Between what s flesh and what s fantasy
And the poets down here don t write nothing at all
They just stand back and let it all be

And in the quick of a knife they reach for their moment
and try to make an honest stand
But they wind up wounded, not even dead

Tonight in Jungleland.


See how romantic it sounds? Well, doesn t it? That s how romantic I feel lately. And here, ladies and gentlemen, friends, ends my Born to Run story only a little over a year since I first heard it and look what influence it has had on my life. And I just want to close my review saying this: Ain t nothing bad in being romantic. I think that contrary to popular belief, this is actually how we achieve things in life. With this album Bruce Springsteen became a rock legend. Me I m hitting the thunder road my dreams have put me on.


Discover it for yourselves.


Thanks for reading.