Wings For Wheels

Think about those words for a second. Putting aside the grammatically incorrect double negative, it’s a remarkable concept. Compare it with with Woody Allen, who, in Annie Hall, said that life was “full of loneliness, and misery, and suffering, and unhappiness, and it’s all over much too quickly.”

Better still, compare it with Thoreau, who wrote that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.” Bruce spits in the face of those words, challenging Thoreau not just on the idea of the first part, but also by to be buried with the song and inviting us to sing along.

More than anything else Springsteen has written, it’s his philosophy. It’s why Ramrod opens Side Four of The River. As the bleakness of Fade Away and Stolen Car still resonate comes one gigantic, stoopid car-as-penis metaphor along the cheesiest organ riff this side of a United Skates Of America reminding you that it’s important to be able to still have fun, even as you slip back into the slap-in-the-face realism that closes the record.

I’ve clutched onto those words in my darkest times. When I joined Facebook, I listed them as my “Religion.” I thought it was a nice little multi-layered piece of wordplay, reflecting both my belief in its importance as well as irreverently suggesting that Springsteen is my personal Lord and Savior.

In early-1985, I was still caught up in the throes of the Brucemania that had hit the year before. I think I only had three of his albums by February: Born In The USA, Born To Run, and Greetings From Asbury Park (by virtue of its $3.99 cost. “The Nice Price,” as the sticker on Columbia’s budget line said). By February, perhaps upset that I was hogging the good stereo in the living room with music they didn’t want to hear, my parents gave me an early 16th birthday present of my own system, a Fisher model with fully automatic turntable, dual cassette deck, and a five-band graphic equalizer.

While Dad haggled over the price (he had long cracked Crazy Eddie’s code on their tags and knew the lowest they could go), I went over to the Springsteen section of the record racks to determine which of his earlier records would get the prestigious first spin on my new stereo. My choice: Darkness On The Edge Of Town.

I thought the music was incredible – especially Max’s drumming on Candy’s Room, Roy’s piano on Racing In The Street, and the greater emphasis on electric guitar throughout – but I didn’t get the lyrics as I did on others. It wouldn’t be until my mid-twenties, after I had experienced firsthand a lot of what he was singing about, that the album’s brilliance would be apparent. But I loved Badlands from the beginning, its joyous and defiant stomp of a refusal to accept less of life than you give it, and, most importantly, its reminder that it ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive.

Somebody recently asked what I would say to Springsteen if I ever had the opportunity to meet him. My response was easy: thank you. And today, I add “Happy 60th birthday.”