Entertainment For Lively Minds
Springsteen: Muse or Money?
Posted by Bo Doogley on 17 November 2008 - 8:43pm.
With the arrival of a new record timed to 'drop' a week after the inauguration and just before his performance at the Superbowl, are we wrong to suspect that Jon Landau and Sony's eye on the bottom line is what motivates Bruce more than his muse? Scuttlebutt has much of the material as rejects from Magic sessions.
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/17/bruce-springsteen-announces...
- More from Bo Doogley.
- Login or register to post comments
-
You are assuming the album is no good
without having heard it, which is a bit harsh. I read he'd finished the Magic sessions and just kept going and recorded in between concerts, rather than just Magic rejects. Anyway, Springsteen is a bit like Dylan with some of his rejects being better than the released material.
As for playing the Super Bowl, seems logical given that he's just off the back of a big stadium tour. To say he is motivated by money more than anything else seems also seems harsh, and given how much he is already worth, probably wide of the mark.
Rejects?
Some of the stuff off the Tracks box set was far superior to some of the stuff that made the bona fide albums! Brothers Under The Bridge, My Love Will Not Let You Down, The Fever etc... all better than anything Human Touch or Lucky Town!
My point..
...is that sometimes Bruce doesn't follow his muse or he does it under undue influence. 'HT & LT' was the greatest example of a misstep in his career, dropping the E Street Band in favor of some youngsters and releasing two albums on the same day. (There are some truly great songs on both records, though.) Daft move with the hallmarks of overweening or overambitious management and the ruthless honchos at Sony. Sure his outtakes contain gems but let's have them packaged as outtakes rather than cobbled together with a couple of new things and thrust out into the market to tie in with big promotional opportunities. Bruce doesn't need the money, but Sony does.