Popdose - Latest Comments in Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

1JOSIGUERRAA — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 11:50:37 -0000

AMO BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN, WAS PART OF MY YOUTH I THINK IT IS WONDERFUL IN ALL
THAT HAVE MUCH IN MU ORKUT VIDEO DELE OHC IT ALL IN GOOD NEED TO COME
IN BRAZIL, I WANT TO KNOW YOU PERSONALLY... KISSES

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

1JOSIGUERRAA — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 11:28:46 -0000

I love Bruce, I would very much like he would in Brazil!! kisses!!

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Gary — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 17:36:52 -0000

Ken - I believe that Outlaw Pete is a great song. The song uses the western backdrop as a symbol of what we all go through -- trying to live a life without our demons. To one extent or the other, we all struggle to do the right thing. Sometimes we disappoint ourselves. While Outlaw Pete attempted to put his past behind him; his instinctual nature, his history and his very being would not allow him to be successful.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Elaine — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 03:33:40 -0000

I'm listening to the song (long version) for the first time. It's good. I'm sorry to report that my mind goes to the 'movie version' of what I figure the images will show me. That's a bummer. Guess it's the price we pay for advance notice.

My own personal annoyance at the way Bruce says long-A "dance" survives, too.

sigh

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Stu J — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 04:56:50 -0000

Ha ha, I think so. Next up: Bruce Springsteen - Part Man, Part Pokemon

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

outsidecounsel — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 14:22:44 -0000

I need to let go of this, but I just can't. Over the course of about an hour in the car last night and today better singers kept coming up. Sam Cooke. Brian Ferry. Rod Stewart. Levi Stubbs. Probably the singer that everyone cites as the worst, or most irritating-- ladies and gentlemen Mr. Bod Dylan. Freddy Mercury. Van Morrison. Neil Young. In the middle of my reverie "Candy's Room" came on, and you know what? I over-rated Springsteen by putting him with Burton Cummings and Neil Diamond. I'm actually hard pressed to say who Bruce is better than at this point. Phil Lynott? Mark Farner?

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Allen — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 14:19:10 -0000

D&D? Magic? Perhaps Bruce is telling us something. Maybe he should have called this album "Dragonball Z".

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Allen — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 14:19:08 -0000

D&D? Magic? Perhaps Bruce is telling us something. Maybe he should have called this album "Dragonball Z".

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

kshane — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 08:46:05 -0000

Good analysis Stu. I'm going to keep listening in the hope that maybe this can become an even better album.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Stu J — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 08:35:41 -0000

Interesting review, I have to stick up for Outlaw Pete as a clearly-defined allegory for Bush's America crossing over to Obama's - that although the American public has seen fit to eject the violent and destructive old world in favour of a more peaceable approach, there's still things that can't be written out of history which the country will carry on it's shoulders.

"We cannot undo these things we've done". Particularly after D&D and Magic (the songs) this track opening the album hits me as a kind of mission statement which puts his politics aside for the rest of the album, and I've got to say I love it as a song and musically. Really great stuff, combining the GOTJ obsession with the west with the modern E Street Band. Real one-of-a-kind track for me.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Allen — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:37:57 -0000

Perhaps not, Dw, but the beauty of much of Bruce's work is that there is a cohesiveness to the tracks as collected on an album. This is an artist who painstakingly chose what songs would and would not be included on a record (all too often leaving out "Roulette" in the 80s, why, I know not) and it feels like he's just sort of gotten dodgy.
Bruce has a musical idiom, to be sure. He excels at that Bruce sound. Somewhere bridging the gap between 50s trashcan warblers and Journey is the world that Bruce inhabits. (Go with me, this isn't a comparison)
I would suggest that his style has been left in the wake of changing musical styles, for the most part and that may have been why so much of his output after the 80s was abysmal.
The only time he really resonated and connected with his audience was with The Rising. There was a cohesiveness, not a "concept" album but one informed by events.
The River, BitUSA, B2R, Darkness, Nebraska, all of these share that sense of "album" by definition.
You wouldn't make a scrapbook of your family and, in the middle, toss in a picture of an office party, would you? You connect to both pictures but the office party one is out of place and would stick out.
That's what's going on here. Cohesion has been tossed out the window. Okay, if Bruce was a singles writer then I would say, fine, gmme the best tracks and I'll be on my way, uploading them to the minivan.
But he isn't. It doesn't wear on him.
Which is why the pastiche nature of these two records and the slapdashed feel of them is annoying.
Queen of the Supermarket is better than any other tracks he was writing??? Then, please, god, let us never ever hear those songs.
I enjoy a good grabcan record every once in a while. I just expect more than a toss off by this guy.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Allen — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 01:23:56 -0000

