#bruce meta

[janiedean]

Ahhh if it's possible for the Springsteen Birthday Extravaganza, I keep thinking how I would love a Moonlight Motel/JB fic SO MUCH but maybe with a less sad ending (yes I am still on my Western Stars bullshit after an entire year)

That would be AMAZING, but if fic inspo is not striking then otherwise an analysis of Atlantic City would make me v happy ❤️❤️

Thank you thank you thank you and happy Bruce Birthday Extravaganza!! 🎉🎉🎉

(ALSO have you heard his weekly radio show because it's absolutely lovely?)

NOW THE FIC IS IN PLANS/INCOMING/MAYBE BEING USED FOR JBWEEK so hold out for that but meanwhile I’ll be delighted to give you atlantic city which I’ll link in my favorite live version Ever u_u

background for the new people: AC is the leading single from bruce’s masterpiece nebraska from 1982 (original version here), most known for a) its stripped down nature b) the bleak nature of the songs and AC was the first single most likely because it was one of the few palatable songs in that sense as it has a very catchy refrain and it’s not as Dark™ as most of that record, but still, not a walk in the park song either. on to it:

Well they blew up the chicken man in Philly last night Now they blew up his house too Down on the boardwalk they're gettin' ready for a fight Gonna see what them racket boys can do

not counting that according to me ‘they blew up the chicken man in philly last night’ is a masterpiece of an opening line, we need to unpack the context here because there’s quite some and as usual, bruce being a Good Lyricist, he gives you everything you need to know in the beginning. first thing: the chicken man in question was a philadelphia mafia boss named philip testa who was indeed blown up by its rivals in his house in 1981 (thanks bruce for the american history trivia that gives me a culture in random local criminals), so we know that chicken man being blown up in philly is what starts the entire story we’re about to hear.

now, ‘down on the boardwalk’: there’s no boardwalk in philly but there’s an extremely famous one in atlantic city, which for anyone not in the know is the gambling capital of new jersey and a fairly large crime hub, therefore now we know that the mafia boss being dead in philly means repercussions in atlantic city and that the ‘racket boys’ will do something about it in revenge. so far so good. Now there's trouble busin' in from outta state And the D.A. can't get no relief Gonna be a rumble out on the promenade And the gamblin' commissions hangin' on by the skin of its teeth

on to stanza two... ‘trouble busying in from out of the state’ means that pennsylvania criminals are getting into nj or the consequences are spawning across two states, which means the situation is so bad that all the police involved are in a hard time (the DA can’t get no relief, the gambling commission is hanging by the skin of its teeth) while a rumble on the promenade is in the works, most likely a bad clash between gangs that has to do with gambling which, AC being a gambling central casino city, would indeed be the logical consequence.

Everything dies baby that's a fact Maybe everything that dies someday comes back Put your makeup on fix your hair up pretty And meet me tonight in Atlantic City

now, refrain: we’ve moved on from large picture to small picture where we have one person talking to his girlfriend (baby/put your makeup on) who tells her to meet him in atlantic city, so we can presume that it’s where either of them live or work or usually hang out... but the first two lines are pretty damn haunting though they give an idea of death/rebirth in the sense that yes maybe everything goes to shit but it can go back to good at some point so it’s not absolutely bleak, so: our guy is in a shit situation, he’s seeing maybe a way out, he wants girlfriend to meet him in AC, so far so good.

Well I got a job and tried to put my money away But I got debts that no honest man can pay So I drew what I had from the Central Trust And I bought us two tickets on that Coast City bus

we find out what went on immediately after, as in: our guy had a job, tried to save money, couldn’t, has debts most likely with the mafia or crime because no honest man can pay them (they’re probably gambling-related at this point) - now, he could pay them up (which he can’t) or take his money from the bank and run, and buy *two* tickets, so: he’s in debt with the mafia, he wants to run, he wants his gf to come with, and we have again the refrain asking her to come with him... and then we get to the bridge:

Now our luck may have died and our love may be cold But with you forever I'll stay We're goin' out where the sands turnin' to gold now Put on your stockin's cause the nights gettin' cold and Everything dies, baby, that's a fact but maybe Everything that dies someday comes back things between narrator and gf are not in a good moment of their romance (their luck has died and their love is *cold*, same as in a lot of bruce songs where the couple isn’t young and in love anymore but has gotten to the stage where both of them are cold with each other but are still together), but he swears he’ll be with her forever so he’s still loyal to here regardless of anything, to the point where he promises her they’re going ‘where the sands turn into gold’ which suggests they’re going to the beach/somewhere warm... which lasts for not long because then he tells her that the night is getting cold, so they’re going nowhere warm and the sense of doom keeps on never quite going away, also thanks to the everything dies/someday comes back repetition outside the refrain. Now I been lookin' for a job but it's hard to find Down here it's just winners and losers and don't get caught on the wrong side of that line Well I'm tired of comin' out on the losin' end So honey last night I met this guy and I'm gonna do a little favor for him

now we’re closing on the end: narrator is looking for a job but he can’t find it and says that the only thing you can do to survive ‘down here’ ie in AC is being on the winners’ side or you’re out, and then he says he’s tired of being on the losing end... which means that he didn’t eventually leave with his gf nor went to florida or the sea, because instead he met a guy and he’s going to do a little favor, so he’s gone from small time gambler to small time criminal and there’s no going back from it, which brings us to the vague optimism of the above part to bleak again..

Well I guess everything dies baby that's a fact But maybe everything that dies someday comes back Put your makeup on fix your hair up pretty And meet me tonight in Atlantic City And meet me tonight in Atlantic City And meet me tonight in Atlantic City And meet me tonight in Atlantic City

and at that point we go back to the refrain again which in this context doesn’t sound 50/50 which also is obvious from the music, in the sense that (especially in the live version) the last meet me tonight in atlantic city is repeated almost obsessively before it goes into the instrumental part that starts after each refrain, as if the guy is really trying to convince himself she will meet him or as if he’s trying to desperately convince her except that we can’t know if it’s going to work out the way he hopes to, if she’s leaving him or where he’s going to end up, but everything in the text suggests that he’s headed for failure... except that there’s that tiny sliver of hope that he won’t (very tiny) which makes it not the bleakest song on that record. which is probably not... not-depressing but still, in absolute tune with the rest of the record - which is all about people who lose their battles or don’t win them or try to do better by their circumstances and don’t manage to or don’t solve their issues, so it makes sense that in that context the guy ends up becoming a criminal, loses the girl and dies in some fight while wishing he went where the sands turn into gold, but you can still hope that she did meet him in atlantic city after all. personally I’m for the bleak interpretation but could be that I’m not wholly correct at the end of it ;)

[janiedean]

im sorry people were bitchy to you but like you 100% do have a "im not like other girls uwu bby" attitude and its obnoxious af be normal

growin’ up is a song from bruce springsteen’s first album, greetings from asbury park nj, and a staple of his live performances though sadly not any that I have seen myself but hopefully SOON, during which he always puts in a bit before the last stanza where he talks about his teenage years or when - in the 70s/80s - would put on literally shows within shows. and while it might not have the Deep Meanings that other songs of his have, it’s still a lovely song and it has a nice message to discuss. how about we have a look at it?

