52 years ago, Bruce Springsteen released his very first album, Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ A perfect hybrid between Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and Elvis Presley. Making of.
50 years of career. Here's a birthday. By publishing his very first opus, Bruce Springsteen entered the legend. And although he will have to wait for his third opus to finally reach the stratosphere of rock, this very first effort remains more than a testimony of an artist in the making, it has charted the future. Because it must be said straight away, Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ traces with rare force and clarity what will be the career of the man we will affectionately nickname “the boss”. On this first album, Bruce Springsteen presents an exterior close to a perfect hybrid between Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and Elvis Presley. Bruce embodies all of this and more. The New Jersey baritone of sorts who still has to prove himself, after years of more or less ephemeral groups, launched when he was still a high school student. Some will achieve a certain local notoriety, but without ever making the break. However, we must first and foremost recognize that the general sound of this first effort shows a somewhat messy but talented Springsteen, still trying to find his way… And his voice!
Indeed, Greetings from Asbury Park, NJ is overloaded with wild rhymes, humorous asides, vivid characters and fast-paced images, most of them taken directly from Springsteen's personal experiences. “Most of the songs (from Greetings) were twisted autobiographies.” he wrote in his 2016 memoir, Born to Run. “'Growin' Up', 'Does This Bus Stop', 'For You', 'Lost in the Flood' and 'Saint in the City' found their seed in people, places, hangouts and incidents that I had seen and things I had experienced. I wrote impressionistically and changed names to protect the guilty. I tried hard to find something that could identify me. »
This opus, however, contains some of the best songs ever written by Bruce Springsteen. No less. Emblematic of the Boss's early work, “Lost in the Flood”, perhaps the darkest track on the album, particularly highlights his talent as a songwriter. This ballad would even launch a form that many of his most memorable songs would adopt throughout his career: a slow manner with a strong, moving story that builds in intensity while building on lyricism of astonishing power; this same lyricism serving as a structure and even a backbone to his work, whether it is highly produced and with overloaded orchestration or on the contrary, in the form of piano ballads, like “Mary Queen of Arkansas” and “The Angel”. The majority of songs from Greetings from Asbury Park, NJ present an uncertain, even worried young man. On the other hand, Bruce Springsteen here, does not yet display the tireless energy which would later characterize his two following opuses, notably Born To Run.
But there is also a lot of lightness, in an airy sense, in the compositions of Greetings from Asbury Park, NJ. “Spirit in the Night,” a precursor to the musical material found on The Wild, Innocent & the E. Street Shuffle; or “Blinded by the Light”, a fun song also incorporating a certain proto-funk-R'n'B influence, a musical genre which will quickly gain a prominent place throughout Springsteen's career. “For You”, “Does This Bus Stops at 82nd Street?” and “It's Hard To Be A Saint In The City” also show a certain vision of what would later distinguish the Boss' writing.
But the most factual and therefore most fascinating point of Greetings from Asbury Park, NJalthough uneven at times, there is no bad song. Nor a real masterpiece either. But real successes, including a song which finished first on the Billboard Hot 100 in the hands of Manfred Mann (“Blinded By The Light”). And this is where we understand the complexity of what the New Jersey bull's journey will be: Bruce Springsteen shows who he is, straightforwardly. He comes from one of the most remote corners of this state in the Eastern United States, next to New York, but the Big Apple is still too far to go there. A guy from his province, but who already manipulates words like a magician – his assonances on “Growin'Up” are astounding –, with a mix of Van Morrison, Dylan from The Band and of course Otis Redding and the pioneers of rock'n'roll.
Bruce Springsteen here is one of these new talents with heightened audacity, talented as hell, even brilliant, and above all, full of a unique energy, the kind that can immediately determine what the future of an artist will be whose career will be explosive and who will establish himself as one of the biggest global stars. He has things to say, and he knows how to say them, to send them far, with a unique poetry made of clashes of words and surprising assonances, forcing the listener to listen. Already there is the blue collar singer, but also the public entertainer, the man who likes to make girls dance and taunt guys.
Greetings From Asbury Park, NJ
- Released January 5, 1973
- Recording: July – September 1972
- Studio: 914 Sound Studios, Blauvelt, New York
- Duration 36 min 59 sec
- Label CBS Records/Columbia
Tracklist
- Blinded by the Light 5:04
- Growin' Up 3:05
- Mary Queen of Arkansas 5:21
- Does This Bus Stop at 82nd Street? 2:05
- Lost in the Flood 5:17
- The Angel 3:24
- For You 4:40
- Spirit in the Night 4:59
- It's Hard to Be a Saint in the City 3:13
Musicians
- Bruce Springsteen: vocals, electric guitar and acoustic harmonica (tracks 1 & 8: congas and bass)
- Garry Tallent: bass
- Richard Davis: double bass on The Angel
- David Sancious: piano, organ
- Harold Wheeler: piano on “Blinded by the Light
- Clarence Clemons: saxophone, backing vocals
- Drums: Vincent Lopez
Staff
- Mike Appel & Jim Cretecos – producers
- Louis Lahav – sound engineer
- Jack Ashkinazy – mix
- John Berg – cover design
- Fred Lombardi – back cover design
