Man...I'm not the biggest Springsteen fan on the planet, but I'm trainspottingly obsessed with early Bruce. He was never better than during the '72-'75 period. I have the tapes to prove it, and my dad used to regale me as wee lad about his stories from Bruce's early Washington, Philly, and Asbury Park concerts. He would tell me about this song he saw them play that was never actually released, some scraggly epic about a guy named "Zero." Decades later I finally found out it was called "Zero And Blind Terry" and was every bit as good as he remembered it being.

Hey, this is the first time Primer has ever linked to a publication I used to write for...

Cool vortex. Maybe one day they'll link to the Back Bay Sun or the Verona-Cedar Grove Times and I'll know how you feel.

Eh. You make me feel old, Esoteric. My father used to regale me with stories of William Johnson and Julie Andrews in "Pipe Dream." I still have a thing for tide pools. . .

My father swears by Mildred Bailey with the Red Norvo Orchestra.

It's been said over and over again, but for as much as I love Bruce, I will never forgive him for "speedball." Nails on the chalkboard every single time I hear it.

I always thought "speedball" was supposed to be what the high school baseball player named his own pitch. Didn't Ricky Vaughn do that in the second movie?

They let it go with a great rendition of "Glory Days," the song about not crying over what you had and what you lost.

A subtle reference to Fleetwood Mac's Dreams? Because that's not really how I'd describe what Glory Days is about, unless I was trying to work in the lyric from Dreams . . . .

It's been said over and over again, but for as much as I love Bruce, I will never forgive him for "speedball." Nails on the chalkboard every single time I hear it.

Do the people who say this understand poetry at all? I'm sure Bruce Springsteen knows what a fastball is. He chose Speedball because it sounded better, maybe because of the half-alliterative p+b consonant sounds. Complaining about "speedball" is like complaining that Keats calls the nightingale a "darkling" instead of a bird or that Robert Frost calls ice a pane of glass in After Apple Picking.

yeesh.

Do the people who say this understand poetry at all?

I don't understand poetry at all, but I think the words should actually make sense. And "speedball" doesn't.

Bit of info on the "Glory Days" video...

Vid director John Sayles was hanging heavy at Maxwells in Hoboken at the time...probably because, like the rest of us, he had a bonta-crush on waitress Martha Griffin (Sayles won out by sweeping her away to LaLa land or wherever his films are made...where she has gone on to become an award winning producer!)...so Sayles, after ripping up the backroom at Maxwells, plunked the sweet-as-cheese Martha in the middle of the video.

When Sayles wasn't talking up Martha or some left wing swing...he talked about baseball. I remember him asking about local stadiums in which to finish off the Bruce video, so we mentioned a few and he settled on Miller Stadium in W.N.Y. where I had worked as a grounds crew soloist when I lived across the street from the ballperk.

And yes...speedball am idiotic.

Nettles got me in the ninth.

I love poetry [hell, check the infamous WS poetry thread for evidence]--but I think "speedball" is an almost definite example of bad writing....yes, the words should make sense; "speedball" offers no interesting richness (ooh--"speed"--must be TEH FAST!), and for a bonus, evokes a weirdly inapproprate drug connotation...

I don't understand poetry at all, but I think the words should actually make sense.

Siberian Khatru

Anderson/Howe/Wakeman

Sing, bird of prey;
Beauty begins at the foot of you. Do you believe the manner?
Gold stainless nail,
Torn through the distance of man
As they regard the summit.

Even Siberia goes through the motions.
Hold out and hold up;
Hold down the window.

Outbound, river,
Hold out the morning that comes into view.

Bluetail, tailfly.
River running right on over my head.

How does she sing?
Who holds the ring? And ring and you will find me coming.
Cold reigning king,
Hold all the secrets from you
As they produce the movement.

Even Siberia goes through the motions.
Hold out and hold up;
Hold down the window.

Outbound, river,
Hold out the morning that comes into view.

Bluetail, tailfly.
River running right over the outboard, river,
Bluetail, tailfly,
Luther, in time.
Dood'ndoodit, dah, d't-d't-dah.

Hold down the window;
Hold out the morning that comes into view.
Warm side, the tower;
Green leaves reveal the heart spoken Khatru.

Gold stainless nail,
torn through the distance of man as they regard the summit.
Cold reigning king,
Shelter the women that sing
As they produce the movement.
River running right on over my head

Outboard, river.
Bluetail, tailfly,
Luther, in time,
Suntower, asking,
Cover, lover,
June cast, moon fast,
As one changes,
Heart gold, leaver,
Soul mark, mover,
Christian, changer,
Called out, saviour,
Moon gate, climber,
Turn round, glider.

Isn't it "Khartu"?

Isn't it "Khartu"?

No, it's Khatru. Apparently it's a word Jon Anderson made up...

If you're going for nonsense, that's one thing. I can even understand if you mangle a word, or even make one up to get a rhyme. But "speedball" gets on my nerves.

See, I can't understand getting upset over any particular word in Glory Days when you've got fetid pile of unlistenable crap that is the title track on that album.

