Written by Wilson Towne
Unlike some of my peers, I never really listened to Springsteen before taking Craig Werner's class at UW Madison -- "Bruce Springsteen's America." My parents were fans of the Boss, but he and the E-Street crew took a back seat to David Bowie, U2, The Clash, and R.E.M.
Honestly, I never could gauge the meaning and depth of issues that Springsteen wailed about. Like many Americans, I was caught up in the misinterpretations around "Born in the U.S.A.," thinking it was simply an expression of unabashed American pride. Basing my view of Springsteen off of the patriotic fantasy that many Americans had of "Born," I (wrongly) believed that Bruce Springsteen was a jingoistic tool.
It wasn't until the 2004 election, when musicians were shooting cease and desists like machine gun bullets, that my parents addressed my misinterpretation and told me to read past the lyrics that everyone associates with the song. And read I did.
Got in a little hometown jamSo they put a rifle in my hand
Sent me off to a foreign land
To go and kill the yellow man
Powerful stuff. It's a wonder that it took Glenn Beck this long to call the song "anti-American," especially considering it fooled our former President Ronald Reagan in 1984. If it wasn't for the political hype surrounding the socially conscious Wrecking Ball, Springsteen might have gone right on misleading the pundits and politicians. Maybe Beck was confusing Bruce Springsteen and his plain-talking wails for Ted Nugent, another musician from the working-class, whose un-apologetic, conservative views make him a frequent quest of Glenn Beck's and Fox News.
Although at some times Bruce may dress and sound like Ted, don't make the mistake of thinking Springsteen shares his ultra-American views. Even the cover of Born in the U.S.A., which shows Springsteen facing an American flag, is done in a reflective, almost introspective, manner. Instead of implicitly sanctioning the actions of the United States by posing with the flag, Springsteen is entering into a dialogue with the American public, asking them about Vietnam, "Is this what you want our country to be associated with? Is this really the America we live in? Can we do better?"
If Springsteen should be associated with any musician it should be Woody Guthrie. Guthrie, no stranger to fighting oppression, slapped the slogan "This Machine Kills Fascists" onto his guitar. Springsteen has some deep similarities to Guthrie who played licks from his guitar and lived the life that John Steinbeck wrote about in The Grapes of Wrath, which influenced Springsteen was so heavily that he made an album titled after Steinbeck's hero, The Ghost of Tom Joad.
Springsteen sings about working class struggles in the same manner as Guthrie, and to me the only difference is electricity. Just as Guthrie struggled with unionization and labor rights during the dust bowl, so does Springsteen in a manner more contemporary to the cold war, and post Vietnam America. Maybe if Ronald Reagan, and Glenn Beck had the chance to hear the acoustic, "Born in the U.S.A.," which was recorded for but not included on Springsteen's Nebraska, they would've understood the haunting lyrics so similar to Guthrie's that decry the treatment of veterans.
So far my re-introduction with Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street band, which takes place at a time of political and economic battle in Wisconsin, has focused on the labor and class struggles his characters face. And most importantly, I pay attention to the goddamn lyrics.
Wilson Towne is a freshman at the University of Wisconsin-Madison studying History and Philosophy. He declares himself "a newcomer to Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band," but is eagerly awaiting Steve Van Zandt's return to Lillehammer.
http://firedoglake.com/2011/04/11/late-late-night-fdl-how-can-a-poor-man-stand-such-times-and-live/
and the two songs I mentioned initially, when Springsteen did them, let's say it was a little difficult to see the stage for a couple minutes.
http://www.myfoxny.com/dpp/news/investigative/farm-tax-breaks-for-nj-celebrities-20110209
I used to love the guy and still enjoy his music but this news of riding the legal system to avoid taxes makes him a hypocrite in my book.
The bigger question is whether we're holding our artists to higher standards than we hold ourselves. I look to artists for inspiration, provocation, insight. But I don't take them as authorities--we all make our own decisions--and I don't expect them to be saints. Far as that goes, Jesus didn't choose his disciples from the ranks of the perfect.
Top of the list of people who know Bruce Springsteen's flawed is Bruce Springsteen.
Reading the progress of faulty assumption to somewhat improved understanding via a surface comparison of Ted Nugent to get to the cliched idea that Bruce compares best to Woody Guthrie-- not so much. I'm glad the student figured out he'd been wrong about what he thought he knew, but the insights are unremarkable.
I wish you and your class enjoy yourselves and each other, and gain many deep insights from your call and response and examination 'of different perspectives to arrive at a greater truth'.
But the insights presented here by Wilson Towne are what they are, and they aren't improved by explanation of classroom technique or educational method, though the explanation does provide context. They are sophomoric, which is fine as the fellow is probably a sophomore, and unremarkable.
And what's needed in such an essay, if it is presented to a wider public, as this one has been, is not the 'cutest remarks', but some brilliant ones, so as to give a reader beyond your classroom something beyond a chance to look over a student paper.
Secondly, Bruce dresses NOTHING like Ted Nugent. He does not wear camos and trucker hats and he has certainly NEVER worn a loin cloth.
Otherwise there were some very good insights in this piece. If you wanna hear some really good Springsteen look for the "Piece de Resistance" bootleg from 9/19/78. That thing just smokes.
Don't forget The Boss at Winterland, 12/15/78, or the harder to find 12/16/78.
No performer I have ever seen, before or after, including Bruce himself has ever put on a more energetic and epic concert. The pure physicality of him safely stage diving on his back during guitar solos, while body surfing over the waves of his audience's hands was an amazing moment. The mutual love and respect was something to behold in an era when most rock stars would have had their clothes torn off for getting too close.