Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band - Live / 1975-85 - The Boss delivers on the promise

With Born In The USA, Bruce Springsteen finally became the mega-star critics and the faithful had been expecting for over a decade.  He reached a massive worldwide audience by delivering what he always had:  poetic tales of the hopeful and oppressed set to a walloping rock and roll beat.  And if some of the newcomers missed the point of the title track, the Boss made his position clear when he pushed back when President Reagan tried to co-op his message for Republican political gains.


His follow-up to the album that dominated the airwaves of 1985 was a sprawling five album box set before such packages were commonplace.  And it perfectly served a wide variety of purposes.  First, it bought Springsteen time to clear his mind from the craziness that was Born In The USA.  Time to craft an appropriate response to the changes in America and his personal life that would be the 1987's Tunnel Of Love.


Secondly it finally offered the live document of the E Street Band's legendary concert experience, widely bootlegged but previously unavailable in any official capacity.  Finally the set offers up a history of the E Street Band and Springsteen's body of work up to this point, bringing the new audience up to speed with the what the cult had known all along.  E Street Band guitarist and Little Steven Van Zandt had famously produced The River to catch the sound and fire of the band's live show for that album.  

The truly amazing fact in hindsight is how well Live / 1975-86 delivers on all fronts simultaneously.  Over the course of three and a half hours (roughly the length of a typical Springsteen show) the Boss' grows from backstreet poet playing small Jersey Shore clubs to American Icon selling out stadiums.  Both subtle and clearly logical, the tracks unfold seamlessly.

The songs universally deliver higher energy and emotional truth superior to the beloved studio versions.  Songs from the early albums are more full and wildly energetic in the live setting.  The Nebraska tracks stand up well with the rest of the catalog, fully fleshed out and powerful.  The Born To Run wall of sound comes through loud and clear and the songs from the River are both lighter and tougher in this setting.  And as a showcase for his total body of work, Springsteen could not have delivered a better document.

Thunder Road starts off with an intimate piano arrangement that highlights the quiet desperation driving the lovers into the unknown.  Born In The USA roars with the tortured venom of the desperate veteran returning home only to find he has somehow become the enemy himself.  And Springsteen's legendary on stage stories and comments relieve the tension (such as "this is for all the girls here" delivered with a chuckle before Fire) or bring clarity to the songs (on the introduction to Woody Guthrie's This Land Is Your Land, pointing out that the schoolhouse favorite is really "an angry song").

A single track sums up the entire experience over the course of eleven and a half minutes.  With sympathetic guitar noodling in the background, Springsteen tells a story of growing up with a father that just didn't understand his son during the Viet Nam years.  As he finishes the tale, he launches into a harmonica driven  version of The River.  The band locks in behind him until the a breakdown near the end of the track.  One can see the singer with his back to the audience, head down, moaning low until the the drums kick in and the weight of fate and desperation pours out into a rolling coda, the band grown into a living, breathing beast.

Here the Boss sums up the deliverance offered only by rock and roll.  Like Roy Orbison, he's singing for the lonely and hey that's me and you.