Bruce Springsteen: A hymn to humanity not patriotism

The Rising

Bruce Springsteen

Sony Music

REVIEW BY
RICHARD PITHOUSE

Bruce Springsteen's new album, The Rising, has been marketed
as vigorously as his 1984 Born in the USA album and, as with that
album, has achieved massive commercial success.

Born in the USA's bitter attack on Reaganite nationalism was
famously misunderstood as support, by Reagan and millions of others. Springsteen
responded with horror and went on to produce unambiguously radical work
without the sing-a-long choruses the industry thought necessary for mass
appeal (and to make regular anonymous donations to striking unions and
other progressive causes).

His sincerity has not been seriously questioned. After all, this is
a man who has continually stood with, and challenged, his working-class
audience while spurning overtures from Reagan, Bill Clinton and, after
a short flirtation, Hollywood.

Some critics have suggested that Springsteen culpably underestimates
the lack of attention with which a large section of the rock “market” receives
its product. This is a little harsh. Consider the lyrics to “Born to Run”:
“Baby this town rips the bones from your back/ it's a death trap, it's
a suicide rap/ we've got to get out while we're young”.

On more than one occasion, New Jersey politicians have proposed that
“Born to Run” become the official state anthem. This refusal by politicians
and music critics to venture beyond the surface of Springsteen's work shouldn't
surprise us too much. It is inevitable in an era where short-term profits
have been fetishised to the degree that any journey beyond sound-bites
and cliche has to be taken on stolen time. To demand that artists with
a higher vision for humanity abandon nuance in order to avoid misinterpretation
is to ask us to become our enemies in order to fight them on their terms.
That makes defeat inevitable.

With the exception of the British Guardian's sneering snobbery
for an album that takes the ordinary struggles of ordinary people seriously,
most of the mainstream Western media have received The Rising rapturously.
But many journalists have misunderstood this album as badly as Reagan misunderstood
Born in the USA. Even the most cursory listen leaves no doubt that
The Rising is not a rousingly patriotic tribute to a “spirit of
resilience” imagined to be a uniquely American result of the rigours of
“free enterprise”.

The Rising is a hymn to humanity. There is a deep and often spiritual
reverence for both the victims and families of the alleged al Qaeda attacks
on September 11 and a number of Arab characters, including a suicide bomber.
It is his capacity for reverence that enables Springsteen to express and
generate such deep respect for the lives of the ordinary, the forgotten
and the despised.

Springsteen's work has always valued lives lived without glamour. But
even songs like “Factory” (1978), about the mass sackings of workers and
the closures of industries by big business, didn't move beyond tragedy
and point to an identifiable enemy. In his more recent work, this has started
to change and in “Youngstown” (1995) he was able to say, with devastating
impact, “Them big boys did what Hitler couldn't do”.

But there are no enemies in The Rising. There is not one word
about US imperialism or al Qaeda's fascist response. There are no calls
for a collective engagement with the forces that put profit and power before
life. There is just a feeling of tragedy, a deep reverence for the value
of all human life and a longing for redemption. The Rising says
much that needs to be said in America but it doesn't say everything.

It is not without politics though. A Palestinian suicide bomber is among
the ultimate enemies in US President George Bush's world, so Springsteen's
equal reverence for the life of a New York firefighter and a Palestinian
suicide bomber is a radical statement. During performances in his current
tour, Springsteen performs his tribute to the firefighters who perished
at the World Trade Center back to back with “American Skin (41 Shots)”,
his ode to the Senegalese immigrant murdered by the New York Police Department.

“American Skin (41 Shots)” led to Springsteen being called a “fucking
commie dirtbag” by a representative from the NYPD when it was first performed
in 2000. On occasion, he has had to tell booing audiences to “shut the
fuck up and show some respect” when he has played it. Springsteen's willingness
to radically inspire, then challenge his mass audiences is a remarkable
achievement. It is built on both his musical and poetic genius and his
refusal to retreat from the broader “we” into some self-righteous avante
garde that despises actually existing humanity.

However, The Rising is not Springsteen's best. While the album
has some magnificent moments, like the sublime “Paradise”, it feels a little
rushed in parts.

“Worlds Apart” is noble in that it gives a character the hopes and desires
of a classic Springsteen hero (and even puts him on a highway rolling into
the dark) but replaces a typical Springsteen reference to God with a reference
to Allah. The implicit message is that the rich and complex vision of what
it means to be human developed by Springsteen through 30 years of songs
includes Arabs as much as Americans.

But “Worlds Apart” feels lyrically contrived and has none of the subtle
attention to detail that has allowed Springsteen to so successfully put
his narrators' voice in the bodies of everyone from a man dying of AIDS
to a Vietnamese fisherman facing down the Texas Klan and a Mexican crossing
the Rio Grande.

There is also something a little contrived about the collaboration with
a group of Pakistani Qawali musicians on “Worlds Apart”. Eddie Vedder and
Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan have shown that rock and Qawali can be woven together
beautifully, and Springsteen himself used the harmonium very effectively
on The Ghost of Tom Joad, but here the collaboration sounds like
it needed a little more time to find itself.

There is a line in The Rising about making a fool of oneself
for love, and there are times when one has to do the same for justice.
It is better to rush out a song that makes a very necessary point than
to wait for the perfect song (or article or march or strike) and miss the
time. History is demanding. And justice has less patience than art.

“Mary's Place” puts Springsteen's moral project before his artistic
project in a quite different way. The story of a bereaved person facing
their first party without their lover sounds like it could have been recorded
20 years ago. No doubt that is the exact point — with some courage life's
familiar pleasures may endure. The words are important and will speak to
the bereaved. But the music itself is very, very ordinary and must have
been rushed. It wouldn't have made it on to any other Springsteen album.

The Rising uses a US tragedy to develop reverence for American
lives and then extend that reverence to Arab lives. It has put these ideas
in to the air and some people will listen. That matters. But if you're
looking for a perfectly crafted Springsteen album you'd do better to spend
your money on records like Nebraska, The Ghost of Tom Joad
or the recent live album, with its sublime versions of “The River”, “Youngstown”
and “American Skin (41 Shots)”.

From Green Left Weekly, September 4, 2002.

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From GLW issue 507