Well, I stood stone-like at midnight, suspended in my masqueradeAnd I combed my hair till it was just right, and commanded the night brigadeI was open to pain and crossed by the rain and I walked on a crooked crutchI strolled all alone through a fallout zone and came out with my soul untouchedI hid in the clouded wrath of the crowd, but when they said, “Sit down,” I stood upOoh… growin’ up

first: he stands stone-like, and he’s suspended in his masquerade, which means that we’re talking about some time in the past where he a) felt like he couldn’t move to the point that he’s stone-like, b) he feels like he’s blocked in a masquerade ie a play-pretend/situation where he has to play fake and pretend to be someone he’s not. he combs his hair until it’s just right, for other people most likely, and then he says he’s open to pain and crossed by the rain and walking on a crooked crutch, as in he goes through a shit lot of suffering because he’s being someone he doesn’t want to be/feel like he is…. and he strolls all alone (without help) through a fall-out zone (most likely his teenage years that are by definition dangerous) and comes out with his soul untouched, as in… even if his teenage years were shit he came out of them all right.

most importantly, other than his soul being untouched therefore not having compromised and having stayed himself regardless of that meaning that he’s alone in trying to be himself, he hides in the clouded wrath of the crowd ie someplace that seems comfortable…. but when they (the others) say sit down he stands up, which means that when others tell him to do something he doesn’t conform to what the others think, which means… that he was growing up and coming into his own.

The flag of piracy flew from my mast, my sails were set wing to wingI had a jukebox graduate for first mate, she couldn’t sail but she sure could singI pushed B-52 and bombed them with the blues with my gear set stubborn on standingI broke all the rules, strafed my old high school, never once gave thought to landingI hid in the clouded warmth of the crowd, but when they said, “Come down,” I threw upOoh… growin’ up

now: after that, the flag of piracy flies from his mast, which means that he’s putting himself in a position where he’s seen as an outlaw/a pirate, and his first mate is a jukebox graduate who can sing, as in music not people, and he bombs people with the blues making his living with hard work and playing music which back in the 70s/60s wasn’t exactly earning people money or not making them weird. on top of that, he breaks the rules, strafes school, and doesn’t think about landing for once, which means that he went and did his own thing at the cost of other people thinking the worst of him or looking like an outside or being labeled as weird. because he cares for his own integrity and what he wants and what he is way more than what other people think.

and again… he hides in the crowd (because singing/playing music was his way to hide from his issues/make catharsis out of his problems) but when others tell him to come down from that cloud he throws up, which means that he has a visceral bad reaction to the idea of conforming to what other people want. and that is also part of growing up, ie refusing to mingle with the people that make him feel so at unease.

I took month-long vacations in the stratosphere, and you know it’s really hard to hold your breathSwear I lost everything I ever loved or feared, I was the cosmic kid in full costume dressWell, my feet they finally took root in the earth, but I got me a nice little place in the starsAnd I swear I found the key to the universe in the engine of an old parked carI hid in the mother breast of the crowd, but when they said, “Pull down,” I pulled upOoh… growin’ upOoh… growin’ up

now here we’re going a bit more metaphorical but: he takes long-month vacations in the stratosphere where it’s really hard to hold your breath, which means that he spent a hell of a lot of time someplace far away from earth/the real world where it’s really hard to hold one’s breath, as in when he’s alone doing his thing, and while he does, he lost everything he ever loved or feared ie that in order to be himself he gives up friends/family/his good name/any chance of being taken seriously, since he’s the cosmic kid in the full costume dress…. except that then he goes back down to earth where his feet take root in it as in he’s spent all that time alone and then he went back to living in the real world/made friends/got a career….. but he got himself a nice little place in the stars, as in after he’s gone to the stratosphere, in the sky, he took some of that with him which means that after having spent all his teenage years/early twenties being ostracized because being himself = playing music and no one cared, now that he’s back to not being so alone… he took with him what he learned, ie to not conform to other people’s expectations. hell, he finds the key to the universe (ie supposedly how to have a nice life/make a living out of his music) in the engine of an old parked car which for me always was the beginning of the car metaphor and probably could also stand for the music he played.

but what’s important is that before he hid in a clouded wrath (ire/negative associations), then in a clouded warmth (which is automatically positive instead) but it’s clouded ie someplace where you don’t have clarity, and in the first stance he did the contrary of what he was asked and in the second he refused to conform. now… he hides in the mother breast of the crowd ie his audience that feels like a mother’s breast ie safe/familiar, and when they say pull down ie go with what the others want him to do in order to make a living out of music… he pulls up, which means that he kept his integrity and has grown up and is growing up still…

and that meant that he got to publish his first record and finally made his dreams come through :))))))

which means that he’s telling us that if you want to actually succeed in life you have to keep your integrity and be yourself even if other people might not like you or think that you’re weird… because there’s absolutely nothing wrong with being like you are instead of conforming to what society wants just out of wanting to be normal/like the others when the point is that it’s not how you feel like you should be.

which is probably a thing that you could bother to learn since being normal means jack shit ;)

[janiedean]

I'm sorry a portion of the fandom you virtually helped to create is being so shitty to you. I'm shocked people don't realize that half that content wouldn't even exist without you doing the work to make it happen... but if I say that anon was right about everything, can I get a song analysis about Devils and Dust? ;)

thank you dear T__T it’s appreciated ;)

aaand OF COURSE YOU CAN GET IT!!!! thank you very much for the input ;)

devils and dust is a song by his almighty bruceness for his eponymous record from 2005, which was incidentally behind the tour that was my first bruce concert so I loooveee it ;) (also watch that video he’s hot as hell in it), which as usual goes back to his Let’s Tackle PTSD In War Vets topic... except that this time it’s definitely an iraq war veteran and not a vietnam one. you absolutely should listen to it because it’s Very Good before I actually go into it u__u so, lyrics!

I got my finger on the triggerBut I don't know who to trustWhen I look into your eyesThere's just devils and dust

so, opening: we have the straight-up image of someone who’s about to shoot someone and doesn’t know who to trust, so it’s already Not Good A Situation; on top of that, he says he’s looking into someone’s eyes - considering that this introduction is throwing you into the character and then the rest of the song eviscerates those four lines, it has to be his wife as we’ll see later because he doesn’t expect to see devils and dust, but it’s JUST that. now, the dust in this case sounds blatantly like desert sand to me (and it doesn’t give you a vietnam imagery) which is why I think it’s iraq war, also because the record came out just out of the first bush presidency and into the second, and we all know where bruce stands politically.

so: he’s looking at his most likely partner, expecting something in their eyes but he just sees the war he’s left behind, and he’s about to shoot someone without knowing who to trust. bad introduction already, I guess.

then:

We're a long, long way from home, BobbieHome's a long, long way from usI feel a dirty wind blowingDevils and dust

going with the above: bobbie is a female name, so as stated above it’s his wife or partner, and now he also feels a dirty wind blowing and they’re a long way from home, so he obviously came back home but he’s having some ptsd flashback in which he’s back in war, with his partner, feeling the dust around him along with the devils which is obviously a metaphor for the evilness of war/what he had to do. at this point we’re kicking in the refrain:

I got God on my sideI'm just trying to surviveWhat if what you do to surviveKills the things you loveFear's a powerful thingIt can turn your heart black you can trustIt'll take your God filled soulAnd fill it with devils and dust

now: before, he talked about devils, now he says he has god on his side or that’s what he tells himself as he tries to survive (in a war), but what he does to survive kills the things he loves. now, since the guy is obviously back home, we can definitely take it that his survival attempts/at going on with his life kill the things he loves, so since he saw devils and dust in her eyes then maybe they’re killing their relationship (the things you love). then he adds that fear is a powerful thing and and turns your heart black, which means that the fear he (understandably) felt when going to war has so much power over him that now his heart changed and turned evil, and with that... we have the religious parallel ™️ in which is god filled soul ie a soul that once was good/pious is filled with devils and dust (ie war and sand which is what gave him ptsd) which turned him into a worse person than he used to be.

