“Devils & Dust” is Springsteen’s 3rd “Acoustic” album, sharing loose stylistic roots with “Nebraska” and “The Ghost Of Tom Joad”. It isn’t however the overtly acoustic album that those two musical cousins are. We do get gentle introspective songs but there’s some full band “rockers” involved too. What is often regarded as a solo acoustic record doesn’t have any completely solo performances on it.

It was released in 2005 but the writer admitted that many of the songs had been written 10 or more years prior. “All The Way Home” was written for Southside Johnny in 1991; the wonderful “Long Time Coming” and “The Hitter” are from the “…Tom Joad” period. Waste not want not I guess. 

The title track sees us post 9/11. Written in the early years of the resulting 2nd Iraq war, the writer sings from the point of view of a soldier in that war who is questioning his feelings toward his (and his countries ?) involvement and, importantly, his part in things. He’s seen his friend die in action (“Well I dreamed of you last night, In a field of blood and stone”) and is now wrestling with what the war is doing to him (“I got God on my side, I’m just trying to survive, What if what you do to survive, Kills the things you love…It’ll take your God filled soul, And fill it with devils and dust”). This is all set within acoustic guitars and strings in a way that harks back to “…Tom Joad”.  There are some powerful ideas expressed in this song, ideas rarely discussed in a country which so often defines itself by its military.

“All The Way Home” shatters any notion that this is another acoustic collection. It’s a full band workout, a bit of a rocker, whereas when first recorded by Southside Johnny it was a soulful ballad. This sets up the 1-2 punch that most of “Devils & Dust” adheres to, solo Bruce followed by Bruce and Band, until we get toward the end.

The lyrically explicit “Reno” caused quite the controversy. Springsteen’s wife, Patti Scialfa, has said of it “”My artistic side said, ‘That is so brave.’ Then, just thinking right from the heart, I was like, ‘What are you writing about that shit for? Are you fucking crazy?’ ”. Without sugar coating what’s happening “Reno” tells of an, ultimately disappointing, liaison with a working girl while the punter daydreams of being with Maria somewhere between Guatemala and Peru and having everything he needs but “Somehow all you ever need's never really quite enough”. Amongst all that it’s a bloody gorgeous song and a fabulous performance. Incidentally on the vinyl release “Reno” sits at the end of Side 1, while at the end of Side 2 we find “Maria’s Bed” in which we’re told “I was burned by the angels, sold wings of lead, Then I fell in the roses and sweet salvation of Maria's bed”.

“Long Time Comin’” might be one of my favourite Springsteen songs. For a rudimentary guitarist like myself (I follow the Joe Strummer method, “I can only play all six strings at once or none at all” !) it’s dead easy to play and sound vaguely like it does on the record. It’s a closing of the book on Springsteen’s father and son songs. There’s a telling section in his biography where, just before the birth of Bruce and Patti Scialfa’s first child, his father, knowing how much his sons life is about to change, visits and offers an apology of sorts for his “parenting” toward his son…something like “you’ve been good to us…I haven’t always been good to you”. This song revolves around a camping trip the Springsteen’s took before the birth of their 3rd child, Bruce trying to be a better Dad to his kids than his had admitted he had been to him, the pivotal admission being “Well if I had one wish in this god forsaken world, kids, It’d be that your mistakes would be your own, Yeah your sins would be your own”.

“Leah” covers some of the same ground. A man now ready to accept that he can love and be loved, released from (some of) his demons by his fathers apology perhaps. The brighter outlook is underlined with its beautiful TexMex horns. 

The record ends on “Matamoros Banks”, laying out the pain of a Mexican, drowned trying to cross the Rio Grande to the US, being returned to Mexico. Both these songs have that TexMex colour to them that we encountered on “The Ghost Of Tom Joad”. It’s an atmosphere that we’ll find in many Springsteen songs from here on.

“Devils & Dust” hit #1 in the US and was supported by the solo “Devils & Dust tour”, just Springsteen (well, him and a couple of Roadies playing keyboards offstage) and an array of instruments. The album has an overall feel of the great outdoors, the range, America’s wide open country about it. It's more along the road of musical themes that will coalesce in a few years on one of his finest records.

Reno - https://youtu.be/8TXYAaJeSS0?si=JhuD4wbu08_c4xs-

The story goes that in the days after the attack on the World Trade Centre in 2001 Bruce Springsteen was standing by the river in New Jersey looking across the Hudson to the smoking city of New York. As a car drove past him someone shouted from the vehicle “Bruce, we need you now”. Bruce did the only thing he could, he reconvened the E Street Band and made an album.