What's the reason for your dislike of "Born in the U.S.A."?

i think repoz may have had the strangest life ever

What's the reason for your dislike of "Born in the U.S.A."?

Well, I respect the message of the song, but I find the music uninspiring and I absolutely deplore the vocals by foghorn that Springsteen opted for. It is one of my most disliked songs ever from an otherwise great album. I also recognize that few others seem to share this opinion.

Whatever, SoSH. There are many of us who think the album is altogether a piece of ####. Springsteen's last great album was Nebraska. Since then he's had the occasional great song ("Dancing In The Dark," "Brilliant Disguise," "Streets Of Philadelphia," a lot of the stuff on Tracks) but that's all folks.

Disliking Bruce because of "speedball" reminds me of those who dismiss the entire FD Roosevelt Administration because of the internment camps. Oh. Wait. They may have a point about Roosevelt. But as for Bruce, c'mon folks lighten up. It's friggin' Bruce Springsteen we're talking about here.

And no, I don't like "Born in the U.S.A." either. "Thunder Road" is quite another matter. In fact, Bruce could have 500 songs with the word "speedball" in them and I would still be a Bruce fan because of "Thunder Road", even if it, too, has a somewhat bonehead lyric embedded within it.

Well, I respect the message of the song, but I find the music uninspiring and I absolutely deplore the vocals by foghorn that Springsteen opted for. It is one of my most disliked songs ever from an otherwise great album. I also recognize that few others seem to share this opinion.

Fair enough. I actually like the music - it's way over the top, to be sure, but I think the drums/synth combo works great. Having said that, I do think the acoustic version showcases the words in a much better light, and that's what the song's really about. A fine song to play on Veteran's Day...

Disliking Bruce because of "speedball" reminds me of those who dismiss the entire FD Roosevelt Administration because of the internment camps.

Who here said that they disliked Bruce, specifically because of "speedball"? The strongest anyone has said is "never forgive". I love Springsteen, but that word drives me crazy.

"Speedball" seems to be an obvious attempt at a folksly, Joe-blow type of speaking style. The narrator of the song isn't a baseball fan, he's a guy who played some baseball in high school (or maybe he didn't even play and just heard of his friend's prowess). The rest of the song is filled with similarly casual language: every "of" is pronounced "uh," he calls his father his "old man" (a verse I had completely forgotten about somehow), the woman and her husband "split up," etc. Just some normal, workaday dude talking crap.

There's probably a great story behind how Repoz met Jim Furtado.

I took "He could throw that speedball by you" to mean his friend sold drugs, and was quite successful.

Actually, that verse has another thing that drives me crazy. Here's the line:

I had a friend, was a big baseball player, back in high school
He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool, boy

Why is "boy" at the end of the line? It's extra, it doesn't fit into the meter (right word?) or the rhyme.

There's probably a great story behind how Repoz met Jim Furtado.

Funny you should bring this up, donic...I was deeply involved in the Great Boston Fire of 1872 and tho it took him a while...Furtado finally caught up with me.

Actually, Jim and I have never met.

But...I sorta met Sean Forman when I came on board.

The only reason to dislike "Born in the U.S.A." is because George Will thought it was a positive song about '80s America...

There are many of us who think the album is altogether a piece of ####. Springsteen's last great album was Nebraska. Since then he's had the occasional great song ("Dancing In The Dark," "Brilliant Disguise," "Streets Of Philadelphia," a lot of the stuff on Tracks) but that's all folks.

And the many of you are really out of your minds. IMHO, Tunnel of Love is Springsteen's masterpiece, a sad meditation on the mistakes we make in trying to meet our own expectations and those others place on us as we get older and try to find love and screw it up royally. Tougher Than the Rest; Spare Parts; One Step Up; Walk Like A Man; Brilliant Disguise . . . the whole damn record (can I still say record in this day and age?). There are maybe -- maybe -- three albums that speak as richly and deeply on a theme as Tunnel of Love. It is so vastly underrated, lost in the comparison to the commercial success of Born in the USA.

Human Touch and Lucky Town are its thematic bookend; the other side of the Tunnel of Love as it were, and it would have been better if he'd streamlined those two into one magnificent album instead of two good ones. But no matter; they both have some fine stuff on them, including the title track to the first one, which is probably my favorite song to sing and definitely my favorite Bruce song to do.

And the many of you are really out of your minds. IMHO, Tunnel of Love is Springsteen's masterpiece, a sad meditation on the mistakes we make in trying to meet our own expectations and those others place on us as we get older and try to find love and screw it up royally. Tougher Than the Rest; Spare Parts; One Step Up; Walk Like A Man; Brilliant Disguise . . . the whole damn record (can I still say record in this day and age?). There are maybe -- maybe -- three albums that speak as richly and deeply on a theme as Tunnel of Love. It is so vastly underrated, lost in the comparison to the commercial success of Born in the USA.

Thank god. Sam knows what's up. Bruce has had many, many great moments since Nebraska and BITUSA. I could see someone making an argument that he hasn't made a truly great front-to-back album in a while. That's fine. But, saying his last great album is Nebraska is wrong wrong wrong. His last truly GREAT album was Tunnel of Love.