Talk About a Dream: The Essential Interviews of Bruce Springsteen (45 page)
And so I took my own spin on it. I couldn’t exactly tell you why I started writing in that direction. It’s funny, Steve [Van Zandt] went on to be one of the most political songwriters, but back in the early times, he was like, “I don’t know if those should mix” [
laughs
]. That’s classic Steve—when he goes, he
goes
! There’s no coming back! That’s Steve Van Zandt [
laughs
].
But yeah, when I was very young, maybe it was because of my background, or because of the music that I liked—I was interested in the class-conscious music of the Animals—these are things that spoke to me and that I also wanted to address in my own music. That was really the way I came to it. I didn’t have a political education when I was young, as I said, I didn’t really grow up in a political family. The politics
in my town were small-town politics. So it was something that, in truth, I really came to through popular music. Through a combination of the times and popular music.
As political awakenings go, I’ve always had the impression that the time around
The River
was big for both you and Steve, as far as getting out of the States and seeing our country through other eyes
.
I know for Steve it was a tremendous awakening, that tour. More so for him maybe than for me, because I had kind of started to write about it on
Darkness on the Edge of Town
and
The River
already, really before we went overseas. But I know for Steve it was tremendous. We went to East Berlin together, and it was quite an experience, East Berlin at that time. It was real noticeable, what that does to you. And also, when you spend a good amount of time over there, you do have a moment to step out of the United States and look back with a critical eye.
If there was one single thing I’d like to give every high school kid in the United States, it would be a two-month trip through Europe at some point during the formative years. Because it’s very difficult to conjure up a real worldview from within our borders. It’s
hard
. It’s hard because we’re so big, and the hegemony of American culture is so weighty and so heavy that it’s very difficult without stepping outside and realizing what it’s like to have the next country just a two-hour drive away, to have a certain kind of interdependence that is different than what we have here. It’s just a certain view of the way the world works that is different. So if I could give every young kid one thing, that would be it—because it would broaden what we listen to, the way we perceive ourselves, the types of leaders we choose. It would change the nation dramatically.
I always remember going down to South America on the Amnesty tour and hearing
incredible
music, or going into Africa and seeing some amazing acts that opened up for us on that tour, and realizing that only a minuscule amount of people are going to hear this music back in the United States. Meanwhile, a six- or seven-piece rock band from Central Jersey is playing the Ivory Coast, and people who have barely heard our music before are going crazy. And we’re speaking English, you know? The openness I’ve found outside the United States contrasted a bit to some of the closedness that we have here. And it’s not intentional—it’s cultural. And it comes from a lack of exposure to other things.
What opened your eyes to some of those things initially? On the
River
tour you talked about the Joe Klein book,
Woody Guthrie: A Life
. Was that book pivotal for you?
That’s a big book, a very powerful book. I was looking for ways that other people went about creating work that spoke to all of these things—emotional, and social, and political, the environment of the day. How did other people do that? How did they balance their creative instincts and their political instincts? I was a very different creature in that, hey, I was a successful pop musician, and that changes the cards to some degree. But at the same time, what’s at the heart of it is still the same sort of questing after the country that you’re carrying in your heart, the country that you want your kids to grow up in. So I studied all of my forefathers very intently along the way. And I just put together something that felt right for us, and for me.
One of the purposes of art is to reflect our world back to us. And there’s so much animosity and fear surrounding that right now—a lot of people, the whole “shut up and sing” faction, seem to think that’s not what an artist should be doing. But considering the folk tradition you’re a part of, thinking about Woody Guthrie, “shut up and sing” is a real oxymoron
.
First of all, there’s a long tradition of artist involvement in the nation’s social and political life. Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, James Brown, Curtis Mayfield, Public Enemy … not only was their music joyous and exhilarating, but it was
timely
. And it was essential, for me, to understanding some of the events of the day. When they spoke, I heard myself speaking. I felt a connectedness. So I think that any time somebody in this country is telling somebody else to shut up, they’re going in the wrong direction. No, no, no, you’re supposed to be
promoting
speech. You may like it, you may not like it—I hear a lot of things I don’t like, either, but hey [
laughs
].
Also, if you listen to the airwaves and the level of discussion out there, we can’t screw it up. It’s already broke! It’s screwed already [
laughs
]. So it’s not like the musicians are going to come in and screw all this up now, you know? That’s not going to happen.
It’s amazing how violent some of the reactions have been—like what happened to Linda Rondstadt last week in Vegas
.
A tragicomedy … [
laughs
] The description of it was hilarious, you know? The idea that people actually got worked up enough to throw drinks,
pull down concert posters, and storm the lobby or whatever, and that they felt the need to escort her
off the premises
—for mentioning a
film
. That’s scary. Or even the Dixie Chicks, who were pounded so relentlessly. So it’s kind of crazy. But right now we live in very divided times; people’s feelings about these issues are very intense, and people are going to have strong responses to anybody coming out and moving toward one side or the other. Particularly if it’s somebody who you like, or whose music you admire. I think for a lot of people it severs a part of that artist/audience bond. But that bond is a little more complicated than that. It’s just a little more complicated. I know what you’re saying: I think we’re waiting for the drums to start.
Considering how divided things are, ideally, what’s your goal on this tour? What’s the message, or the result that you’re looking for?
Well, the best thing is that we have a very simple result in mind—and that result is to change the administration in November. So at its core, it’s a very direct goal. At the same time, working with MoveOn and America Coming Together, we’re trying to get voters registered, trying to get people mobilized to vote, trying to get people out on the street to mobilize the progressive voters, to get people involved in the democratic process. That’s the means to the end. But the end is very clear for this short tour: we’re out trying to change the direction of the government, to add our voices to the folks who are trying to make a change at the top.
