Carnal Reason

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN CD/DVD Review - “Devils and Dust”

In the Bible Cain slew Abel
and East of Eden he was cast
You’re born into this life paying
For the sins of somebody else’s past

Daddy worked his whole life
For nothing but the pain
Now he walks these empty rooms
Looking for something to blame

You inherit the sins
You inherit the flames
Adam raised a Cain

Lost but not forgotten
From the dark heart of a dream
Adam raised a Cain

That is one troubled, tormented, young New Jersey guitar hero, “scream singing” on his 1978 album Darkness on the Edge of Town. If you have any lingering doubts, don’t trust me: listen to the fire and rage in his vocals, his Telecaster, and his arrangement of the song for the E Street Band behind him.

In 2005, Bruce Springsteen is now happily married and raising a family. His new release, a combination CD/DVD, entitled Devils and Dust, revisits the question of “Who’s gonna pay for these sins?” in “Long Time Comin’”. Keep in mind now his Telecaster has been in its case the entire record so far, and he’s writing and performing — relying — on a battered high-end acoustic guitar.

Here he writes:

Well my daddy he was just a stranger
Lived in a hotel downtown
When I was a kid he was
Just somebody
Somebody I’d see around
Somebody I’d see around

Now below and pullin’
on my shirt
I’ve got some kids of my own

Well if I had one wish in this
God forsaken world, kids,
It’d be that your mistakes
Would be your own
Yea your sins would be your own.

At the beginning of “Long, Time Comin”, Bruce promises us he will “get birth naked, bury my old soul, and dance on its grave.” To my ear, it’s the music that fulfills this big lyrical promise. Rhythmically, this song kicks into a gently rockin’ dance groove best analogized to a Marley reggae dance beat. Bottom line: musically, lyrically, and on the DVD solo acoustic guitar/harmonica/vocal performance, in a “film noir” video, Bruce delivers the goods on every level we could ask for.

All doubt that Springsteen’s mining the same vein he worked on Nebraska and The Ghost of Tom Joad ends with track two, “Reno”, a gritty tale of a man, a prostitute, and his pure, wistful visions of his soul mate Maria — the one true love of his life — the one who got away.

She unbuckled my belt, pulled back her hair,
And sat in front of me on the bed.
She said, “Honey how’s that feel, do you want me to go slow?”
My eyes drifted out the window, down to the road below.

Band member and guitar wizard Nils Lofgren’s influence on Bruce as an acoustic guitar player — and a fuller, brighter vision of Maria — shines on track Six, “Maria’s Bed”. Bruce’s acoustic guitar overdubs ring; they are as nostalgically clean as the “cool, clear waters from Maria’s bed…”

Springsteen never mines just one poetic vein of Americana on his albums. So far I’ve talked about how Devils and Dust considers sin, redemption, parenthood, prostitution, and lost love idealized. I haven’t touched on what desert guerrilla warfare does to your soul and faith (”Devils and Dust”). And it will take me years to plumb the depths of a song about a Buffalo soldier acting as guide for an inner city kids (”Black Cowboys”). And why Springsteen revisits the desperate lives of Mexican peasants with visions of a better life in America.

Where’s Woody Guthrie when I need his cell phone number to ask him to explain? But that begs the essential questions.

Upon the release of Springsteen’s Born to Run 25 years ago, Jon Landau called him the future of rock of roll.

John Lennon and Bob Marley are gone. Keith Richards isn’t. Eminem wants you to vote. Reverend Al Green has made a new secular record. Bruce and Bono wanna take over for Dylan the way Dylan took over for Woody Guthrie. The eternal thunderstorm they call rock and roll rumbles on. And Bruce is holdin’ up his end. If we can just secure Russia’s missing plutonium, maybe Bruce and your kids will get a chance to write and compose some more poetry.

Bruce, as always, wants us to have faith; he closes “Jesus Was An Only Son” with this:

Well Jesus kissed his mother’s hands
Whispered, “Mother, still your tears,
For remember the soul of the universe
Will a world and it appeared.”

In this reviewer’s humble opinion, Jon Landau was right.

Posted on August 28th, 2005 by Paco Malo
Filed under: General