Well I dreamed of you last nightIn a field of blood and stoneThe blood began to dryThe smell began to riseWell I dreamed of you last nightIn a field of mud and boneYour blood began to dryThe smell began to rise

SOOOOO, now it gets upped a notch because now he said he dreamed of her last night but the field of blood and stone obviously suggests it’s a nightmare; also the blood dries and the smell rises, which is a thing he could absolutely have experienced during the war and so he sees his partner go through that, too, and it ups another notch after where it becomes mud and bone - mud is typical wartime stuff because the moment it rains you end up with that under your shoes, and the bones are obviously for corpses/dead people... and her blood begins to dry/the smell rises, so it means he dreams that she’s dead and he can’t save her, so now she is also a part of his ptsd-related nightmares.

We've got God on our sideWe're just trying to surviveWhat if what you do to surviveKills the things you loveFear's a powerful thingIt'll turn your heart black you can trustIt'll take your God filled soulFill it with devils and dustIt'll take your God filled soulFill it with devils and dust

now, this refrain is more or less the same except that now we have god on their side, not I have... but at the end it’s still your heart and your soul so he’s still talking about himself only, not about him and his partner, which means that she is safe from her soul being filled with devils and dust, he isn’t, because he’s been to war and she hasn’t.

Now every woman and every manThey want to take a righteous standFind the love that God willsAnd the faith that He commandsI've got my finger on the triggerAnd tonight faith just ain't enoughWhen I look inside my heartThere's just devils and dust

at which we have the last bomb. now: the first concept is that everyone wants to be righteous and so assumes it is, and god gives them the strength to do it/to be convinced of their righteousness through both love and faith that come from god, right? all sounds good - I believe in got, he fills me with love and faith, I think I’m right, that feeling legitimates my actions, which is what he supposedly thought until he went to war..... but then he says he has his finger on the trigger like the beginning (did he wake up with a gun in his hands? did he go to sleep with a gun nearby? did he hold it up against his partner?) and faith is not enough, which means that his righteousness got shredded and blown to bits in war and there’s no faith that wil make it better, because when he looks inside himself... it’s just devils and dust and nothing else, like in the eyes of his partner in the beginning, so we can retroactively say that in the beginning he saw himself in her eyes and he hated it, and now he looks inside himself and sees that too and he realizes that his righteousness doesn’t exist anymore and tldr going to war has permanently changed his life view and stripped away all his old convictions... and has turned him into a worse person in his eyes (because there are devils inside his heart), never mind that after having gone to war his faith in god is shaken and is not enough to counteract the consequences of what he suffered. 

I've got God on my sideAnd I'm just trying to surviveWhat if what you do to surviveKills the things you loveFear's a dangerous thingIt can turn your heart black you can trustIt'll take your God filled soulFill it with devils and dustIt'll take your God filled soulFill it with devils and dust

at this point, with that context, we can deduce that he still tries to hold on to god being on his side as he tries to go on, it’s not working, his relationship is in pieces and he’s afraid of facing it and of what he did during the war... to the point that his heart is still as black as it was in the beginning and the devils and dust (of most likely desert sand because above implications) have taken hold of his soul and filled it with hate/evilness/fear, and that’s where it leaves you - there’s no other solution, just the implications that he went to war feeling righteous about it and came back with ptsd and that his inability to talk about it or do anything about it or talk to someone is dragging down his relationship, too, and it’s killing the things he loves.

we can also assume that the harmonica parts (after the blood and bone part and in the end) bookend that because they’re in between the righteousness declaration and the last affirmation that it’s only devils and dust in his heart and not god’s faith or love anymore, while the rest is fairly quiet/understated as far as music goes.

in short: as this is also the opening of the record it sets the entire mood (admittedly all of devils & dust is not exactly uplifting stories except a couple songs) and the ending song talking about mexican immigrants dying drowned trying to cross to the us makes it in itself a bookend because it starts with a presumably american soldier who can’t get free of war and might ruin himself for it for good and ends with a mexican immigrant trying to get a better life and dying in the process, so thematically the fact that it gives you no satisfaction nor resolution and just concentrates on how the guy is feeling and what his ptsd has done to him actually makes sense because then you have to listen to all the rest before arriving to the very bitter ending. in short, not the first song about the subject from bruce’s catalog but an excellent addition to it that goes on yet another angle and tackling another war rather than his usual vietnam eviscerating, which was indeed what We All Needed in the year of the lord 2005. ;)

thanks anon!!

[janiedean]

HELLO ANON, I’m delighted you wanna participate in my week-long springsteen birthday party celebrations!!! and since you took care to leave me such a long, well-put, thought out message that I’m sure you thought I couldn’t wait to read, I decided to talk to you about a truly absolute classic and if you don’t know it I even picked for you one version where he’s hot as hell, isn’t it darling? ;) so, without further ado...

badlands is the opening act of bruce’s fourth (and most likely turning point) record darkness on the edge of town from 1978. it’s one of his truly most known classics, a hell of a concert opener/piece (believe me, I’ve tried it seven times and it was always a mystical experience, you should too!!) and a perfect summary of... pretty much all of his favorite themes. sounds good? believe me, if you ain’t experienced badlands in your life you’re missing something. ;) now, shall we go through the lyrics? (ps: really, listen to it while you read my explanation or you won’t get the full experience :( )

Well, lights out tonight Trouble in the heartland Got a head on collision Smashin' in my guts, man I'm caught in a cross fire That I don't understand

so, we have one of those openings of bruce’s that cold kick you into the scene that imvho are one of his trademark points and I love him dearly for it which immediately projects you into the scene: we’re in the heartland and the lights are out tonight, which means that it’s night and it’s dark and already from the first two lines you can contrast the upbeat rhythm with the utter bleakness of the opening. by the way, if we all failed geography like jon and sansa, this is what we mean with badlands:

and with heartland we mean that part in the US that goes from north dakota/iowa to kansas/missouri roughly, so we can assume that our narrator comes from some small town in center-USA and he’s not enjoying his time there that much. see, two lines and you already have situation, mood and location - this guy knows how to write a song, amrite?

so, other than that, it’s lights out and this guy has a collision in his guts, which makes you immediately think of a car accident inside his body in one of the most tender parts of it/in the part that gets upset when we feel sick first, which is supposed to make you feel his visceral unhappiness at his situation. also, he’s caught in a crossfire ie he feels in the middle of a bunch of different problems that jump at him and he doesn’t understand them, which also means that he hasn’t straightened them out and he doesn’t exactly know what’s wrong with him, but he knows that he has problems and that his life isn’t what he wants.

But there's one thing I know for sure, girl I don't give a damn For the same old played out scenes Baby, I don't give a damn For just the in-betweens Honey, I want the heart, I want the soul I want control right now You better listen to me, baby

so: now he addresses a girl, which means he’s talking to a woman who’s supposedly his love interest, and he tells her he knows one thing at least, which is that... as before we have guessed he’s in some situation of stasis that he dislikes while he feels caught in a bunch of problems he can’t face/figure out/have a grip on, and his visceral reaction to it is that he wants to cut away with all of that, he wants to stop rehashing his old life (the same old played out scenes/just the in-betweens), and he immediately states it as he says that he wants the heart, the soul and control, as in: he wants to have back his feelings (his heart), his life (the soul) that he feels he doesn’t have anymore and mostly he wants control over them, as if until now he’s felt like he didn’t have it and everyone else was taking all the decisions, and he presses to his girl saying that she has to listen to him. seems like he’s decided, right?

