Bound For Glory: The Rare 1973 Broadcasts

Sealed - Brand new 180 gram 2LP vinyl with gatefold cover. Made in UK.

Some of it was new, like the new Lower Dens album, and some of it was old, such as Ivor Cutler.  One thing I picked up out of the blue in Resident, however, was this double vinyl release by Bruce Springsteen.  I didn’t even know it existed, or anything about it, but fuck me it’s brilliant.

Now, I am a big fan of really early Bruce Springsteen.  I know it’s an unbearably hipster thing to say, and I don’t at all intend to downplay the quality of his later stuff, but Greetings From Asbury Park, New Jersey and The Wild, the Innocent & the E-Street Shuffle are phenomenal records.

Maybe it’s because his influences are still so close to the surface, and there’s so much funk in there (not something you’ll hear me say every day), but there’s something about the exuberance of those albums which I have always loved, and these radio sessions sound a little like being there when they first started to take shape.

The music is tentative and a little ramshackle, and a lot less full and forceful than you’re used to hearing from the band.  For me, particularly with a band as polished and tight as the E-Street Band, there’s something a ‘glimpse behind the curtain’ about even hearing these songs in such a sketched-out manner.

Almost as captivating as the songs, however, is the chat.  I didn’t see Springsteen’s keynote address at SXSW this year, but I listened to it later, and it is a confident articulate speech.  The chat on these recordings is just that of a nervous kid though, with a really dorky laugh.  It’s incredible. For some reason it’s a bit of a shock to realise that even someone as accomplished and successful as Bruce Springsteen started out like one of us: always a little bit amazed when someone takes notice.

If you’re not a Springsteen fan then fair enough, but if you are, particularly of the early records, which are the songs mostly played here, then I would get this as soon as I could possibly get my hands on it if I were you.