I saw rock ‘n’ roll’s future—and its name is Bruce Springsteen
On August 25th, 1975, Bruce Springsteen’s musical career changed forever. Born to Run was a triumph of encapsulating the motifs of the American Dream, the hope of the future versus the world weary reality, the desire to make something out of nothing and never look back, audiences took to it immediately and a star was born. Many thought that this Jersey boy had come out of nowhere (he had) and that this was a stunning debut (it wasn’t). The genius of Born to Run lay in its absolute desperation, it’s all or nothing grandeur that was indeed the result of an artist taking his last shot at stardom, doomed to fade to obscurity if he failed. The tales that came out of this recording were legendary, it took two years to make the album, with a good 6 months spent on the title track, complete with 12 guitar overdubs and a change in production and management halfway through. The guitar slinger from Jersey had finally found critical and popular success, yet Springsteen had already touched upon the themes so heralded in Born to Run, and it was The Wild, The Innocent and the E Street Shuffle that had brought him there.
Continue reading Classic Albums: The Wild, The Innocent, and The E Street Shuffle (1973)
The Art of the Mixtape 