Talk about a dream Try to make it real You wake up in the night With a fear so real You spend your life waiting For a moment that just don't come Well, don't waste your time waiting

now, here we have one of the most iconic lines bruce ever put to music (the first four verses) which would deserve treatises, but anyway, for what we can do: he tells her that they have dreams that they shouldn’t forget and that they should try to make them real ie they shouldn’t be there worrying about played out scenes and in-betweens, but then they wake up with a fear so real that they can’t do it, and at this point you feel their fear too because he’s singing in a way that about throws all of that in your face. but then he says you spend your life waiting for a moment that just don’t come and that hits you even more because don’t we all wait to do things/wait for the right moment to experience things/throw ourselves into what we want to do and then it passes and you think it’s gone? yeah, that. and with that he says that we shouldn’t, and we go into the immortal refrain, as in:

Badlands, you gotta live it everyday Let the broken hearts stand As the price you've gotta pay Keep pushin' 'til it's understood And these badlands start treating us good

now: living the badlands every day (look at the above) is obviously a way to say suffering through your life while feeling overwhelmed (don’t you feel overwhelmed just looking at those pictures?) while the broken hearts stand as in, your heart being broken is the price you’ve got to pay because life is shitty, but if you *push until you get it* then the badlands might start treating you good and you might turn your life around. that’s the message, but it becomes even more obvious when you go ahead with the rest:

Workin' in the fields That'll get your back burned Workin' 'neath the wheels 'Til you get your facts learned Baby, I got my facts Learned real good right now You better get it straight, darlin'

so: our narrator has a physically demanding and hard job (working in the fields/’neath the wheels) which causes him physical problems (back burned) and he had to suffer through that to learn his facts real good, which he stresses repeating it twice, and then explains:

Poor man wanna be rich Rich man wanna be king And a king ain't satisfied 'Til he rules everything I wanna go out tonight I wanna find out what I got

admittedly, it’s not the most original moral but it’s because it’s true: poor people want to be rich (of course), the rich never have enough and want to rule over the others (be king) and the kings/rulers/people in power have no satisfaction until they have everything under their rule because their ego is out of control and power breeds power and no one ever has enough of it (seems like grrm likes bruce). our dude, who’s definitely poor and not a king, just wants to go out tonight and find out what he’s got. and what does he have?

Well, I believe in the love that you gave me I believe in the faith that can save me I believe in the hope and I pray That someday it may raise me Above these

so, he has three things: the love his girlfriend gave him so we can suppose she definitely has an agency in this relationship and he didn’t expect her to give it to him, he has faith that he can be saved from his crap life (could be faith in god or the love he feels for her or both) and he has hope and prays that all of this might raise him above the badlands, ie: that the fact that he has love in his life and that love gave him hope might give him the push to leave his crap life behind and get to something better that he desperately yearns for.

Badlands, you gotta live it everyday Let the broken hearts stand As the price you've gotta pay Keep pushin' 'til it's understood And these badlands start treating us good

now you see that the refrain repeated at this point has a new layer added to it, right? now, you should really be listening to the song because that’s when clarence clemons’s immortal sax solo happens and brings you to another dimension and then it slows down before the last part is basically a whole crescendo which believe me in a concert is a mystical experience. also, get ready for one of the Best Lines Bruce Ever Wrote In His Life:

For the ones who had a notion, a notion deep inside That it ain't no sin to be glad you're alive I wanna find one face that ain't looking through me I wanna find one place I wanna spit in the face of these

now: here we get the nail on the head ie he sums up the entire deal in two lines: this song is for the people with a notion deep inside ie a need so bad it’s etched inside them and nothing can carve it out or take it from them that there’s nothing sinful or bad in being glad you’re alive as in, in being glad you are because then you can keep on living and make things better for yourself rather than just give up and die in a life that you hate, and those people should find a face that doesn’t look through them (as in, someone who sees them for who they really are and loves them for it), one place (as in, a place to live that they want to live in), and they should spit in the face of the badlands ie the horrible life they feel like they can’t conquer but that they need to leave behind.

I mean, it’s basically spitting in the face of what hurt you until now and go off to live your life and trying to be happy, what’s to hate about it? and if you listened to that song, you’d know that at this point the crescendo ends and it kicks into the last refrain:

Badlands, you gotta live it everyday Let the broken hearts stand As the price you've gotta pay Keep movin' 'til it's understood And these badlands start treating us good

which is the same as before obviously, but now has three different layers more to it and tops perfectly a gem of a song that is deservedly one of bruce’s most beloved ones by us all fans and that should be more known to the casual listener because it’s truly iconic and speaks to all of us because we all felt like that at some point, didn’t we?

thank you so much for indulging me in my springsteen extravaganza anon! you might find it a little difficult to do it again I fear, but if you find a way I’ll be delighted to find you some other iconic song to dissect. happy early springsteen birthday!!!! :)

[janiedean]

nebraska is the title song from bruce springsteen’s eponymous 1982 album, which is incidentally the objectively best record he’s ever put out or at least it’s in the top three and about everyone agrees about it in some kind of miraculous conversion of fan and critics’s opinions.

nebraska is not just a turning point in springsteen’s career, as it was the first time he put out a record which was pretty much bleak/depressing material with not much of a way out of it and a great stylistic change from his usual as it’s all voice, guitar and harmonica, to match the bleak atmosphere of the songs, but it’s also a damn gem of a song that everyone should listen to, so please let me have a go at it. ;)

now, background: nebraska is about real life serial killer charles starkweather, who in turn bruce learned from while watching terrence malick’s excellent movie badlands (guys y’all really should watch it it’s REALLY GOOD!). tldr, this dude at nineteen took his 14-yo girlfriend around nebraska and wyoming for a week or so and killed ten people and was then sentenced to the death penalty, and that’s all you need to know on the subject. bruce was interested in the story, researched it and wrote the song about it and put it as first in the album to which it gave the title, and that should already suggest you what you’re signing up for. but now on to the lyrics, shall we?

I saw her standin' on her front lawn just twirlin' her baton Me and her went for a ride sir and ten innocent people died

the opening is reminiscing of the malick movie we discussed before - the scene with the girlfriend twirling her baton is lifted right from it, and gives us an excellent summary of the entire song because bruce is good at summarizing things: you know that the protagonist, as the song is in first person, sees his girlfriend on the front lawn, takes her into his car and they killed ten innocent people. now, if you aren’t listening to the song you don’t know that he’s singing it in an extremely flat voice in such a way that he seems extremely detached from what he/the POV of the song has done, which makes the entire effect even creepier. so, what happened on the ride?