The novelist Nick Hornby has always been a fan of Springsteen, and his essay on “Thunder Road,” in
Songbook
, is one of the most penetrating meditations written about the song. Hornby interviewed Springsteen, who was on tour for
Devils & Dust
, and asked some probing questions about stage presence, writing style, and musical tastes.
Earlier on in the week that I met Bruce Springsteen, and before I knew I was going to meet him, I’d decided I was going to send him a copy of my new book. I got his home address off a mutual friend, and signed it to him, and the book was lying around in my office in an unstamped Jiffy bag when the editor of this magazine asked if I’d like to do this interview. So I took the book with me.
I wasn’t expecting him to read the bloody thing, nor even to keep it, and yet even so it seemed like something I needed to do.
A Long Way Down
was fuelled by coffee, Silk Cuts and Bruce (specifically, a 1978 live bootleg recording of “Prove It All Night,” which I listened to a lot on the walk to my office as I was finishing the book). And Springsteen is one of the people who made me want to write in the first place, and
one of the people who has, through words and deeds, helped me to think about the career I have had since that initial impulse. It seems to me that his ability to keep his working life fresh and compelling while working within the mainstream is an object lesson to just about anyone whose work has any sort of popular audience.
The first time I met him was after his Friday night show at the Royal Albert Hall, at a party in an upmarket West End hotel. He talked with an impressive ferocity and fluency to a little group of us about why he demanded restraint from his fans during the solo shows. The following afternoon I went to the soundcheck for the Saturday show, and sat on my own in the auditorium while he played “My Father’s House,” from
Nebraska
. It wasn’t the sort of experience you forget in a hurry. I interviewed him in his dressing room, and I was nervous: I have, in transcribing the questions, made them seem more cogent than they actually were.
He looked younger than the last time I saw him, and he’s clearly incredibly fit; he changed his shirt for the photographer, and I could tell that he does a lot more two-and-a-half-hour shows than I do. He was pleasant and friendly, but though he asked after a couple of younger musicians who both he and I know, there wasn’t much small talk; his answers came in unbroken yet very carefully considered streams. He is one of the few artists I’ve met who is able to talk cogently about what he does without sounding either arrogant or defensively self-deprecating.
I gave him the book, and he thanked me. I have no idea whether the cleaner took it home, but it didn’t matter much to me either way.
I was thinking when I was watching the show last night that maybe when you play with the band you can at least say to yourself, “I know why people are coming to see us. We’re good at what we do, and there’s this dynamic between us.” But when it’s you on your own, you can’t tell yourself that anymore. How does that feel? Have you got to a stage in life where it doesn’t feel weird that so many people come to see only you?
I performed like this in different periods of most of my playing life before I made records.
1
It just so happens that I didn’t do it on the
Nebraska
tour, maybe I was feeling unsure about … I hadn’t performed by myself in a while. It feels very natural to me, and I assume people come for the very same reasons as they do when I’m with the band: to
be moved, for something to happen to them. So I think the same things that make people plunk down their hard-earned bucks for the tickets, it works both ways. You’re looking for an experience and something that contextualises, as best as possible, a piece of the world. I’m just taking a different road to it out there at night. It’s the same thing, you know?
It’s always struck me that you work very hard on the stage side of things, that you have a theory of stagecraft. Is that right?
Well, I don’t know if I’ve worked hard at it. It’s always felt natural, because I’m generally very comfortable with people. That’s probably genetic in some fashion [
laughs
]. There is a presentation and I think being aware of the fact that there’s a show going on is a good idea [
laughs
].
2
I think it fell into some disrepute when the idea of the show became linked to falseness in some fashion, which is a superficial way to look at it. It’s actually a bridge when used appropriately. It’s simply a bridge for your ideas to reach the audience. It assists the music in connecting and that’s what you’re out there for. I think if you do it wrong, you can diminish your work, but if you do it right you can lightly assist what you’re doing. It can be an enormous asset in reaching people with what might be otherwise difficult material. I have a large audience coming to see this kind of music, an audience which in other circumstances would not be there. The audiences are there as a result of my history with the band but also as a result of my being able to reach people with a tune. I have my ideas, I have my music and I also just enjoy showing off [
laughs
], so that’s a big part of it. Also, I like to get up onstage and behave insanely or express myself physically, and the band can get pretty silly. But even in the course of an evening like this there’s a way that you sort of attenuate the evening. Your spoken voice is a part of it—not a big part of it, but it’s something. It puts people at ease, and once again kind of reaches out and makes a bridge for what’s otherwise difficult music.
I think that’s right. Those shows where you borrowed things from James Brown … I think some people did find it troubling that this music is supposed to be real and authentic and yet there’s this stagecraft, this messing around, at the same time.
3
I think the people who get the shows always see that there’s not a contradiction
.
Plus, you know, when I was young, there was a lot of respect for clowning in rock music—look at Little Richard. It was a part of the whole
thing, and I always also believed that it released the audience. And it was also a way that you shrunk yourself down to a certain sort of life-size (
laughs
) but I also enjoyed it, I had fun with it, and I never thought that seriousness and clowning were exclusive, so I’ve approached my work and my stagecraft with the idea that they’re not exclusive. You can go from doing something quite silly to something dead serious in the blink of an eye, and if you’re making those connections with your audience then they’re going to go right along with it.
