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CLASSIC ALBUM No.2

Bruce Springsteen :  Born To Run (Columbia, 1975)

Some albums are genuinely life-affirming. And this is one of the best of them. Bruce Springsteen's third album took him from a relatively unknown but critically adored act into the mainstream (although it was to be another 9 years before he found massive success, with the mega-selling "Born In The U.S.A.".)  Born To Run was, in part, born out of desperation. His first two albums for Columbia had been well received but not big sellers. He needed to produce an album that made the leap into commercial success, and achieved it with this set of 8 songs. The album is full of romance. In an era of post-Smiths cynicism and Radiohead weariness, this can be too much for some stomachs. Born To Run, and Springsteen's music generally, might be seen as too puffed-up, too full of hopeful machismo, and just too damned American. But, alongside swaggering songs like 'Born To Run', 'Thunder Road', and 'Tenth Avenue Freeze Out', the album has  more minor key pieces like 'Backstreets', a song of a young man brooding over a relationship gone wrong, while 'Meeting Across The River' is an unusual and highly atmospheric spoken word piece that features some great saxophone by Michael Brecker, and details the life of a small time criminal desperate to make a deal work.

The title track, "Born To Run", fizzes with a love of life and adventure. It's four and a half minutes of musical dynamite, from the dynamite snare roll that explodes the song's beginning, to the famous low guitar riff, to lyrics that bristle with hope and revel in the passion of youth : "Some day, girl, I don't know when, we'll get to that place where we really want to go, and we'll walk in the sun. But, til, then, tramps like us, baby we born to run."

It was not, however, an album that came easily. Springsteen and the e-street band  worked for over a year in the studio, trying to capture what he had in his head and put it onto tape. The sessions in New York ran from April 1974 to July 1975, and even then he wanted to start the whole thing from scratch. Some of the songs were through thirty or-more re-drafts as Springsteen went over the lyrics with the finest of tooth combs. Some tracks, notably the   9minutes and thirty six seconds of "Jungleland", with its multiple sections, were very complex, involving numerous changes of pace and mood. The band were used to ensure the best effect - the songs are real ensemble pieces,  with saxophonist Clarence Clemons and pianist Roy Bittan offering inspiring moments of playing.

What's most special about Born To Run, is that its predominantly joyful quality. It's a young man's record. Springsteen was just 26 when the album was made, and somehow the 8 tracks here capture a young, energetic and optimistic heart. It's not a record without shadows or regrets, but it does eloquently capture the exuberation of youth like very few other albums before or since.   

By Miles Cain