From the town of Lincoln, Nebraska with a sawed off .410 on my lap Through to the badlands of Wyoming I killed everything in my path

here we have another example of how good is bruce at painting a very vivid picture with ten words - we know where they left from (lincoln nebraska), we know what weapon he used (the .410), and then he went through the badlands of wyoming killing everything in his path, which if you know how the badlands of wyoming look, should give you a pretty damn good idea of the scenery. if you’re like jon and sansa stark and failed geography, I’ll remind you:

suggestive, huh? so, he has you visualize the entire thing while singing flatly and without emotions about a guy who went on a murder spree without many emotions about it himself. which is made clear in the next line:

I can't say that I'm sorry for the things that we done At least for a little while sir me and her we had us some fun

so: he’s not sorry, and he sees it as having had some fun. now, usually people who murder even one person without wanting to have life-lasting trauma because of it, because I assure you, no one likes murdering people in general. just a thought. then again if you look up starkweather he seemed to think he was above the law and to have a fairly nihilistic worldview according to which *dead people are all on the same level* so we can assume that mr. starkweather had definitely issues that no one had noticed/most people would have overlooked in the year of the lord 1958 and that went untreated resulting in the murder spree.

anyway, they got caught as it was bound to happen, which then results in the next passage:

The jury brought in a guilty verdict and the judge he sentenced me to death Midnight in a prison storeroom with leather straps across my chest

now, bruce doesn’t really waste much time with the trial because even if we didn’t know shit about the story before we might have guessed that he’d be captured/sentenced the moment he said he killed a bunch of people, so what we know is that they sentenced him guilty and to death too, and when he says leather straps across my chest we also know it’s an electric chair even if he doesn’t have to say it, and then you also get the midnight in a prison storeroom visual that gives you an idea of something fairly sordid and carried out in a haste when no one can see for how horrid the entire situation is. the entire point isn’t even making you empathize with him because you’re not supposed to... but the entire picture it paints is supposed to make you feel really, really creeped out including being in the head of an actual mass murderer, which is usually not a place where you find people feeling sorry or re-elaborating their trauma tied to their actions, because this guy certainly has no trauma related to them nor feels sorry about it. which we can see for true in the next bit:

Sheriff when the man pulls that switch sir and snaps my poor head back You make sure my pretty baby is sittin' right there on my lap

as in: when he talks to the sheriff in extremely blank/flat terms about his own death (pulls the switch/snaps my poor head back, poor being the only thing that suggests us he actually has feelings about it) the only thing he wants (which cannot happen obviously) is that his pretty baby is sitting on his lap, which considering that starkweather was 19 and she was 14 when the entire thing went down makes the entire thing sound really fucking creepy as it should sound. but that is what he cares about. not the people he killed, not his guilt, not any consequences of what he might have done, just that his girlfriend is there to see him die - which isn’t a thing he gives much of a fuck about anyway. and at this point you're wondering, what’s the point. well, the final stanza is giving you the point, even if he could also not giving you any point and it would still hold up because that’s entirely it, the guy killed people because he could and because he was angry, not because there was a point.

They declared me unfit to live said into that great void my soul'd be hurled They wanted to know why I did what I did Well sir I guess there's just a meanness in this world.

aaaand now you get the whole actual Meaning Of The Thing thrown in your face in three lines which need a lot of unpacking, but in order: they declared me unfit to live has a not so slight implication that it’s wrong for someone to decide who’s fit to live or not... which then in turn is kind of ironic coming from someone who killed ten people because he could, but that doesn’t make it any less true that he’s operating in a system that declares people unfit to live... same as he did, so he’s most likely asking why they have the right to decide it and he doesn’t. then we add that they wanted to know why he did what he did, which is the crux - until now he just said he had fun and he felt like it. now, bruce springsteen has no idea of why starkweather did it because of course he never knew him and only researched the topic, and the movie obviously had its take on things but it’s a movie. so what he does? he provides an answer which is also a reference to flannery o’ connor’s story a good man is hard to find’s ending where a similar thing was said (guys honestly read that it’s an a+ short story you should)... as in: well, I guess there’s just a meanness in this world. he GUESSES, he doesn’t know. *well, sir* suggests an answer like he’s just shrugging and providing it because it just occurred to him, not that he thought about it. but then what’s the point? that the world is mean. and it sucks. and meanness exists and you can’t do anything about it, and he was mean same as the world he comes from and so he did something mean that will result in his soul being hurled into the void (but other people said it, not him, he most likely doesn’t even think his soul will survive the execution), but that’s it. there’s nothing else. there’s no reasoning, there’s no guilt, there’s nothing. just, there’s a meanness in this world. dot. and since the world is mean people do mean things such as kill innocent people, to whom mean things happen all the time, and you can’t do shit about it. and then the song is over and you’re left with a chill running down your spine and wondering, is it really just as bad as that?

but since the singer isn’t giving you any answer either way and he’s not sympathizing with the murderer nor is trying to make you sympathize with him, he’s just telling him like it is, you as in the listener have to put effort into it and do the math and decide for yourself if you want to agree with the fact that the world is inherently mean and it sucks and it inevitably will do it over and over again, or if you want things to be different. you can’t know either way. he’s not telling you to judge his murderer not to sympathize with him. he’s asking you to think about it.

hm. imagine that.

now, if only people actually followed that advice and thought about things including how narratives focusing on seventeen-year olds having to kill someone in order to save people after developing ptsd for two years are not meant for the reader to blame the seventeen-year old with ptsd but the system that fucked him over that much, that would be even better now, wouldn’t it? ;)

[janiedean]

god, youre so delusional, its pathetic.

johnny 99 is a song by Our Only Savior Bruce Springsteen, to be found in his masterpiece 1982 record Nebraska, which was wholly composed of acoustic songs concerning themes way darker than his usual and which his record company probably considered a commercial suicide back in the day - and it’s regarded by many people as his actual finest record (and objectively I agree, ngl). the song, other than being in the same stark style as the rest of the record, as in, acoustic guitar and harmonica only, in less than four minutes manages in an admirable example of synthesis, not only to tell an entire story, but to touch heavy themes such as economical crisis, the death penalty, the fact that the american government didn’t give a shit about blue collar workers way back in the seventies and arguably also that it might be a tad too easy to buy guns in the US. sounds interesting? great, then let me welcome to this evening’s episode of tumblr user janiedean explains bruce springsteen! ;)

so, shall we start? brace up because this is a wild ride.

Well they closed down the auto plant in Mahwah late that month Ralph went out lookin' for a job but he couldn't find none He came home too drunk from mixin' Tanqueray and wine He got a gun shot a night clerk now they call 'm Johnny 99 

first of all: bruce again shows that he knows how to hook you in, because in four lines he has pretty much told you the bones of the story. first - and most important thing: a factory in a town in new jersey closes. it was a true fact, and in real life it was because they failed to follow environmental rules, but as back in the day there was indeed an economical crisis in the US for which a lot of factories shut down, we could fictionally assume it was for that reason as well. anyway, what matters is that the factory closes. our protagonist, ralph, who presumably works there, is fired, searches for a new job, isn’t re-hired (which was common to a lot of people who were laid off at that time, please feel free to read dale maharidge’s journey to nowhere and somewhere like america to get educated on that), proceeds to get drunk and when he’s not thinking straight he buys a gun (just like that), shoots a guy and gets a new nickname: johnny 99. why? we don’t know yet. but we know that a guy who was just doing his job and failed to be rehired lost it and shot someone... because he lost his job. hmm. but let’s go on.

Down in the part of town where when you hit a red light you don't stop Johnny's wavin' his gun around and threatenin' to blow his top When an off duty cop snuck up on him from behind Out in front of the Club Tip Top they slapped the cuffs on Johnny 99

so: after having shot the night clerk, our guy is in the part of town where you don’t stop at a red light so we can assume not the best part of it, he’s threatening to hurt himself with the gun, he gets arrested by an off duty cop, that’s it. sorry, not that much of a criminal career. but snuck up on him from behind... maybe like the closing of his factory and the fact that his life was fucked in the span of a few days? that might have been a deliberate lyrical choice, which makes you, if not sympathize with the guy, at least get how he’s feeing right now.

