The Wild, The Innocent And The E-Street Shuffle

 

I bought my first long-playing records around 1974, after I had earned some money with my first holiday job. To be honest, I bought three albums on recommendation. Yessongs and Dylan's Before The Flood because at the time I thought live albums showed the artists unvarnished and with a double or triple album I would have got more for the money I spent. I also bought Bruce Springsteen's second album.

Springsteen wasn't the boss back then and was largely unknown. I actually only bought the album on the recommendation of the salesman in the record shop, but I have never regretted it. The album is now over 50 years old and I still listen to it from time to time. It has none of Yes's overblown organ sound but a lot of Dylan, especially the gift of telling stories in the songs. 

For me, his quieter and atmospherically dense songs have always been in the foreground and here he has collected many of his best and most melancholic songs. With Rosalita he laid the foundation for his later status. A record that has stayed with me throughout Springsteen's career and shows what he was all about. A poet from New Jersey who dreamed his dream of rock ‘n’ roll.