Bob Seger vs. Bruce Springsteen

regards,

REB

Both acts are so pedestrian and far behind the times. They have no clue how music has evolved over the years and no clue as far as how to evolve themselves.

The road to hell is paved with groups who were "of the moment," dumbass. Watch out, or you'll step on Roni Size.

Well, yes I am a dumbass....in every sense of the word and of the highest order. But this dumbass cannot bring himself to think highly of any groups considered "of the moment" or those who are only consistent in consistently repeating themselves. For this dumbass, the only musicians worthy of praise are those who expand their musical horizons to incorporate the many styles and genres that are out there to learn of and learn from. In their ignorance, they remain vapid and vacuously....burma shave.

(And "Like a Rock" is a total piece of shit and possibly the *worst* thin Seger has ever done.)

Springsteen, on the other hand, totally rulez.

According to my uncle who worked for him back in the late 80s, Seger has enough money he doesn't have to worry about anything and was completely sick of touring and the business of making music. He never formally has said he was retired, but just doesn't do much anymore. I doubt he cares about anything current or being of the times other than to himself.

Springsteen lost his touch when he broke up the E-Street band and moved to Cali and hasn't been able to get it back. Everything he has done that I have heard since "Tunnel of Love" sounds too slick and the songs just don't have the same hook.

"They have no clue how music has evolved over the years and no clue as far as how to evolve themselves."

Mind you, their music isn't nearly as good as what they used to do, but at least it is in line with what they have done before.

So should they be making filter house, glich folk records or getting remixes by the Neptunes? As the saying goes, there is nothing more pathetic than an aging hipster.

To somewhat his credit, Robbie Robertson tried to stay current, at least production wise, but the results are pretty mixed. I like his first solo album, which was pretty high tech for its time.

At least until his last record, which wasn't very good, Tom Petty seemed to be keeping more on the mark than any of his peers.

Neither Springsteen nor Seger will ever (or could ever) again make a record as great as the ones which made them famous. Petty could, but won't.

When singer/songwriters track the records together, the interplay between instruments sounds stiff, which is why later Springsteen, Seger and Mellancamp doesn't work as well as their best music.

Petty went through a stretch in the 80s, where he was trying to keep "current" with production and it just didn't work as well.

I just didn't think the songs on Petty's last record we're that great.

When Springsteen released Human Touch/Lucky Town with that crew of L.A. longhairs, I was certain the end was nigh. And, for the most part, it was. The only times Springsteen really moves me anymore is when it's just him, a simple backbeat, and an acoustic guitar or distant synth ("Streets of Philadelphia," "Secret Garden").

Furthermore, I think joyful is dead-on regarding the attitude of many indie fans. Now, don't get me wrong, most of my collection is indie, underground, avant-garde, punk, experimental, free jazz, and psychedelic flip-outs. However, I think the cynicism the music industry has brought on itself (for good reason) has had an interesting side-effect where too many people have evidently decided that the LESS people who know about a band, the better that band MUST be, and ANY band that has the gall to make a good living in their chosen trade, instead of having to keep their day jobs, MUST suck. Not true.

Reviews that are better than the album they are reviewing...

Go listen to "2 + 2 = ?" (aka "two plus two is on my mind") from the LP "Tales Of Lucy Blue" (aka "Ramblin' Gamblin' Man") by The Bob Seger System and tell me that Jack White did not rip-off this song wholesale for "Seven Nation Army"

"Like many '70s rockers, Bob Seger thought his master tapes were safely biding their time in the record company's vault.

But when he compiled Greatest Hits II, Seger found that his stereo master tapes weren't of high enough quality, and the original multitracks had turned to goo.

That meant baking the tapes in a convection oven to stabilize them, transferring them to digital, and remixing each song from square one."

Yeesh. That does not bode well.

McCollum: A lot of fans wonder when we're gonna see compact disc reissues of older albums like "Noah" and "Back in '72." What's the status of all that vintage material?

Seger: We, in conjunction with Capitol, bought (the masters). So we -- and Capitol -- can determine when that stuff is going to come out...