Well the city supplied a public defender but the judge was Mean John Brown He came into the courtroom and stared poor Johnny down Well the evidence is clear gonna let the sentence son fit the crime Prison for 98 and a year and we'll call it even Johnny 99

at this point, of course johnny goes to trial. he gets a public defender (which from what I gather tends to be shitty) and a judge whose nickname is mean, from which we can surmise that the stacks against him are bad regardless. the judge comes into the courtroom and stares poor johnny down, and at this point it’s obvious that we’re meant to sympathize with him, not with the judge, who is *mean* and stares down at the guy before even sitting down at this point. so, the judge says that the evidence is there, and his sentence is 99 years of prison.

which is why he’s re-baptized johnny 99 as we had seen in the beginning. now, 99 years is pretty much life, since this guy must have been at least older than twenty to work in a car factory. rough. 

A fistfight broke out in the courtroom they had to drag Johnny's girl away His mama stood up and shouted "judge don't take my boy this way" Well son you got a statement you'd like to make Before the bailiff comes to forever take you away

this verdict does not indeed please johnny’s family/loved ones, as a *fistfight* breaks out and they have to forcibly remove his girlfriend, while his mother pleads the judge to not take her boy this way, presumably crying, which means that again, we are supposed to see that he has relatives who love him and would cry for him and so maybe he’s not a bad guy deep down. sure, we haven’t heard his side yet, but we know his girlfriend loves him enough to try to beat up the guards and his mother pleads for another solution... which is denied, and the judge actually replies with the last two lines, which sound fairly rude and insensitive especially given that the bailiff is coming to forever take him away. but it’s as if the judge has decided that since the guy isn’t rich or matters much in the great scale of things, it’s an already done thing and fuck that. ouch.

Now judge I got debts no honest man could pay The bank was holdin' my mortgage and they was takin' my house away Now I ain't sayin' that makes me an innocent man But it was more 'n all this that put that gun in my hand 

aand wait, here finally our dude finally speaks for himself. first: he had debts no honest man could pay, which means that losing his job fucked his finances for good and he was deep in the red. the bank was taking his house away, which was another thing that was extremely common back in the day (same as in the twenties haha) (read those maharidge books for more info) and so he was going to become homeless because he couldn’t find another job and had no other safety net to fall back on. he doesn’t try to argue for his innocence because he did kill a man so he’s not really downplaying it, but then he adds that ‘it was more than all of that which put a gun in his hand’, which means that it was losing his job, losing his money, possibly losing his house, being unable to provide for his family and feeling most likely useless and like he couldn’t do anything anymore with his life. and that puts the gun in his hand. he didn’t do it because he enjoyed it, he did it because he saw no other way, and none of that was considered in the *evidence*, which means he got a trial where his circumstances weren’t even taken into account. but that’s not the heaviest blow this song deals. that one’s the ending:

Well your honor I do believe I'd be better off dead And if you can take a man's life for the thoughts that's in his head Then won't you sit back in that chair and think it over judge one more time And let 'em shave off my hair and put me on that execution line

HAAAAA BUT JUST YOU WAIT. so: he thinks he’s be better off dead, which admittedly is fair of him, idk if I’d take 99 years (so: entire life and death) in a US prison over just being done with it already, and after all if he has no job, no house, no money and no prospects, what does he have to lose? and fine enough, but here’s the gist: if the judge can take a man’s life for the thoughts in his head, ie if the judge thinks he can condemn him to 99 years in prison ie rotting in there until he dies for what he thought and not giving a fuck about why he thought that or why he did what he did... then he welcomes the judge to ‘sit back in that chair’ (which is already pretty damn wording because it sarcastically implies the judge is in a higher position and nothing can hurt him in the chair while everything can hurt johnny 99 and everything has done so already) and have the balls to give him the death penalty instead of condemning him to die but pretending to have been merciful and only giving him time in prison that he can’t possibly serve before he dies. so he’s basically raising the judge (representing the system that betrayed him) the middle finger because if the judge/the system have ruined his life then they should at least have the courage to end it instead of condemning him to be a prisoner for the entirety of it.

now: that’s it. there’s nothing else. there’s no lesson, there’s no moral, that’s how it ends, it’s bleak and sad and it doesn’t really give you any silver lining... because there’s no silver lining and it’s unjust to live in a society where losing your job means losing your life *and* you will be automatically judged for the thoughts in your head without a chance to prove that you can be better or meant better or could make up for it.

no, it’s one mistake out of reasons beyond your control that you would actually pay for, and hey, thrown in jail with the keys thrown away. what an enlightened, beautiful, just system, the system that judges a man for the thoughts that are in his head, huh?

and actually, bonus story: this story is tied to bruce’s biggest BDE display ever, as when reagan became president and was running for re-election in 1984, he thought to quote bruce’s (sadly misunderstood) song born in the usa in a speech in nj. at that point bruce said nothing for a bit, but then:

guys, what a man, what an idol, what a class. no, sure af reagan did not listen to nebraska nor johnny 99.

and, given how you, my dear anon, also judge people by the thoughts that are in their heads and proceed to be their jury, judge and executioner, both fictional people and real ones, if you’re who I think you are (and I actually know you are)... I’ve got a feeling that neither have you. and I really think you should, same as everyone because bruce is the best ;)

[janiedean]

*Roose Bolton voice* I'm dissapointed in you

HEY ANON SORRY FOR THE LATENESS BUT I’M SURE YOU SENT THIS FOR SPRINGSTEEN ANALYSIS, RIGHT? ;) then sure let’s have something! what can I get for you with the roose bolton voice, hm…

OH OKAY LET’S GO BLEAK POLITICAL.

so: SEEDS!

Seeds is an outtake from born in the USA and was only properly published in 1998 when it ended up on tracks (a four-cds compilation of outtakes that still doesn’t even fucking scratch the surface of what he has in the vaults bruce come on take the rest out), but as a lot of other bruce songs that were never technically published on official records it has enjoyed a very lively life on stage/live especially when our man gets political. we should probably put as a premise, other than that, that this was one of bruce’s first political pieces following the vein that would then end up in bitusa, tom joad, youngstown and so on, and as a lot of those songs it focuses on poverty/unemployment in the us of a. it’s not a coincidence that it was out of the bitusa sessions post-nebraska, but then again nebraska was his first record with Serious Political Themes and half of the original songs ended up on bitusa anyway so those records are pretty much tied together.

also, seeds has been a favorite throughout the bitusa tour (the one where bruce dissed reagan) where it was played along the title track, a cover of war that you can find on the live 75-85 box set, johnny 99 and atlantic city. as in, basically it gave you a pretty straight bleak picture of the current times, and it came back with a vengeance post bush-jr and I’m 100% sure it’ll show up again when he tours post-trump.

anyhow, as I think I’ve bored you enough with the technicalities, let’s move on to the actual thing. so, what do we have?

