Bruce Springsteen
Working on a Dream
Review By Jeff Ehrbar
“With you I have been blessed/what more can I expect,” blathers Bruce Springsteen on his latest CD, Working on a Dream. If his music is a reflection of his personal condition, he appears to be very happy. But the satiated feeling that permeates Working on a Dream is its Achilles’ heal — do you really want to listen to Mr. Darkness on the Edge of Town unabashedly fawn over his love with the accompaniment of strings?
Springsteen hinted at this path toward bliss on 2007’s Magic, his uneven attempt to recreate a Phil Spector sound. But he hadn’t yet achieved nirvana, so songs like “Girls in the Summer Clothes” “Radio Nowhere” and “Gypsy Biker” had their own quiet inner conflict. Working on a Dream has no such tension.
Musically, the songs are appealing. “My Lucky Day” and the title track are pleasant, catchy rockers. But with no descriptive teeth in the lyrics (“I’ve lost all the other bets I made/you’re my lucky day” and “out here the days are long and nights are lonely”), these songs are awash in clichés. “This Life” has all the brightness of the Beach Boys, with its “ba,ba,ba-ba,ba,ba,ba-bas” backing vocals and its sunshiny optimism (“this lonely planet never looked so good”).
“Surprise Surprise” is so syrupy, so ’60s bubblegum (“come on and open your eyes/and let your love shine down”) it recalls the Archies’ “Sugar Sugar.” Springsteen should be court-ordered to forfeit any leather jackets he owns. This good vibe continues on “Kingdom of Days,” where he contemplates his mortality (“with you I don’t feel the minutes ticking by”) against sweeping, Jimmy Webb orchestration.
“Queen of the Supermarket” is embarrassing. There’s humor in the concept of lusting after the working girl — Tom Waits’ early career was based on it—but Springsteen doesn’t see it. To the Boss, produce is serious business. With ascending strings and background vocals, he sings — with the somberness of a monk — “everything you need is at your fingertips/a dream awaits in aisle two.”
The only song that shows a pulse is “Life Itself.” Amid guitar-feedback, Springsteen’s back in the territory we know him best. “I knew you were in trouble/you carried your little black book from which all our secrets fell.” Unfortunately, “Outlaw Pete” is simply indulgent; it’s an eight-minute yarn whose thinly constructed “outlaw-as-hero” theme was done much better before by the likes of Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash.
Also included is the previously released “The Wrestler,” which fit well with the movie. But again the Springsteen overkill: how can a one-legged dog walk? (Would the one leg pull the remaining three? But wouldn’t the dog stumble the second he picked up the good leg?) Springsteen is a great songwriter — “The Rising” and “Born to Run” are among the best American songs ever written. But when doing Woody Guthrie thing at the Obama rallies last year, Springsteen railed against George Bush and the “disastrous administration of the last eight years.” Maybe we should rail against Springsteen’s disastrous recording output of the last four years.
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