so admittingly I don't know much about springsteen but your top 5/10 springsteen songs and why?
WELL THEN HERE WE GO (sorry this required a long answer) (also if I start going like ‘this is it bUT IN THIS VERSION NOT IN THAT ONE it’s because actually he has wildly different version of the same song XDDD)
*cough* *drum roll* videos for the first five + links for the others as usual xD
one: the ghost of tom joad
I once ranted about this specific song in detail so here if anyone’s interested, but: it took me years to decide on which one was my favorite overall but then I went for tom joad because it has all. it’s a heartbreaking song that updates one of my favorite ever novels (the grapes of wrath) to current days situations and guys I swear to god the fact that he put to music tom’s speech to his mother in the novel at the end after rehashing the themes in a new light in the rest of it killed me and I want it tattooed, so. tom joad now and always thanks guys. I love this damned song to levels that are embarrassing as hell.
two: no surrender (in the live 75-85 version)
so: no surrender is originally on born in the usa and actually it’s my favorite song from that record regardless - like, it opens side two and I remember that the first time I heard it was on a tape a friend’s dad (haha) had lent me bc he knew I was into bruce and he was too and I turned it to the second side of the tape and played it and I was like holy crap this is it but then I heard the acoustic live version from the following tour and guys. guys. if you ever had friends you fell out of touch with but still remember fondly and/or friendships you know that even if you don’t talk for a while you’ll always be close when you meet again this is.. just… idk it hit me like a punch in the stomach and it never left. I cried every single time he played it live when I went to see him. no regrets. I love this song sfm and the melancholy in the acoustic version just destroys me.
three: for you (acoustic piano version)
I 100% realize this is probably a weird choice for top three, but: this was on his first album and the version on there is pretty damned good - it’s about a guy whose girlfriend tries to commit suicide and reminesces about their relationship - and you’d go like why, but: first of all he has some of his best lines in this (my electric surges free I just sdgsldjl) and the entire last stanza where he goes from where I found you broken at the beach to the end is just a knife into your heart, but this goddamned version here just goes and tears your heart out and stomps on it and I swear if there is one thing I want from bruce is that he plays this in front of me next time I see him live because for now I never managed and just - the slow piano kills me. I love it. the fact that when I asked brian fallon in a tumblr q&a his fave bruce song and he said this specific one just confirmed he’s a true intellectual. ;)
or: this is the love song. I just. the first time I heard this I fell off the chair or something and it was the studio version which is nowhere near as heartfelt as the live versions and I swear it’s just - it has very lovely lyrics that perfectly balance melancholy and hopeful and don’t make it saccharine, the fucking sax solo destroys me every single goddamned time I hear it and when you get to the end and he says that she has his love heart and soul it’s The Most Heartfelt Thing I Have Ever Heard In My Life Or Close To It and I just, I love drive all night with every inch of my atoms, bye.
I ranted about this extensively yesterday here so I refer you to it for long rant about it, but tldr: this was actually the first bruce song I ever heard knowing it was by bruce - it wasn’t what got me on that train but it still was the first and like… I didn’t understand it for a long time bc my first run-in with bruce was a hit and miss but then I did and like, this song is basically quintessential bruce because it has all his themes rolled up into one, all the good stuff, everything that is good about his music and most of all live it’s a goddamned religious experience.
so, that was for the top five, but top ten…
six: youngstown (click here for full rant from last year) which was a hard choice but this damned song slays me whether acoustic or electric and I love his use of language and how he built it and how he teaches you things in five minutes pretty much and how the music/mood matches the words in both versions and seems to mean different approaches but still doesn’t change the core of it, and is2g the last two lines and the second stanza and the line he recycled from the mahardige book he inspired himself with when he wrote this are just goddamned out of this world and like this one raised the ladder for years but I just, love it to pieces
seven: rosalita (come out tonight), or: bruce does serious and politics incredibly well but this one is just a delight from beginning to end, it’s fun, I could listen to it for a month without getting tired, it always puts a smile on my face and the entire last part where he tells her to inform her dad he has a record company now so no reason to hate that his daughter is with a moneyless musician is just… so… lovely and fun and lighthearted and I just really love this song a lot ;;
eight: highway patrolman or, there’s no way a top ten bruce songs has no nebraska material from me because nebraska Is A Damn Masterpiece and this one’s my fave off it, but tldr: the utter, absolute way this thing slays you with just voice and guitar and the way he makes you feel about the cop who ends up letting his brother with ptsd from vietnam escape after he accidentally kills someone is out of this world and I just, this one really has a way to make you empathize with the narrator and my heart ;_; (also the movie they made from it which is in that video is really good k viggo mortensen playing the brother with ptsd isn’t leaving me anytime soon)
nine: thunder road (rant attached to the link) or: this one is short and sweet but honest, it’s not The Definitive Love Song To Me just bc drive all night exists. this damned song is a masterpiece in itself. it’s flawless. it has the crescendo, it has the fact that at whichever moment in his life he sings it it works, ‘it’s a town full of losers and I’m pulling out of here to win’ is the most iconic line that ever ended a song or close to it and it’s exactly the kinda love song you wanna hear if you want realistic love song material and just, legendary. okay? legendary.
ten: american skin (41 shots), or: this actually is what got me into springsteen bc I borrowed the live album it was published on originally after my first try with darkness went so-so, I listened to it and was like ‘okay yeah he’s good’, then I got to this one and went like ‘wait a fucking moment this isn’t just good’ (count that I was twelve and understood maybe 1/5th in the english songs I heard), I actually looked it up, went like woah wait aaand listened to it for two weeks straight, bought the record, translated everything by hand, started reading about what the fuck was wrong with the circumstances for which it was written and here I am twenty years later dying over bruce and having been introduced thanks to him to 80% of his country’s societal issues or I’d have had no idea that early in my life. anyway: other than the sentimental value, it’s honestly out of this world good and the live version just nailed it way better than the studio that was released years later and I love bruce a lot, k? k.
thanks for letting me rant ;)