Well a great black river a man had foundSo he put all his money in a hole in the groundAnd sent a big steel arm driving down down downMan now I live on the streets of Houston town

so, we’re starting with a bang. first thing, the song’s title is seeds, which should suggest us that it’s about either agriculture or farmers.

except that it opens saying that ‘a man found a great black river’, and at the end of the stanza we find out that we’re in houston, so presumably around texas, so the black river that then turns into a hole in the ground with a big steel arm driving down down down (which considering the fast rhythm of the song gives you anxiety just hearing it) means that someone found oil and started drilling it in texas and as a consequence the narrator lives in the streets of one of texas’s biggest cities, so we can suppose that this guy was a farmer, he lost his land because of the oil drill and now he’s homeless. NICE START GUYS! but let’s go on.

Packed up my wife and kids when winter came alongAnd we headed down south with just spit and a songBut they said “Sorry son it’s gone gone gone”

next stanza, we find out that our guy has a family that he had to pack up when winter came along, so either his land was dead because of the oil drill or he couldn’t support them anymore out of farming. now, this could either be set in texas or not, but since in the eighties a lot of people from the north who lost their houses or land and used to be farmers or steel workers or so on went to texas because it was said to be someplace they could get jobs (again I know I say it every damned time but if you read dale maharidge’s somewhere like america or journey to nowhere you’ll see exactly what I meant), so either he went to texas from a nearby state or he was in northern texas and went down south, but the point is: he lost his job, he was a farmer (so not in a good position to start from since farming hasn’t made much money for small owners for a while) and now he’s gone to texas with a spit and a song (ie: hope), but as the song’s music keeps on being fairly bleak, the only answer he’s given is ‘sorry but it’s gone, gone, gone’, as in: if he wanted work, there isn’t any.

Well there’s men hunkered down by the railroad tracksThe Elkhorn Special blowing my hair backTents pitched on the highway in the dirty moonlightAnd I don’t know where I’m gonna sleep tonight

If we thought that was bad news, though, we’re just getting started, because not only our dude isn’t the only one in that same situation (men hunkered down by the railroad tracks, referring to the fact that in the eighties a lot of people had started riding trains again like in the great depression so they slept near the railroad - the elkohorn special is the name of a train), in tents along the highway in the *dirty* moonlight which suggests you a fairly bleak, sad picture. also, he doesn’t know where he’s going to sleep tonight, which means he doesn’t even have the tent.

Parked in the lumberyard freezing our asses offMy kids in the back seat got a graveyard coughWell I’m sleeping up in front with my wifeBilly club tapping on the windshield in the middle of the nightSays “Move along man move along”

solution: sleeping in the car, since they don’t have anything else. so, the guy and his family try to sleep in the car in a lumberyard with his children being sick (graveyard cough, suggesting that it’s pretty damned bad), except that they can’t even do that because the police shows up and tells them to leave, which was apparently common practice in texas at the time (again: same thing happened to the reporters in the aforementioned book because they had a car with ohio plates…), so they can’t stay and have to *move along*, but to where? we just don’t know.

so: the guy used to be a farmer, lost his job, went down to texas to look for work with his wife and kids, didn’t find any, was treated like crap and can’t even sleep in his car with his family, the alternative is tents along the highway or a railroad in winter, his kids are sick and there’s no hint of salvation anywhere nor of government help nor… really much of anything.

Well big limousine long shiny and blackYou don’t look ahead you don’t look backHow many times can you get up after you’ve been hit?

now, that’s it for the backstory - we don’t know where the narrator ends up or if he finds work. but we learn his opinion. first of all, he talks to a generic ‘big long shiny black limousine’, which we can automatically assume means that he’s talking to someone rich (or the idea of someone rich) who could afford such a car (he certainly can) accusing them of not looking ahead ( = not seeing the consequences of their greed, which we can tie back to the oil drill in the first part that started our guy’s problems) and of not looking back ( = can mean that they don’t care for who comes behind them in wealth or that they don’t remember not being wealthy or both), and then asks them, how many times can you get up after being hit, as in, how many times could you fall on your feet before you end up like me?

we just don’t know, but probably more than the narrator… though one supposes the narrator is hoping the time comes for them, too. that becomes veery clear in the next part:

Well I swear if I could spare the spitI’d lay one on your shiny chromeAnd send you on your way back home

if he could spare the spit (which suggests he can’t, so maybe they barely even have means to drink and eat) he’d use it to spit on the limousine ie what stands for enormous undeserved wealth that a) the narrator will never obtain, b) caused the (economical) situation that brought the narrator to misery, so we also can see that the narrator is absolutely aware that his poverty is tied with the fact that rich people don’t care for the likes of him and would throw him under the dirt in a second, nor care if he can’t support himself anymore. and then he’d send the rich person back home, if he could. but he can’t.

and that’s bleak enough, but then we get to the last part and it gets possibly worse:

So if you’re gonna leave your town where the north wind blowTo go on down where that sweet soda river flowWell you better think twice on it JackYou’re better off buying a shotgun dead off the rackYou ain’t gonna find nothing down here friendExcept seeds blowing up the highway in the south windMoving on moving on it’s gone gone it’s all gone

at this point, the narrator is addressing someone else - someone named jack who could be anyone as it’s an extremely common name - who might want to go south and tells him not to. going south means leaving a town where the north wind blows (so where it’s cold and there’s nothing for them) to go where that sweet soda river flow which paints an imagery of a river overflowing with sugary refined drink… from which poor people can’t serve themselves anyway, and according to the narrator if that is the plan, then you’re better off buying a shotgun ie killing yourself before you go south because there is nothing down there except seeds blowing up the highway in another type of wind, so the seeds they might have planted back home are getting wasted along the highway people sleep on… and everything is gone and they have nothing left.

and the fact that it’s this bleak is probably why it didn’t end up on the record proper (admittedly bitusa has a slightly different feeling so it probably wouldn’t have fit given that it’s a lot more raw and musically angry than any other song on that record except maybe bitusa but the electric version lures you in with the beat and you don’t realize how angry it is until you hear the original imvho), but it’s sadly a fairly accurate portrayal of how things were going bad economically for all the people laid off without a second chance to find something better in the late 70s-early 80s. too bad that things haven’t changed and this piece has stayed pretty much relevant even these days.

thank you anon with the roose bolton voice, I hope you enjoyed the fruits of your disappointment ;)

[janiedean]

“Can’t wait till these two children’s cartoon characters fuck” yeah not creepy at all

Today, I will talk to y’all about what’s honestly one of the creepiest questions that has haunted me since I was twelve years old, specifically: how the fuck can people ever have thought that Born in the USA is a patriotic song in 1984 and how can’t they still understand it now?

Honestly, I have no idea, and in this essay I will walk you through it so it’s exceedingly and clearly explained how it’s in no way, shape or form a mindlessly patriotic song but, on the contrary, is a sharp, angry, vitriolic satire which criticizes the US government and its stance on the Vietnam war to Hell and back.

Born in the USA is the title song of the eponymous 1984 record which turned my good old pal Bruce into a world superstar, but it had originally been written for 1982′s acoustic masterpiece Nebraska. It was then reworked into an electrical version whose music is probably what makes people thing it’s patriotic since it sounds happy and singing-inducing, except that if you listen to the original:

You can notice that the famous one is just the upbeat version of the hauntingly, frankly anxiety-inducing acoustic that does certainly not work to sing out loud, but admittedly isn’t as good to sing in a stadium.

After having made this clear, we can finally move on into analyzing the lyrics.

The song opens with:

Born down in a dead man’s townThe first kick I took was when I hit the groundYou end up like a dog that’s been beat too much‘Til you spend half your life just coverin’ up

Now, here we have the first iconic question of this evening, as in: how in the hell a song that opens with born down in a dead man’s town // the first kick I took was when I hit the ground can ever be taken for mindless praising/patriotism?