I have to confess as we’d gone through the ’90’s I’d had a very loose connection with Springsteen and his music. “Human Touch” and “Lucky Town” had been something of a disappointment to me and in the 10 years twixt those two and this one he’d only released “The Ghost Of Tom Joad” when it came to new music. The fanfare around a new record with the E Street Band is what piqued my interest in this record. “The Rising” was the first album Springsteen had recorded with the E Street Band since “Born In The USA” in 1984, 18 years previously (all of the band played on 1987’s “Tunnel Of Love” but didn’t all play together on the same songs). They had played a reunion tour through 1999 and 2000 and Springsteen had already written some of the songs that appear on “The Rising”, "Further On (Up The Road)" was performed on the reunion tour, “Waitin’ On A Sunny Day” and “Nothing Man” were written in the ‘90’s.

Many people look upon "The Rising" as Springsteen’s “9/11” record and in part that’s the case, it’s recording was certainly sparked by those events. But we already know that some of these songs were in play before that fateful day. One of those is very likely “Lonesome Day”, the all important Track 1 Side 1, but this time it’s not only kicking off the new album it’s re-introducing us to the E Street Band. On first hearing I was a little taken aback, to me the E Street Band has Professor Roy and the Big Man up front but here they’re not. The guitars are up front now and so is new E Streeter Sister Soozie Tyrell’s fiddle, with some extra added other strings. This is the wall of sound of “Born To Run” and the chest thumping of “Born In The USA” but updated for the 21st Century. Many people hear it as a 9/11 song on the back of the 2nd verses lyrics (“Hell’s brewing, dark sun’s on the rise, This storm will blow through by and by, House is on fire, viper’s in the grass, A little revenge and this too shall pass”) but that ignores what had been said in verse 1 (“Baby, once I thought I knew, Everything I needed to know about you, Your sweet whisper, your tender touch, But I didn't really know that much”) and Springsteen’s ability to write lyrics that aren’t always entirely literal (he might be singing about cars and girls but he’s not necessarily singing about cars and girls…ya dig ?). I hear it as much more of a broken relationship song that wouldn’t have been out of place on “Tunnel Of Love”, and has become a great live favourite.

If you’re looking for comment on that day in September 2001 then look no further than the last song written for the album “Empty Sky”. In a very concise lyric Springsteen lays out the pain of having lost someone that day (“I woke up this morning, I could barely breathe, Just an empty impression in the bed where you used to be, I want a kiss from your lips, I want an eye for an eye, I woke up this morning to an empty sky”). The line about “an eye for an eye” would elicit cheers from US audiences and at a 2003 concert in Atlantic City Springsteen was prompted to explain the lyric was meant to express the pain of the protagonists loss and was “never written as a call for blind revenge or blood lust”. The State of New Jersey named its 9/11 memorial Empty Sky.

The most overtly 9/11 focussed songs come in a triptych toward the end of the record. Part one is “You’re Missing”, the sentiment is obvious, right ? Your shirts and shoes are still there, the baby is still here, we still have coffee cups, the papers still get delivered, the TV is still on, we’re waiting for you to walk in but…You’re Missing…a simple statement of loss and not knowing. When he performed it at Old Trafford Cricket Ground in 2003 my wife Deb was only 5 weeks past suddenly losing her Dad and this song got to her, the tears came…the power of music huh ?

That’s followed by “The Rising” (the song) which has become a permanent fixture in Springsteen’s live set. He’s performed it every time we’ve seen him since this albums tour in 2003 when it was second on the setlist after “Born In The USA”, now that was an opening salvo ! It’s a huge singalong, cathartic crowd pleaser but allied to a deeply ambiguous lyric wrapped up in religious imagery. As it opens it is almost obviously about a firefighter entering one of the towers

Can't see nothing in front of me, Can't see nothing coming up behind
I make my way through this darkness, I can't feel nothing but this chain that binds me
Lost track of how far I've gone, How far I've gone, how high I've climbed
On my back's a sixty pound stone, On my shoulder half mile of line

Can’t see nothing, this darkness, how high I’ve climbed, on my shoulder a half mile of line, all things you’d imagine a firefighter  entering a burning building might experience. But what is this “chain that binds me” and what is it binding him to ? A little later in the song we hear

