My Bruce Journey - Part 4

‘And you’ve got to learn to live with what you can’t rise above’

Originally posted 30th January 2010


I don’t remember thinking much about Bruce between 1985 and 1987.

I see that Tunnel of Love (TOL) was released on October 9 1987.  We bought our first CD player when we lived in Carlisle and we didn’t move there until 1988.  We have never owned Tunnel of Love on anything other than a CD so, although it pains me to say this, we didn’t buy this when it was first released.

I can’t believe this now.  These days I am practically queuing at the door and although I try hard to resist I have probably heard the illegal copy several times before that via the internet.

Some time in the late 80’s we bought a new hi-fi system.  This replaced a Bush music centre. Very 1980s - grey plastic with a smoked perspex lid.

The new system was a Pioneer midi stacking system, shiny black, very good looking with great sound - tuner at the bottom, double cassette deck in the middle and record deck at the top.  I loved it.

This must have reawakened our interest in music because we bought seven albums in 1989.   (I have included the list below if you are at all curious).  I know this because I had to do a bit of research for this week’s chapter looking at lists of albums released.  We couldn’t remember exactly when we bought our CD player but I know all our 1989 albums were cassettes.  Now seven albums might not seem many but it’s six more than we bought in 1988!  The 1988 album was Rattle and Hum - U2.

Our 1990 albums were all CDs so I am plumping for the 1990 January sales when we bought the CD player. This matched the hi-fi system we already had and simply slotted in between the cassette deck and the turntable.

Try as I might I can’t remember when we bought TOL but I think it was between 1990 and 1992.

I already knew ’Brilliant Disguise’ and ’Tougher than the Rest’ which had been released as singles.  I love both these tracks.  Don’t think I was so familiar with ’Tunnel of Love’ or ’Spare Parts’ which were also singles but didn’t do as well.

Over the years I have sometimes been disappointed by the second album I have bought by a particular artist. When you really love the first album it’s not easy to fall so hard again.  With Bruce I was on to the fourth album and I still wasn’t smitten!

I played TOL more than ‘Nebraska’ or ‘The River’ but it still wasn’t the ’Born in the USA’ part two that I had been looking for.

Listening again now I remember that at the time I liked ’All that Heaven Will Allow’, ’Walk like a Man’ and ’One step Up’.

Nowadays there are only a couple of tracks that I am not keen on and I am keeping these to myself.  You can have a guess if you like.

So let’s see what tour dates did we miss out on this time around? - Birmingham, London, Dublin, Sheffield and loads in Europe.  I have seen the videos though which is better than nothing … just.

We still hadn’t been to a rock concert in 1988 when Bruce was on The Tunnel of Love Express Tour.  The nearest we had been was Odyssey at a small nightclub type venue in Cleethorpes and Barbara Dickson in a converted sports hall.

Our first proper gig was Tina Turner - the Foreign Affair Tour - SEC Glasgow 16 September 1990.


Our first Springsteen gig was Sheffield Arena 15 April 1993... and so to next time.

1989 album list
Bonnie Raitt            Nick of Time
Michael Bolton         Soul Provider
Cher                       Heart of Stone
Don Henley             The End of The Innocence
Tina Turner             Foreign Affair
Eric Clapton            Journeyman
Phil Collins             …But Seriously

So much hate

Last week when I was trying to find any evidence that Bruce actually dislikes The Way I came across several threads on a number of forums simply discussing how much they hate Bruce.  I Googled 'Bruce Springsteen dislike' by the way.  Dislike I can understand.  Not everyone cares for Bruce's voice and some people don't like his politics.  There are folks who say his music is a bit overblown and any number of people who think he is overrated.   

This guy has actually written a whole blog post telling us how much he hates our hero and he's not the only one.  I see his post is dated a few years ago.  Perhaps, by now, he has turned his vitriol to someone else - U2, maybe, as I see they seem to inspire a lot of hatred too.

This post written only last month is a good read, though, by someone who previously didn't like Bruce and has recently changed their mind.  I quote ...

I have just finished listening to Darkness on the Edge of Town in its entirety for the first time (via the awesome recent box set The Promise), and it was glorious.

I don't understand why someone would suddenly announce to the world that they hate a person, I don't understand how someone can carry around such negative feelings and I certainly don't understand how someone could hate Bruce!  There are even Facebook pages for people who hate him.  They don't have many friends admittedly but what possesses people to set up 'I hate' pages anyway.

This exchange on one message board made me smile though.

Original post
I Hate Bruce Springsteen
Does that make me un-American? Not only has the blasting of “Born to Run” here at the cafe made it impossible for me to concentrate. Now one of the boys at the table next to me is singing along! Save me! 
Reply
I LOVE BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN. It doesn't make you un-American to hate Bruce Springsteen, it just makes you a little sad to not have that joy in your life.

For an artist of any kind - musician, painter, author or actor the worst thing must be indifference: for the public not to care about you.  I found an article about indifference.  Quite highbrow but it sums it up like this :- 'there is no hope for the one who does not care but all the hope in the world for one who is connected albeit in denial and rebellion'.  So is there hope for our haters?

I think that as long as Bruce can excite such high emotion, positive or negative, he must be doing something right.  At least people are aware enough of him to offer an opinion.

And talking about negative feelings Mark Wright started a thread on Greasy Lake about the 1995 Sony Studio Show. Now I'm not familiar with this, but to put it kindly, Mark says it's not Bruce's best work. Most other peeps agree with him... in some fashion.

Here's a clip see what you think.




I can't, of course, let this week go by without mentioning Stan Goldstein's tweet of 23rd August:-

Hear we're getting a new Bruce Springsteen (non E Street) album this Fall and a tour with E Street Band in 2012. Stay tuned... 


I don't know how close Stan is to those in the know but can't think he would say anything publicly if he wasn't fairly certain.

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