Bruce Springsteen - Classic or Dud ?

First-rate!

Just make sure you get a Steinbeck character into the chorus and it's done.

"Last night" is the touch that really makes it.

You might need to add a dream sequence and some father issues, though. And a gypsy curse.

<Big Man takes a sax solo>

this is killing me rn

Out from under the shadows of the pulasky skyway
Speeding past the Sbarro sign at the Walt Whitman rest area
We can ride this turnpike all night but the ride ain't free
just tell me what exit and I'll punch your ticket baby

Never knew my daddy, but he was a union man
Gypsy woman told him "do all that you can"
I walked in a dream past the boardwalk sights
Saw John Steinbeck in those neon lights

We're almost there. Just need some chugging Roy Bittan chords through a Leslie speaker.

Not so fast - if you want to beat Dylan at this game, you'll need crime, a character of indeterminate gender, and some sisters.

wait so this song opened with sex in the caaaaarrrr?

Lily Dale, you could be helping here - at least sketch out a verse, sheesh.

I am the Jon Landau of this song. I don't help, I just provide highbrow criticism.

I think sex in the caaaaaaarrrr was a false ending? (To be followed by ONE TWO THREE FOUR! and the verse about the Jersey Devil.)

ok.

A figure in green haunted my dream
Maybe a man, maybe a lady
My sister heard a siren scream
Gypsy said "that was your maybe"

Rhonda was stuck in between
Blood in the mist out by the beach
Vanished behind a smokestack screen
The cops arrived, she was out of reach

[unintelligible moaning]

AND THEN WE HAD SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR! <sax solo>

SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR!
SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR!
SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR!
SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR!
SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR!
SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR!

All right!

Keep it rockin' boys!

How are you all doing these without using the word "sir"?

Sex In The Car, Sir

<Nils does a dance on a trampoline>

Out from under the shadows of the pulasky skyway
Speeding past the Sbarro sign at the Walt Whitman rest area
We can ride this turnpike all night but the ride ain't free
just tell me what exit and I'll punch your ticket baby

― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Thursday, October 10, 2019 12:42 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

I feel like it should actually be "Burnin' past the Sbarro sign..."

Fair point, it's not really Springsteen unless something's on fire.

or he gave away the g's

I put those g's in Sir Sbarro's sign, honey, and then I torched it

And she said "Honey you should know by now that pizza's no good!"
as she lit a cigarette and flicked the ashes on my hood

Another American job lost to high tech outsourcing

Saw her in the Sbarro's by the dynamo
Just a-twirlin' that pizza dough

The bar band there was hopping
I got lost in Rhonda's world
Redemption was the topping
As the pizza slowly twirled

They closed down the Sbarro's 'cross the railroad track
Ralph went out looking for pizza and never came back

Everybody knows a hungry Ralph

https://frinkiac.com/meme/S04E17/509675.jpg?b64lines=V2VsbCB0aGV5IGJsZXcgdXAgdGhlIApjaGlja2VuIG1hbiBpbiBQaGlsbHkgbGFzdCAKbmlnaHQKCgoKCgoKCi4uLm1tbW1tLi4uY2hpY2tlbi4uLg==

Meet me tonight at Panera Bread

no dude that's mark kozelek

his songs are even easier to parody because he pretty much writes them as parodies of their own style to begin with

I had to listen to "The Promise" earlier - Bruce's most self-referential song? That 2-disc lost album sort of thing they put out with the Darkness box is nice, but the 3 year gap (lawsuit-imposed?) between Born to Run and Darkness probably did him a lot of good in the long run.

IS THERE SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR?
YES THERE"S SEX IN THE CAAAAAARRRR!

That killed me because Bruce has never directly sang about sex, eh?

--

https://the-niche.blog/2018/04/16/the-top-ten-horniest-bruce-springsteen-songs/

On Badlands: "Any given lyric in this song could be about overthrowing American capitalism or getting gloriously, generously rawed. Or both!"

Because The Night Belongs To Fuckers

that list of horny springsteen songs is glaringly missing "candy's room."

and the ILM springsteen song is glaringly missing a river. or lake. or some body of water.

good point.

We kiss, my heart's pumpin' to my brain
And the blood rushes in my veins, the fire rushes towards the skies
I go driving, driving deep into the night
I go driving deep into the light, in Candy's eyes
...

i'm gonna take a shower

There's that song on "Devils & Dust" about a prostitute in Reno that's about as explicit as Bruce has ever gotten, or for that matter could be.

my. goodness.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5PoIrcyd34

and the ILM springsteen song is glaringly missing a river. or lake. or some body of water.

It's also missing the part where he listens to the radio. We have so much work to do.

The buildup and release in the beginning of “somewhere in the night” was my first big OH WOW Bruce moment (outside of “tunnel of love” and certain BitUSA singles). Now I love all the classic stuff

By the moonlit lake, there's a teenage punk
Jackin' off into a ball cap which is full of spunk
Meanwhile a Chevy roars across the bridge over the river
And the old faded mine worker does some more damage to his liver

Willows weep and hangdogs creep like barflies crawling down the street
While the lights from the swamps glow bright with high pomp for the girls we're trying to meet
The wheels on the car spin fast to go far from the places we want to escape
But the draw of the dump smells strong of gas pumps and we all pass out from the heat

A+

"Pink Cadillac" also belongs on the list of horny songs. I love that Springsteen wrote a song about a black Cadillac and a song about a pink Cadillac, and the black Cadillac is a metaphor for death and the pink Cadillac is a metaphor for vaginas. That is some sophisticated symbolism right there.

I was thinking about adding a verse about driving Dow. To philly with a girl from basking ridge and stopping on the way to make it under the Trenton makes bridge.

I don't know, that sounds a bit too happy. Better throw in a state trooper or two.

Red Headed Woman from the Not Unplugged album is pretty frisky:

Listen up stud, your life's been wasted
till ya got down on your knees and tasted
a red headed woman, a red headed woman
it takes a red headed woman to get a dirty job done

Tight skirt, strawberry hair
tell me what you got baby waitin under there
big green eyes that look like, son
they can see every cheap thing that you've ever done

Well I don't know how many girls you dated man
but you ain't lived till you had your tires rotated
by a red headed woman, a red headed woman
it takes a red headed woman to get a dirty job done