There's spirits above and behind me, Faces gone black, eyes burning bright
May their precious blood bind me, Lord as I stand before your fiery light

Is our firefighter rescuing survivors or does this lyric reveal him at the very moment he himself has succumbed to the flames and the buildings collapse and here he is caught between “worlds” by the “chain that binds me”, that being his wife, children, family, friends…a life he doesn’t want to let go ? In his sets these days Springsteen uses the song as the crescendo to an emotional build-up throughout the show, it gives the crowd the opportunity to sing along, express and expel some of the emotion that he’s been feeding them for the last couple of hours…you bust a lung singing along to the  “Li Li, Li Li Li Li, Li Li” refrain, after that we can party. The past 3 occasions we’ve seen him live “The Rising” has been followed by “Badlands”, then the two “Born…” songs and some mix of “Dancing In The Dark”, “Tenth Avenue Freeze Out”, “Bobby Jean”, “Glory Days” and other songs and covers that you can dance and sing and shout along to. Springsteen understands the emotional power of “The Rising” and that after that we all need some release/relief.

The third part of the trio is “Paradise”. A quiet, contemplative song, Bruce plays all the instruments, Patti can be heard briefly on backing vocals. There are are 3 scenes, one appearing to be in the Middle East, one in Virginia, the last by a river. In all the scenes Paradise is sought, whether that is Christian Heaven or Islamic Jannah or something else is never specified. Written in the immediate aftermath of 9/11, Springsteen himself isn’t sure what it’s about “I wasn’t sure what I was saying when I wrote this song…an intuitive thing that fell together in a certain way”. Like Steve Earle later (see “Rich Man’s War”) Springsteen stirred controversy with this song as the first verse was seen as being sympathetic toward terrorists. But like the couple in “Nebraska” going on a murderous rampage across Nebraska and Wyoming, Springsteen was trying to understand.

The album ends on the statement “My City Of Ruins” which might seem like a song obviously written about the attack on New York but it was in reality written and performed almost a year before 9/11. 

“The Rising” (the album) arrived at a time when Bruce Springsteen had been relatively quiet for 10 or so years. He was seen as of the past, maybe not as culturally or artistically relevant as in the past. This album and and its accompanying 120 show, 82 city, 14 month world tour returned him to the forefront of people’s minds and reminded them of what a powerful songwriter and performer he is. The albums over the ensuing 20 years have been patchy in places but the tours and gigs have been a joy to attend, many centred around this records title song.

The Rising - https://youtu.be/6i-fiRgbpr4?si=IGuCRF7PakNdXR_1

A largely acoustic album and a close relation to “Nebraska”. Tom Joad was the lead character in John Steinbeck’s story of the Great Depression, “The Grapes Of Wrath”, one of the caravan of Okies who headed for California to find work and a better life. This puts us back in a similar timeframe or feeling of time that “Nebraska” sits in, a time before…some of the ghosts that inhabited the landscapes of “Nebraska” are back again.

“The Ghost Of Tom Joad” also sits at an important point in Springsteen’s journey. He has gone through the struggling beginner phase and on to the hit records, global superstardom and then shedding of a skin (the E Street Band) periods and now here he is, looking back (?) and perhaps wondering where to go next. It can certainly be seen as a crossroads, his next studio album after this wouldn’t be for another 7 years and for that he was to be jolted into action by an event that has seriously scarred America and left its mark on the entire World. Springsteen has said that he thinks “Nebraska” is his best album and in his biography, “Born To Run”, confesses that this album picks up the thread from “Nebraska”. While he sits at his metaphorical crossroads he’s looking back at “Nebraska”, trying to (e)raise those ghosts ? 

“…Tom Joad” is looked upon as an acoustic or solo record but there are other musicians playing on these songs, many of them session musicians (the album was recorded while Springsteen was still based in California) but E Streeters Danny Federici, Garry Tallent and Soozie Tyrell contribute and Patti Scialfa adds backing vocals. Only 7 of the albums 12 tracks are truly solo Springsteen performances.

