A FAN’S NOTES

Hello Again

As I suspect is much the case with most music fans my tastes were formed in my teens and early twenties, directed or misdirected by the foundational noises crackling from the mono hi-fi of my childhood. I like to think that my tastes have not petrified because, man, a lot of great music has been released since Bob Dylan went to Jesus and Mick Jagger figured a solo career was a no-brainer. Still, I’m no schoolboy anymore and I know what I really like.

The somewhat imprecise measurement of time is one of humanity’s great achievements. Time is however a primitive element, like air, fire and water. As far as I can discern, no one of us can exist outside of it. Not even a boy prophet who once walked handsome and hot. Bruce Springsteen’s latest single is called ‘Hello Sunshine.’ It’s the first release from the forthcoming Western Stars. I’ve not been so jacked about an album teaser from the aging Boss since the post-9/11 ‘The Rising.’

Artists are no different than us, their fickle fans. They move through phases in their lives and careers much like we who exist in suburbia and book economy class. Except we tend to project our nostalgic aspirations on our heroes because recording another masterpiece after 45 years have burned down the road must be like riding a bicycle, right? In his autobiography Springsteen reveals his vexation with his audience’s indifferent reception of Wrecking Ball which he felt was the most accessible LP he’d waxed since Born in the USA. He and we had grown up and were worrying about different things. One of the few songs on that album that resonated with me was the tardy studio version of ‘Land of Hope and Dreams’ which reminds me of ‘People Get Ready’ by the Impressions and, anyway, as a Canadian I’ve a thing for rolling steel both metaphorical and actual because the railroad stitched this fragile federation together.

‘Hello Sunshine’ is underpinned by a genteel hip-hop syncopation, maybe with a bit of a nod to the Tennessee Three – after all, everything in music as in life is connected. That percussive sound reminded me of Springsteen’s ‘Streets of Philadelphia.’ Springsteen is the cosmic kid no longer, that hipster in the wife-beater and greasy leather jacket who somehow successfully blended Phil Spector, Dylan and Roy Orbison into something we’d never heard the likes of before. ‘Hello Sunshine,’ lush and shimmering, is his admitted attempt to echo classic Glen Campbell. And Campbell is probably one of those country artists who made Waylon and Willie shake their heads on the outskirts of Nashville and roll another number.

And yet. ‘Hello Sunshine’ is a thoughtful rumination on restlessness, depression and loneliness. Life. The hook, if there is one, suggests an illumination of the midnight soul and an openness to potential redemption: “Hello sunshine, won’t you stay?” Springsteen delivers the invitation with the same vulnerable intonation Campbell used interpreting the declarative Jimmy Webb lyric: “And I need you more than want you and I want you for all time.” I can already hear ‘Hello Sunshine’ coursing through speaker wires in the wee small, melancholy hours, lights out, bar open.

It’s dreadfully disconcerting to consider a new Springsteen album in the context of a late career renaissance. But here we are; time has exacted its toll. Springsteen remains one of my few ‘automatics,’ that is an artist whose work I will never fail to purchase. But I’m not that kid in his high school bedroom memorizing the words of the songs and the liner notes anymore. Somewhere along the line Springsteen stopped speaking to me and started preaching. I tuned out after one or two listens. ‘Hello Sunshine,’ as different as it is from anything he’s done, feels like we’ve resumed an unfinished conversation from long ago.      

Bookmarks are so 20^th century. Use that thingy on the right to sign up for e-mail alerts from meGeoff. It’ll just be between us, nobody else needs to know.