Just another point since I am a huge fan masquerading lately as a Bruce hater.
I've read (and agreed) that Outlaw Pete steals its melody from a KISS disco tune and that's horrible enough.
What does that say in the shadow of Radio Nowhere's blatant rip of Jenny 8675309)?
For that matter, while, yes I hear the Meatloafiness of the back end of Queen of the song I ran out of ideas for....but does no one hear that the BEGINNING of that track sounds suspiciously like the theme to St. Elmo's Fire??
What's the deal, Bruce?

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

kshane — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 21:41:20 -0000

Great comment Rob. To the great songs from Magic, I would add "Last to Die."

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

EightE1 — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 21:01:02 -0000

"It’s not easy growing old, a fact that Springsteen acknowledges throughout this record." Good point. I would add that he's acknowledged such in recent interviews, as well. He's pushing 60 (hell, Clarence is 67), he just lost a bandmate he's had for, what, 40 years? It seems to me that records like this one and Magic are less about striking out into the singles market than allowing himself the luxury of releasing more music this late in the game, before it's too late. Isn't that what we all wanted from him when he was taking 5 or 6 years between records?

Magic grew on me with repeated listens, and so has Working on a Dream. There are a couple clunkers ("Outlaw Pete" and "Surprise Surprise"), but I'll deal with them in order to have "My Lucky Day," "Life Itself," "Kingdom of Days" and "The Last Carnival, " just as I was willing to trade "I'll Work for Your Love" and "Magic" for getting to hear "Girls in Their Summer Clothes," "Long Walk Home," and "You'll Be Comin' Down" last time out. Them's is decent trade-offs, to my ears.

Rob
EightE1

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

EightE1 — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 20:49:23 -0000

He has certainly done much with what, at first listen at least, is a limited instrument. He's always had the rocks and gravel thing down, but he can also soar, and, to my ears at least, the last couple records have shown more versatility than we're used to hearing from him. Ken picked a good one with "Kingdom of Days" off the new record, but I'd also point to "Thunder Road" (lead and bg vox) and, if you can find it (I'll have to dig up some of mine), live versions of "Youngstown," from Ghost of Tom Joad. I have a bootleg called One Night in Amsterdam or some such thing, from the Tom Joad tour, and what he does with his voice in the tail end of that song is otherworldly.

Rob
EightE1

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Malchus — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:58:18 -0000

This is fantastic. Anyone who loves this song should download the long version of it.

Thanks, Dan.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Dan — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:34:11 -0000

No, it was re-upped to a mediafire file. Scroll down the comments on that page.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Malchus — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:06:43 -0000

Bummer, the file has expired. Would you mind emailing it to me?

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Dan — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 17:53:31 -0000

Here is where I found the longer version: http://synchronized-love.bl...

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Dan — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 17:49:56 -0000

Can't remember. I'll try to figure it out.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

outsidecounsel — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 16:13:34 -0000

Check Berry is one of the inventors of the form. He sings straight ahead rockers ("Johnny B. Goode", "Back in the USA"), straight blues, country, callipso, ballads--in his versitility he is more like B.B. King or Elvis than just about any other artist in the form.

Janis handled the rockers, the blues and ballads with consistent excellence. I don't think there has been a woman singer in rock that could do as much so well.

"Racing in the Streets" is not the example I'd have used-- but there are numbers on "The River" that illustrate your point. Again, I'm not saying he's a bad singer- that would be absurd.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

kshane — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 15:57:09 -0000

Good point Scott. I think you're right about that.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Malchus — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 15:32:39 -0000

The longer one is probably the version used in the actual film. It's longer to cover the entire end credit sequence. Where did you find it because I think having the piano play all the way out at the end instead of the fade out is far more moving.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

kshane — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 15:06:05 -0000

The one I have is 3:51.

Re: Listening Booth: Bruce Springsteen, “Working On a Dream”

Dan — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 14:52:40 -0000

I found 2 versions of The Wrestler on the net. One is 3:50 and the other is 5:28. Any idea what that is all about?