Springsteen Edges Into the Future

In the 1988 Tunnel of Love concert, a palpable sense of change

I used to be a Valentine's Day resister: A Hallmark holiday, likely the holiday on which greeting card fortunes were built. Unless it was Mother's Day, of course. Neither were big holidays in our house growing up, because our dad always forgot, not even flowers. I mean, we were a family with my birthday in December, and my brother's in February. When he and I were kids, one year we were treated to a joint birthday party in January. And in later years, if we got our mother a present, there was always a chance she might not like it, and would say so. I bought her a book I thought she'd like for her 40th birthday (I was working in a bookstore part time) and she so resented it that she yelled and threw it out. I promised never to buy her another present again, and I didn't.

So, is this a great tie-in to posting my review of Bruce Springsteen's "Tunnel of Love" concert in 1988 from Nassau Coliseum, two days before Valentine’s Day? Maybe not. But it takes a lifetime to unlearn the bad habits of a family obsessed with being outwardly "normal," the dust swept under the rug so thick the carpet had hills and lumps.

Watching the show, I detected something amiss in Springsteen's E Street family. An undercurrent of impending change. That's what I wrote about. His professional enablers at his record company told a colleague of mine they thought my perceptions were balderdash. But in 1989, he put the E Street Band on hiatus, and his marriage to actress Julianne Phillips ended in divorce. In 1991, he married Jersey girl and backup singer Patti Scialfa. At the same carnival where there had been a tunnel of love ride, for young couples to smooch in the dark, I had paid a surreptitious visit to the fortune teller, who reminded me to perceive the obvious.

Bruce Springsteen: Into the Future

Wayne Robins, Newsday, 4 April 1988

THE "TUNNEL OF LOVE" tour is not rock-and-roll business as usual, or even Springsteen business as usual. This, after all, is a show that for its first few hours revolves around non-hits, B sides and dramatic revisions of familiar material. Say goodbye to 'Thunder Road'. Say hello to 'Be True', 'Seeds', 'Roulette', 'War', 'I'm A Coward' and 'Light of Day'.

But this show is not a willful denial of the past. It is a confident, mature journey into an uncertain future. It was thematically cohesive, as thoughtful as it was uplifting. As the phrase went on the back of the T-shirts sold out at the concert, "This is not a dark ride."

The concert is centered on the songs from last fall's Tunnel of Love album, a drastic departure from its predecessor, Born in the U.S.A. Instead of proud anthems played and sung with 50-megaton force by Springsteen and the E Street Band, the Tunnel songs were rueful lamentations on the difficulty of relationships and, occasionally, the joy of emotional connection. Members of Springsteen's band made only intermittent appearances on the sparely arranged album.

In concert, the band is back in force, and augmented by a five-piece horn section. The Tunnel of Love songs all benefit from the fuller arrangements: The primal scream of the single-mother protagonist in 'Spare Parts' was embellished by howling, bluesy guitar riffs; 'Ain't Got You' had a more emphatic rhythmic current that allowed it to segue perfectly into 'She's the One', and Clarence Clemons' saxophone parts added a rich dimension to 'All Heaven Will Allow'.

But more than the arrangements have changed in Springsteen's music: so has the personality of the group. The E Street Band used to be a rogue boys club, with Bruce sometimes literally leaning on Clemons' broad back for all the support he needed.

Springsteen and Clemons don't pal around as much on stage. Now the singer draws much of his energy from Patti Scialfa, who has graduated from backup singer to a frontline guitarist and vocalist.

In a theatrical skit before 'All That Heaven Will Allow,' Springsteen and Clemons sat on a park bench as the singer reminisced about the old days. They're both married now, and Springsteen cut the visit short: He's got to be home at 6:30 for dinner.

Once it was Bruce and Clarence against the world. Clarence is still his symbolic best friend, but Scialfa, the symbolic wife, now comes first. Their almost shrill shouts in 'Cover Me' evoke all the joys, and all the fears, of unbridled intimacy.

Springsteen used to tell wild stories about running with the boys. Friday night, introducing 'Spare Parts', he told how it was about a woman "trying to understand the value of her own individual existence", and, in an even larger sense, how the past keeps us down when we obsess about dreams that don't come true instead of moving forward.

Just how far forward Springsteen is intent on moving was made clear near the end of the show, when he appeared alone with an acoustic guitar. The song was one he wrote 15 years ago, and its meaning has changed for him. It used to be about running away. Now, he realizes, "You can get away, but your individual freedom is meaningless unless it's attached to people, friends and feelings you know. . . Here's a song that kept me good company on my search. I hope it's kept you good company on yours."

The song was 'Born to Run'. Sung alone, in this context, the emphasis changed drastically, from the teenage boast "tramps like us, baby we were born to run" to his adult mission: "I want to know if love is real."

Nevertheless, Springsteen hasn't forgotten how to have fun. 'Hungry Heart', 'Glory Days' and the old, reliable 'Rosalita' had an exuberant joyfulness, and a Mitch Ryder medley, Arthur Conley's 'Sweet Soul Music' and Eddie Floyd's ''Raise Your Hand' ended the night on a roaring adrenalin high.

But what gave richness to the show was Springsteen's insistence on dismantling the rock star facade built around him, brick by brick. He comes across as a man with an unquenchable desire for growth and self-knowledge, who has challenged his audience to keep growing with him.

© Wayne Robins, 1988

Thanks to the Rock’s Back Pages library of London for keeping my archives on hand. Hence, U.K. dating and punctuation, to which I don’t usually adhere.