I have no fucking clue except for ‘people only listen to the refrain’. Anyhow, from this opening which is literally a kick in the teeth we learn that a) the narrator was born in a dead man’s town ie somewhere small without many options nor many people, b) his life has been shit since the early beginning since the first kick he took was when he hit the ground, which is fortified by the following two lines in which he compares himself to a ‘dog who’s been beat to much until he spends half his life just covering up’, a sentence that makes a hell of a lot more sense if you listen to the rest of what he has to say later.

For now, we have the immortal refrain:

Born in the U.S.AI was born in the U.S.AI was born in the U.S.ABorn in the U.S.A

In which the narrator informs us where he comes from, except that if we take the first stanza into account… the USA don’t sound really idyllic, now, don’t we?

Anyway, stanza two:

Got in a little hometown jamSo they put a rifle in my handSent me off to a foreign landTo go and kill the yellow man

And here we can finally see what’s the problem: our guy is a Vietnam veteran. However, things aren’t so easy. What we surmise from these short, extremely packed with information lines, is that:

the narrator wasn’t drafted;

the narrator was coerced into going by a method that was pretty common back in the day - people who ended up in bar fights or such altercations were given the choice of going to jail or go to Vietnam and of course if they had to support a family/needed money they’d pick Vietnam, but it’s still coercion and he certainly didn’t want to go;

which is why he says they put a rifle in my hand - it’s they running the action, not him;

and they also sent me off to a foreign land ie they/the army sent him to a place he doesn’t know (foreign) to go and kill the yellow man (vietcong) even if he didn’t want to.

And then we’re again informed that he was born in the USA, and that means he a) was born in a crappy place, b) was sent to Vietnam for a menial fight (a little hometown jam), c) was sent to kill people when he didn’t want to by higher powers who give zero shits about him.

Doesn’t seem like a compliment to me.

However, there’s more!

Come back home to the refineryHiring man says “Son if it was up to me”Went down to see my V.A. manHe said “Son, don’t you understand”

Our narrator comes back home to the refinery (compare with what I said before in the Youngstown analysis - that one also went to Vietnam and came back to a job at the steel mill he didn’t have anymore, so they both had highly stressful jobs that would take a toll on their health sooner rather than later) and the hiring man doesn’t hire him and shrugs like hey I wish I could but I can’t. So he goes to the VA who asks, don’t you understand, which in this case means that there’s no place for him in this context.

Which ties to the fact that Vietnam veterans were treated like shit and generally ignored because the war was lost and people didn’t want to think about it, except that at the same time they were the first to actually vocally come together and ask for help and actually they were the first who recognized the importance of treating PTSD and ran free clinics in which also WWII and Korea veterans could come for treatment, but hey, let’s send people to fight wars we know we’re losing and then let’s not help them, why not?

But no, son, don’t you understand.

And then he informs us again that he’s born in the USA, a country where after being sent to war without wanting to he’s not wanted anymore after he comes back.

The bridge, though, gives us even more interesting info:

I had a brother at Khe Sanh fighting off the Viet CongThey’re still there, he’s all goneHe had a woman he loved in SaigonI got a picture of him in her arms now

This stanza has an inane amount of info we can unpack in a handy checklist:

the narrator wasn’t the only person in his family to go - he had a brother in Vietnam, too;

the brother not only died but most likely died during the khe sahn battle which is admittedly one of the fucking dumbest decisions ever taken by the US military in their entire history and which was a defeat from the US even if they don’t like to admit it and prefer the ‘withdrawn’ excuse, which places him at the most recognizable and famous point of the Vietnam war for the casual listener/student;

the viet cong he and his brother fought are still there, he died, so = the US lost the war;

BUT the brother was in love with a Vietnamese woman (in love ie a serious thing) and the narrator has a picture of the two of them together, which suggests that neither he nor his brother hold the Vietnamese any ill-will and actually most probably dislike the US government more than the people they were supposed to fight.

We have no refrain after that, just the solo, but I don’t think he needs to say again how he was born in the USA for us to assume that when he says that, he’s being extremely sarcastic and not proud of it whatsoever.

Anyhow, we’re finally at the last stanza:

Down in the shadow of the penitentiaryOut by the gas fires of the refineryI’m ten years burning down the roadNowhere to run ain’t got nowhere to go

Again showing how good he is at packing info in a short space while providing the listeners with info about how it sucks for his character, he paints a fairly bleak picture with two lines: the shadow of the penitentiary suggests how he comes close to being arrested and the out by the gas fires of the refinery suggests that he’s out there inhaling the toxic gas but not working there, so he’s basically left to himself without any help.

Also, he’s ten years burning down the road, which means that he’s been back for that long and no one’s helped him since then, and then he has nowhere to run and nowhere to go, so even if he wanted to leave, he literally can’t because he has no other option than his dead man’s town (most likely because he doesn’t have the means and the money and he most likely has untreated ptsd, so he’s stuck there), and that is how his country left him. And now the last refrain changes:

Born in the U.S.A., I was born in the U.S.A.Born in the U.S.A., I’m a long gone daddy in the U.S.A.Born in the U.S.A., born in the U.S.A.Born in the U.S.A., I’m a cool rocking daddy in the U.S.A.

Because now not only he’s born in the USA, but we also know that he has a kid (I’m a long gone daddy + cool rocking daddy) and both definitions contrast with each other - long gone is the exact contrary of cool rocking, which suggests that the latter is as sarcastic as the rest of the refrain (the long gone pairs exceedingly well with the ten years burning down the road) and if we take LONG GONE at his word, he hasn’t seen his kid in ages because he can’t work or has ptsd or both.

So hey, being born in the USA for the narrator meant:

being left without options except the refinery in his town if he wanted to work;

being sent against his will to vietnam;

losing a brother in there, too;

(also, out of the two of them, the brother ie the one who found love there died while he who has nothing in either ‘nam or the US survived);

losing his job;

being rejected by everyone including most likely his family/his child;

being left on his own even by the VA as in the office supposed to help him;

risking going to jail;

being unable to change his situation or crawl out of it because all of those circumstances make sure he can’t literally do it;

all this while he’s probably hearing rhetoric about how great his country is everywhere.

So, that is why the refrain is not mindless patriotism but pure vitriol - it’s like, ‘hey, if you listened to the thing, everything sucks but hey, I was told being born in the USA is great so hey, I WAS! AMAZING, RIGHT? /sarcasm’, not ‘OH MY GOD HOW GREAT THE US IS I LOVE IT UNCRITICALLY’.

Admittedly, the fact that Ronald Reagan thought it was a patriotic song that might resonate with his audience:

Shows exactly all the reasons why Reagan was a complete idiot without a shred of text comprehension, and too bad people remember Reagan’s opinion more than the mythical, amazing, unreachable slam Bruce gave that speech not long later:

TLDR: this is not a song about mindless patriotic US drivel and it’d be frankly obvious from basically listening to the lyrics, but then again listening to the lyrics is the same thing as reading something with a modicum of using your brain, and from what I see reading while using 0,05% of someone’s brain capacity on tumblr is basically asking for the impossible.

Anyhow, I think anon’s time would be better spent thinking about how creepy is it that I see people on youtube commenting on American Skin (41 Shots) with ‘omg Springsteen is a leftist now I’ll go burn my copy of BITUSA’ when it’d be obvious from that song that his politics haven’t changed from then than about how people shipping things is apparently creepy.

:’)