Bruce Springsteen
“Devils & Dust”
* * * * (four stars)
Columbia Records
At 55, Bruce Springsteen, probably closer to his death than his birth, has had a revelation about life that’s as simple and complex as the songs on his latest album, “Devils & Dust.”
On each of the dozen tracks, through a range of characters and unique situations, Springsteen sings about rising above the evils in us and getting to higher ground. It’s a secular album that brims with a universal spirituality and an understanding of humanity at its best and worst.
Lofty notions and intentions for a Jersey guy with a guitar. But after 9/11 (which profoundly affected the singer/songwriter), the Iraq war and last fall’s election of President Bush, the singer felt a need to wrestle with his demons and find the meaning in life’s madness.
That said, this disc is surprisingly non-political. Even the title track, inspired by the invasion of Iraq, isn’t political, it’s personal. The songs opens with Springsteen plaintively singing, “I got my finger on the trigger, but I don’t know who to trust … I feel a dirty wind blowing devils and dust.”
The track serves as a blueprint for the narratives that follow.
There are bright folk songs on this quiet album, like “Long Time Coming”; there are tunes with the starkness of Woody Guthrie’s dust bowl odes, like “The Hitter.” There are even a couple of tunes that come close to rocking, but the desire to mend the tear of emptiness, rather than musical style, is the constant.
In the song “Jesus Was an Only Son” – one of the best cuts – Bruce hits bottom on the refrain, “Now there’s a loss that can never be replaced, a destination that can never be reached, a sea whose distance can never be breached.” He’s helpless, and hopeless – Springsteen sees even Jesus as a man who needs the human touch.
Musically, the seeds for this folk record were planted over the years with albums like “Nebraska” and, more recently, “The Ghost of Tom Joad.” In fact, two of the new album’s songs, “The Hitter” and “Long Time Coming,” were actually written and performed when Springsteen was touring for the “Ghost” album.
For “D&D,” Springsteen opted to record without the E Street Band, choosing instead his producer Brendan O’Brien on bass and drummer Steve Jordan, who produced last year’s “23rd Street Lullaby” by Springsteen’s wife, Patti Scialfa.
The other interesting element of this record is a video portion that finds Springsteen in an old house that still has hints of a former glory. He is seated on a straight-back kitchen chair, playing a beat-up Gibson acoustic guitar. The set is as plain as the arrangements, but the no-frills approach works so well because it makes it easier to feel the power of the lyrics. Even better than the performances are the extended introduction to each, when Bruce sounds as if he’s talking more about himself than his songs.
Download these: “Devils & Dust” and “Maria’s Bed”
8 FACTS ABOUT BRUCE
* When he was in the third grade, a nun stuffed Springsteen, an altar boy, in a trash can under her desk for misbehaving.
* Springsteen’s first band was the Castilles, a quartet that played its first official gig for $35 at the Woodhaven Country Club in Woodhaven, N.J.
* The Boss failed a U.S. Army physical exam and given a 4-F classification (staying out of Vietnam), partly due to injuries from a motorcycle accident.
* The first Bruce Springsteen and E Street Band show was in York, Pa., in 1972, not Asbury Park, N.J.
* It took Springsteen six months to get “Born to Run” right.
* “Born in the U.S.A” was meant for his first solo effort, “Nebraska,” but he wasn’t happy with it, so saved it for later.
* At Frank Sinatra’s 80th birthday party, Springsteen’s wife, Patti Scialfa, performed.
* The Boss has presented at the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame five times. Can you name the groups he helped induct? (They are Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Jackson Browne and U2.)
From “The Ties That Bind: Bruce Springsteen A to E to Z,” an “encyclopedia Springsteenia,” out this month.