Bruce Springsteen

I'm no Bruce Springsteen expert, but I can't help but see how (quietly) radical the start of "Thunder Road" is:

The screen door slams, Mary's dress waves
Like a vision she dances across the porch as the radio plays
Roy Orbison singing for the lonely
Hey, that's me and I want you only
Don't turn me home again, I just can't face myself alone again
Don't run back inside, darling, you know just what I'm here for
So you're scared and you're thinking that maybe we ain't that young anymore
Show a little faith, there's magic in the night
You ain't a beauty but, hey, you're all right
Oh, and that's all right with me...

Radical? Yep. It's a popular song, but the speaker isn't a wide-eyed teen, and almost nothing is simple. Nothing is black-and-white. Do you notice all the shades of gray? Mary "ain't a beauty," but counts as "all right." The two stars "ain't that young anymore." The speaker himself doesn't seem fully certain that this date--whatever it will be--will turn out to count as a great idea. But the alternative is unbearable: "Don't turn me home again. I just can't face myself alone again."

Self-loathing in a Top 40's hit! A (sort of) love song. Odd.

Also, I admire the craftsmanship. It seems effortless. It isn't. How quickly a scene is painted: the slamming screen door, the waving dress, the Roy Orbison song on the radio. The breezy way the speaker "connects" with Roy Orbison (just as Bruce Springsteen is inviting *us* to connect with Bruce Springsteen).

Springsteen isn't telling us that all is perfect, but he's giving us the image of a divided, suffering, enduring self, and as we consider that self, we might feel a bit less alone. For the length of a song. Hurray for that!

P.S. Did you notice the playing-with-the-term-"all-right"? It can mean "pretty-ish," and it can also mean something bigger. "That's all right with me." "I'm soldiering on."

P.P.S. This song reminds me of "Dancing in the Dark," which also gives us a guy fed up with himself, pleading with a prospective date to start something new.

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