Published on Apr 19, 2005
So what happened to America? It’s actually doing nothing new; I
am from and live in a country that has been violently, tragically
divided by a historically consistent American-politician arrogance
that had refused to concede a five thousand year-old nation could
possibly govern itself. Because you know, we Koreans (and Chileans
and Nicaraguans and so on) are simply too uneducated and barbaric
to possibly comprehend, let alone execute, a functional modern
democracy. (Bush is actually shaping up to prove to be the
exception, but will he come through? This time, America, the world
is watching.)
Anti-American sentiment around the world is very, very real,
especially if you’re living outside of the U.S. A lot of it has to
do with envy and misunderstanding, but a lot of it also has to do
with what even the most stereotypical redneck right-winger must
concede to be legitimate grievances. Having actually lived in
America at one point, though, I know it’s a country that’s much
more complicated than simply Red States vs. Blue States.
Part of what complicates my picture of America is Bruce
Springsteen.
Springsteen is a different kind of American hero than, say,
Martin Luther King Jr. or Margaret Sanger. To many he’s significant
not for what he’s done but for what he represents. He’s so embedded
into American iconography that I find it hard to imagine him being
successful had he been born anywhere else (picture a Japanese
grassroots rock-and-roller if you will, or the Boss as a violinist;
he would’ve improvised cadenzas to jazz chords and spray painted
the back of his Stradivarius). His moral values and emotions are as
instrumental to his music as any Telecaster, and there is no art
more American to me than how he incorporates these values and
emotions into the songwriting imagery; he is the Toni Morrison of
music. And his concerts are essentially town meetings that
celebrate everything that is universally agreed to be good and true
about America.
Originally a five-record set (virtually unheard of at a time of
double or triple live albums),
Live 1975-85 was put together in an attempt to assuage the
masses of fans clamoring for a live album from the Boss. But does
it recapture the live experience? The consensus among fans turns
out to be an emphatic no, but it comes close.
The album is not from one concert but from a range of concerts,
from the more intimate club dates (if you can call hanging from the
chandeliers at the Roxy “intimate”) to the huge
Born In The U.S.A. arena dates. I don’t envy the guy who had
to wade through all those miles of soundboard tape to select these
(actually, I do) because it’s difficult enough trying to pick out
songs from the collection to review. (Reviews for this album are
noticeably short, largely composed by Boss-heads frothing at the
mouth in front of their hi-fi speakers and barely getting their
fingers to a typewriter keyboard.)
My favorite tracks are the “audience participation” tracks,
where the audience acts like one huge delighted organism at
Springsteen’s every cue. Their reactions to Springsteen’s beginning
monologue to “The River” are as terrific to hear as the story
itself, and the arena-filling unison as thousands sing the first
verse and chorus to “Hungry Heart” is something akin to a
collective religious experience. Springsteen works the crowd into a
pious frenzy in every song, even in the supposedly impersonal big
venues; the keyboard chords for “Born In The U.S.A.” were meant to
ring out to a huge arena, its bitter message being literally driven
into the masses.
Fans will also find unreleased tracks like “Raise Your Hand” and
“Fire” (Now why wasn’t “Fire” officially released? Seems like
everyone else has recorded it in a studio…) along with his
much-loved greatest hits, and as an added bonus due to the powers
of change, we get to see Springsteen in the
touring-with-with-E-Street heyday, something I believe we’re going
to see less of as time goes on (he embarks on a solo tour of the US
and Europe later this month, lasting until June).
You can basically see how the point of this album was not to
recapture the live experience per se, but to create an archive for
fans to have in their homes. Sure, you can download a bootleg
nowadays, but it’s still worth it to get this album in a great
sounding studio-mastered edition, to froth over and worship in
hi-fi at home. And here I sign off, hoping that the Boss will
continue to complicate America for years and years to come.