You can’t help but feel a sense of injustice hanging over the whole record and that is expressed forcefully on the title track. The first verse you could easily hear as being sung from the time of the Great Depression where Tom would see men wandering aimlessly, followed by cops, finding shelter and food under bridges, whole families displaced and living in their cars, all of them with “No home, no job, no peace, no rest”, like a musical re-tooling of John Ford’s 1940 cinematic telling of Steinbeck’s novel. But when we reach the chorus we are left in no doubt that what we are seeing is happening now. This isn’t Tom Joad retelling his story, these troubled times have returned, it’s now “I'm sitting down here in the campfire light, Searching for the ghost of Tom Joad”. It’s one of Springsteen’s greatest and most important songs, a song he has returned to and recorded more than once (the original album version, on an obscure folk compilation in duet with Pete Seeger, in a full band version with the E Street Band and Tom Morello, which we shall get to later on, and completely solo on the soundtrack to the documentary “The People Speak” based on Howard Zinn’s “A People’s History of the United States” one of Springsteen’s favourite books), the only one of his songs to exist in 4 distinct studio versions.

The song has been widely covered by artists including Rage Against The Machine, Elvis Costello and Roger Waters. Springsteen has played it in various arrangements at some point on every tour he’s undertaken since this albums release (apart from, ironically, on a short Vote For Change tour in 2004) so it’s clear it has become a very important statement to the writer himself. In the 9 times I’ve seen Springsteen live he’s played “Born To Run” every time and “The River” 8  of 9 times making it pretty obvious he sees those as pivotal songs in his life. I’d put “The Ghost Of Tom Joad” right up there with those two in terms of importance in Springsteen’s cannon (but as he didn’t play it in Cardiff recently I’ve likely missed my chance to hear it live). It’s an absolutely incredible song in any of it’s incarnations and I urge you to have a listen to any or all of the versions I’ve left for you below (we’ll return for the full band version when we reach the album “High Hopes” in a couple of weeks time). 

“Youngstown” is another song that made it from this albums “acoustic” setting to the full E Street Band treatment on stage. Inspired by Dale Maharidge’s 1985 book “Journey to Nowhere: The Saga of the New Underclass”, Springsteen had read the book in one night when he couldn’t sleep just as he had finished, or so he thought, this album. The book chronicles the “hobos” riding the railways looking for work. But these are not Steinbeck’s “hobos” of the ’20’s and 30’s, these men were still doing this in the 1980’s ! The book inspired two new songs, “Youngstown” and “The New Timer” (one I’d recommend a listen to, it’s a lyrical and storytelling masterpiece), which Springsteen insisted must go on this album as they fit its theme so well. 

In “Youngstown” one of those ‘80’s “hobos” Maharidge had talked to in his book, Joe Marshall Jr, tells how the steel mills of Youngstown, Ohio supported him, his father and America until, in 1977, they were gone. The Jenny that Springsteen sings to in the chorus (“My sweet Jenny I’m sinking down, Here darling in Youngstown”) isn’t somebody’s wife or girlfriend but Jeanette, the 90 foot tall, 500 ton blast furnace at the Youngstown Sheet and Tube Company that in its 69 year lifespan produced 11 million tons of steel and kept the people of Youngstown in work until it was decommissioned. “Youngstown” on this album is a beaten  down, weary and tragic song. By the time it was put into the hands of E Street Band it became, and still is, a defiant, raging howl at the injustices meted out to ordinary people…and you thought he just wrote about cars and girls ! 

“The Ghost Of Tom Joad” is a quiet, introspective album. There are no bombastic stadium rockers here. It’s made of subdued acoustic guitars, keyboards, pedal steel and fiddle, to my ears there’s something of a TexMex feel about it in places, which won’t be the only time I say that about a Springsteen record. The songs themselves are like poetry being read over the music. The power here is in the lyrics and the stories they tell of ordinary people, the brothers tempted into cooking up Meth for the Cartel in “Sinaloa Cowboys”, or the descent into prostitution and drugs for young illegal immigrants in “Balboa Park”, how the ex-convict in “Straight Time” is trying hard to keep his nose clean while still surrounded by his former life and the racism and tragedy of “Galveston Bay”. It’s not an easy record to listen to, it requires your attention and concentration, and I admit it is one I’ve struggled to fully appreciate even after 30 years. Within these songs are some of Springsteen’s toughest lyrics and most firmly held views. I’m not quite there with all of it yet but I plan to give it all the attention it requires until I am.

The Ghost Of Tom Joad - https://youtu.be/2Nbe2O-mJmc?si=gOY_fI-cB18T5NHG

The Ghost Of Tom Joad (with Pete Seeger) - https://youtu.be/NN0gy6fSRkU?si=-N-6F3ny1CDrRmim

The Ghost Of Tom Joad (Solo) - https://youtu.be/avDyB0B02jo