I Was Wrong

“A man's errors are his portals of discovery.”

The Irish writer, James Joyce said that. The Irish ability to form words is without question, and as a writer, this man had no peers. I was reminded of these words of Joyce upon my repeated listening to Springsteen’s “Working On A Dream”, his latest release, while I was eating humble pie, and I don't mean the band.

The initial reaction to this collection of songs was mixed, mostly predicated on two early releases, “The Wrestler” and “Outlaw Pete”. The former was written for the movie of the same name. The song has already won a Golden Globe award and is up for Oscar consideration.(Update:The song has NOT been nominated. I apologize for the error-ed.) The latter was deemed a KISS rip-off and has clouded the acceptance of the rest of the album.

I was one of those in unsteadiness, as well. I thought “The Wrestler” to be a wonderful song, capturing the emotions of a man, who has dedicated his life to one purpose, facing the reality that he has no life when that purpose is taken away. Springsteen has always had that empathy with the characters that try, fail, and learn to deal with that failure.

Ironically, the song “Outlaw Pete” is also a movie song. Except, in this case, the sonic landscape that Springsteen creates is cinema-like. The saga of Pete unfolds like a movie, building steadily to its epic close. We “see” Pete going over the edge by Springsteen's use of descending scales. Bruce hasn’t used the “wall of sound” so well since “Backstreets.”

Which is why I sit here eating that pie. Yes, he does lift the KISS song, but it is far, far from being a lazy rip-off as some (me) earlier thought. Besides, we don’t think any less of Brian Wilson because he copied Chuck Berry note for note.

Sal Nunziato, the musical maestro over at Burning Wood, asked me to hear, not just listen, to the album. He has championed WOAD from its initial leaks as a brilliant Springsteen album. He is right in his assessment. Like many of Bruce’s previous songs, there are many on WOAD that can be easily heard, as they will eventually be, played live. The E-Street Band will expand the sound of “My Lucky Day”, “Life Itself”, “Surprise Surprise”, the title song, and “Good Eye”. Can’t you see Bruce, under a solo spot, singing “The “Wrestler?” Seriously, after listening to “Good Eye”, wouldn’t a Springsteen blues album be something?

Where Sal was wrong, at least with me, is that I never was one “…who think Bruce's best work is behind him, nothing will ever sound satisfying to you again. Very few songs are "Thunder Road" & "Meeting Across The River" and few will ever be.” Amen, brother, but you’re preaching to the choir.

What I thought, with my initial dabbling with “Outlaw Pete”, was that the money and the fame and having Obama on his iPhone speed dial had finally gotten to the artist I had so respected. While in the past, artists like Cole Porter continued to create late into their lives with bona fide compositions, today’s artists seem unable or, worse, unwilling to make viable work. They seem to be satisfied playing their jukebox for inflated ticket prices for nostalgic audiences who try to re-capture a memory. I wanted Bruce to be more than just the half time performer at Super Bowl whatever.

Indeed, with WOAD, he has done that. He has not only made a good album. He has, perhaps, written some of his best music. Ever. He has shook off any dust that may have gathered, stepped up and hit a game winner. No one in his class of artists has been able to deliver like this in a very long time. It will take a lot for any of them to match this effort, and that might include Bruce himself. To the doubters, like me, he has already alerted us. I just didn’t listen. He said on “Changing Children”:

“All you gotta do is hang around

Tell you you're never gonna know

Just what's going down
You ain't never gonna know…”

I’ll say.