Except it was this song:
This song came out right before Born in the USA, which was the first (and last) Bruce Springsteen album I ever owned. In eigth grade I didn't really pay attention to musical artists so I didn't know that John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band was not Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band until 9th grade (which is practically forever in teenage years).
John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street
The names are even similar, except John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band was a one hit wonder modeled to seem a lot like Bruce Spingsteen. They did such a good job that when an album came out sounding like them I bought the album and then wondered why that song wasn't on the album.
I blame this lack of insight on my part exclusively on the amount of hair spray I used from 1983 - 1984.
An aside: There is a club in Providence, RI called Lupo's and one of the guys in the the Beaver brown band has the last name of Lupo...I wonder if they are related.
Recently I was listening to All Songs Considered, a podcast put out by NPR, and there was
another band that sounded a lot like BS&ESB except they were obviously not them. The lyrics were similar to Mr. Springsteen's. I feel like if I LOVED Bruce I would love this band but I am ambivalent now (I blame this on a boy named Brian who broke my 13 year old heart...when he cast me out I cast out all music he liked, The Bruce included. I moved onto much more melodramatic music like The Smiths and The Cure...I also stopped wearing harispray to make my bangs into perfect wings and started using it to spike it up...but I used A ton of hairspray either way). The new band was called 'The Hold Steady'. If you like Bruce, you will love them. I offered them to my one friend who is a Bruce fan (Hi Kelly!) and she gave them the thumbs up (she has to be a Bruce fan, she is from NJ).
another band that sounded a lot like BS&ESB except they were obviously not them. The lyrics were similar to Mr. Springsteen's. I feel like if I LOVED Bruce I would love this band but I am ambivalent now (I blame this on a boy named Brian who broke my 13 year old heart...when he cast me out I cast out all music he liked, The Bruce included. I moved onto much more melodramatic music like The Smiths and The Cure...I also stopped wearing harispray to make my bangs into perfect wings and started using it to spike it up...but I used A ton of hairspray either way). The new band was called 'The Hold Steady'. If you like Bruce, you will love them. I offered them to my one friend who is a Bruce fan (Hi Kelly!) and she gave them the thumbs up (she has to be a Bruce fan, she is from NJ).
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7 comments:
I was wayyyyy too punk to have any appreciation for Bruce at that time. Now, a postcard of the Born in the USA album cover is beside my kitchen sink.
What the hell was I thinking?
I mean taped up by my kitchen sink so I can um... appreciate him. You get it.
This is Kelly. When Arwen told me to read the blog, I asked her how many versions of "Born in the USA" the song does she have.
I have 4 versions on my MP3 Player alone. My personal best is the Live in NYC version. I very nice steel guitar, Memphis Blues take.
I have two songs that I would like to see in concert and have never seen:
1. Wild Billy’s Circus Story - (Full E-Street Band concert.) I just really want to see a Tuba as the featured instrument in a full on Rock-and-Roll extravaganza.
2. 4th of July in Asbury Park (Sandy) - My Grandfather would take me on the tilt-a-whirl at the south of town every summer.
Erm...I still don't appreciate The Bruce. I listened to Gang of Four, Circle Jerks, & MDC at the time, and even my personal (and now public) shame - Motley Crue. I'd still rather listen to them than some midwest boy bellowing about patriotism. "I feel like a beetle on its back, love will get you like a case of anthrax..." - YEAH! "I'm a cool rocking Daddy in the U.S.A. Born in the U.S.A." - NO! Please tell me it was the cough syrup....
~Hell
sorry- I'm about to hijack your comments...
I've always liked Bruce (I know you won't be surprised) and still do but I have to disagree... John Cafferty may have vocal stylings like The Boss, but he was all fluff.
One thing about Born in The USA that many people missed at the time- and still do- is that it's actually an anthem to the pain of growing up... the realizing that being Born in the USA isn't a ticket to the American Dream. The mega synth radio hit "Dancin in the Dark" is about waking up to a life that's lost it's shine- he's bored, stuck in a rut and doesn't know how to get out. Born in the USA is one of the greatest anti-war anthems ever recorded and the right wing keeps approaching Bruce to use in in campaigns. They're always met with a "you're kidding, right? Have you actually listened to the lyrics?"
Another thing about BITUSA, is when you look at the arc of Springsteen's career, it's his biggest commercial success, but it was misunderstood and embraced for all the wrong reasons, and it had a lasting influence on all of thw work that followed. Here is an excerpt from a blog entry from Rhino Records (to read the entire entry where he goes from Tunnel of Love to Bed's too Big Without You, click here (http://www.rhino.com/rzine/storykeeper.lasso?storyID=410):
"Born In The U.S.A." ain't a hell of a lot different from today's Top Forty fodder. Made for the radio, made for the masses. "Born In The U.S.A." was the first Springsteen album you couldn't respect. What was all this crap about "Bobby Jean". God, that's a sad story, it should be a dirge.
And like everybody who broke through bigger than they ever expected, it fucked Bruce Springsteen up, it disillusioned him.
At the peak of his career, suddenly nothing worked anymore. He had enough money, enough friends, enough fans, but his marriage was not satisfying, he had all the totems, but none of the SOUL!
And that's when he cut "Tunnel Of Love".
3
"Well it ought to be easy, ought to be simple enough Man meets woman and they fall in love"
And here we have it. The opposite of the drivel we were told and sold as children. It OUGHT to be simple, that's the way it SHOULD be, it's just fucking not.
Oh, how disillusioning is this?
Talk to somebody who's divorced. The first thing they'll tell you is they didn't envision it. And then they'll say they're not sure they can ever trust again.
Everything they believed in, it's GONE!
And now, Bruce is singing their story.
But what makes it so great is it's NOT ONLY this story. It's not only the story of a relationship. There's the metaphor of the tunnel of love, but what's even MORE amazing is the song SOUNDS like a ride through the tunnel of love, a dark roller coaster with unpredictable twists and turns.
Oh, the big radio track was "Brilliant Disguise". But that had no magic. "Tunnel Of Love" was something you could listen to again and again. Because you could identify. Because Bruce GOT IT!
He was in pain. And like all great art, his personal story was EVERYBODY'S story.
On the Dark Side takes me waaay back...great song! At least you didn't actually think it was Eddie and the Cruisers...
I like Bruce, but don't LOVE Bruce like some of my compatriots do. Born to Run is fantastic, as is Born in the USA. The rest are all worthy, but not on a level of, say, any Bon Scott AC/DC album (he says, knowing full well he'll get shit for that).
And that Hold Steady album is very, very good. The album before that (Separation Sunday) is also good.
Damn, CB~ All that and I was just looking at his bum. If I can take my mind off it I'll listen to the album anew.
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