Bruce Springsteen’s song is about being “an outsider”
(Source: Far Out / Larry Busacca – Alamy)
It’s hard to imagine a time when Bruce Springsteen wasn’t a beloved, globally successful and hugely influential cornerstone of rock and roll music. The New Jersey-born songwriter has had a truly iconic career that has spanned six decades, spanning a variety of different styles and genres in that time. Throughout all that time, however, Springsteen never forgot his early beginnings as a rock and roll outsider growing up in New Jersey.
In these early years, Springsteen, like many people of his generation, found an escape from the monotony of suburban life in the revolutionary sounds of rock and roll. In fact, it was the sight of the King himself, Elvis Presley, on The Ed Sullivan Show At just seven years old, this set Springsteen on his first path to musical greatness. However, this penchant for rock rebellion also made the future songwriter seem like an outsider and loner during his high school years.
As Springsteen’s 20s approached, the aspiring young musician felt largely lost. Alienated from education, he briefly enrolled at a local college before dropping out; he didn’t seem to “fit in” anywhere. But as always, the answer came in the form of rock and roll. After seeing the Beatles perform on American television in 1964, Springsteen threw himself into it, forming various groups and playing at any local bar, pub or restaurant that would let him.
After spending much of the 1960s making a name for himself in the American East Coast music world, Springsteen finally set about recording an album – Greetings from Asbury Park, NJ – along with the group that later became the E Street Band. In fact, it was this album that gave Springsteen his first big step into the music industry, a step he would never regret.
It’s safe to assume that if you’re reading this, you already know the rest of the Springsteen story about his rise to rock stardom and his unique ability to stay at the top of his game for several decades. It seems, however, that Springsteen never completely turned his back on his New Jersey roots, but regularly paid tribute to his hometown and the early life experiences that shaped him. Inevitably, even as a rock’n’roll superstar, the songwriter always maintained the “outcast” mentality.
These feelings of youthful alienation have been addressed by Springsteen many times over the years, but are perhaps most evident in the 1975 track “Backstreets,” which is taken from his formative album Born to run. When we talk about the construction of the song, Rolling Stone In 2016, Springsteen said he was inspired by “youth, the beach, the night, friendships, the feeling of being an outsider and kind of living away from everything in this little outpost in New Jersey. It’s also about a place of personal refuge.”
Given that he had previously escaped teenage alienation and the monotony of suburbia for the vibrant world of rock ‘n’ roll, it must have been a great satisfaction for Springsteen to come full circle by writing an incredibly successful song about that very subject.
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