There's a reason they call him the Boss

Review of Bruce by Peter Ames Carlin

Touchstone Books; 500 pages; $28

By Jeff Wenger

Consciously at least, growing up, Bruce Springsteen was more of an influence on my life than my own father. Some may find it shocking and some may find it sad, but I swear that it’s true and I’ve made my peace with it. Quite evidently that says much about my relationship with my old man. It also, it turns out, says something about Springsteen’s relationship with his old man.

I undertook Peter Ames Carlin’s recent biography, Bruce, with enthusiasm. The book had been reviewed well and, having thirty years ago devoured Dave Marsh’s Springsteen bio Born to Run merely as a fan, I looked forward to an objective, journalistic inspection of the man and the artist.

Mostly I got that. Bruce provides insights and leaves the reader with a feel for the person. If it fails to to be completely satisfying, it may be that, however cooperative he may have been, the subject himself remains elusive.

Springsteen has said ‘trust the art, not the artist’ and given his enormous artistic presence, there is nothing else that he can say; human beings with their peeves, flaws, warts and ticks would invariably come up short - at least in the long term - of the transcendence of “Badlands” or “The Promised Land” or “The Rising”, the joy of “Rosalita”, the thrill of “The Ties That Bind”, and on and on. He shows what he’s willing to reveal in his work. But still, you wonder a little what harm there could be in trusting the artist.

Carlin’s “honest account of (Springsteen’s) life” reveals a pretty good guy. The world doesn’t need, and this reader and fan doesn’t want, another decadent romp through the dark side of rock and roll. Springsteen isn’t a cad, and indeed, is seen often as a perfect gentleman. Nevertheless, he has at times behaved badly and subsequently broken hearts.

More broadly, far from treating fans with disregard, he seems legitimately motivated, even now, by profound respect for them and is committed to giving them a great experience with both excellent records and live performances. Nobody here wants Springsteen to be exposed as a bad guy and it turns out that he isn’t a bad guy. So everybody can honestly leave the show pumped.

But afterward, as feet settled back down onto the earth, you wonder about things and some are explored in Bruce, though others less so. Further, fans will recall many of the stories in Bruce from the original sources in other interviews in books and magazine articles.

Nevertheless, it is a penetrating look into Springsteen’s childhood and the sense of his father’s social isolation that was passed on to the son. I saw Springsteen perform “Johnny Bye-Bye”, a song about Elvis’ death, 25 or 30 years ago in concert and he introduced it by talking about how a person who could come to mean so much to so many people might really be lonely and hurting. And I thought he was talking about Elvis - and he was, but, I’m embarrassed to say now, I was slow to see that it works on a couple of different levels.

Bruce reveals the subject to be an absolute professional, still working, some 50 years since his mother bought him his first electric guitar, to perfect his craft. The E Street Band were not - are not - a tight unit accidently, but became that way the same way Delta Force operatives do: through hours and days and months of practice past the point of exhaustion, believing in the rightness of the cause, and viewing their commander with a mixture of respect and awe. It's not for nothing that Springsteen is called the Boss.

The shared memories of members of the E Street Band are most illuminating because they have stood side by side for decades. Steve Van Zandt, a keen intellect and true rocker himself, shows great discernment about Springsteen and certain situations that arose within the band. Van Zandt’s contributions to the final sound on the albums with the E Street Band weighed it toward an early 60s pop and rock sound. I realize now that the music with Miami Steve is the Springsteen music I like best. To learn that Van Zandt and Springsteen’s manager and co-producer Jon Landau were at logger heads is of interest. The conflict seemed to presage Springsteen’s desire to work for a while with other musicians.

But Carlin realizes, as people should, that Springsteen is one of a handful of the true greats in his chosen field. Few artists - let alone rockers - have remained so relevant for so long, the new music becoming as important and personal and permanent as the early work. (When I say that Mick Jagger hasn’t contributed anything of relevance since being accomplice to Jimmy Fallon in a Mick Jagger parody, isn’t to take anything away from The Rolling Stones except to say that it’s hard to be king of the mountain for such a long time and that maybe Charlie Watts had the right idea by retiring.)

Springsteen is just a man. He cannot command time and tide; his best efforts didn’t get John Kerry elected president in 2004, and 2007’s Working on a Dream wasn’t really very good, but who cares? The Rising, and Magic were great albums and Devils and Dust and Wrecking Ball were very good.

And maybe just there I fell into the trap of confusing the art with the artist. But with the music being so personally important to me, I could only ever write so objectively about Bruce Springsteen. It’s woven into my DNA now and it’s just another thing to make my peace with.