But I am considering putting out an album eventually of all these tracks that you read about on the Internet, all these tracks that just missed being on albums -- even outtakes from "Live Bullet" and things of that nature. Just clearing the deck. It would be about 30 or 40 songs that have never been released. Like, "OK, here they are! Now stop calling me!"

Why is Bruce so untouchable? Every goddam song has a lame saxophone solo, excepting the horribly overrated Nebraska, which sucks for another reason entirely. His lyrics are mostly trite, faux-working class blue collar 'Noo Joisey' shit, like Bon Jovi aping Dylan, but guilty of the same out-of-touch-with-the-working-people-ness as certain members of Congress.

While I don't dislike Bruce NEARLY as much as the Beastie Boys and Kiss (I happen to like a few of his songs, namely on Darkness on the Edge of Town and "Spirits in the Night"), I just don't see the big deal, and brother, I have known my share of Bruce purists who've tried in vain to get me to see the light. Give me Elton over Bruce.

that's what acute/car park had to do with the theoretical girls reissue. it's time-consuming but by no means impossible, especially if you've got $. which i'm assuming mr.seger does.

more interesting -- stan ridgway v. springsteen. how about that one, hey?

that said, and as i said sometime earlier, i first heard "ramblin' gamblin' man" for the first time ever a few months ago and i really liked it.

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0350/eddy.php

And I know what you mean about "guilty pleasures." Mine include Buckingham/Nicks-era Fleetwood Mac and the Monkees. :-)

Well, you just described me! Seger sorta wins by default but that's more because I still haven't gotten around to hearing all these early singles of his, which sound intriguing. Then Seger will probably win by merit too.

and tho I can take or leave the Monkees, I own every Michael Nesmith album - genius!!

john sinclair takes sides, circa born 2 run, throws down a long form argument anti-boss/pro-bruce with digs at marsh and landau along the way.

http://oldnews.aadl.org/node/200073

right on!

no no no he's pro-BOB *slaps forehead*

Despite was Sinclair claims, Marsh hated Don McLean. Marsh also praised Seger at every opportunity, before, during, and after Bruce's ascendance.

All the "West Side Story" crack shows is that Sinclair (himself a virulently anti-rock'n'roll snob until he was asked to manage the MC5) had never heard anything by the Ronettes, the Crystals, or the Shangri-Las, among others.

i was listening to an mfsl half speed mastered copy of born to run the other day and i like that it reminds me of christmas music. and bat out of hell. and that whole rocky horror theater-rock thing that was in the air back then. also, the song born to run will always sound like the best phil spector wall ever. so weird that i never get tired of that song. how many times do you think i've heard it in my american lifetime?

x-post-that Sinclair piece is a fun read.

the opening bit about black musical culture being on the verge of totally taking over is v prescient

I love the Christmas music aspect to Springsteen (his Christmas soul covers are, not coincidentally, total ragers), and of course Bat Out of Hell is at least partly driven by the E Street Band. BtR the song is some once in an eon force of nature. There's a great bootleg from I think '74 or so, right around the time before the album landed, where Bruce clearly doesn't quite know what he has yet. The song comes third - third! - in the setlist, and while the rest of the show is great, BtR lands with this weird out of context wallop.

Anyway, interesting piece, albeit tainted a tad by dirty laundry. I love reading about the rise of folks like Springsteen from a contemporaneous perspective, because I can imagine someone totally dismissing it as smartly marketed hype, before the dude had proved himself a thousand times over. Seger, I don't know much about that cat except the radio songs, which I really don't like. But a lot of people I do like like him, so I've always been curious, though not enough to dig anything out. Is there one Seger album whose deep (that is, non-single) cuts are so great they'd convince me?

Incidentally, Springsteen was always reportedly very self-conscious about his inability to attract a black audience. Possibly because the ascendant funk and soul of the '70s was so different from the '50s and '60s black music his own music echoed. If anything, I wonder if the number of non-white people attending his shows has gone down since the early '70s. You'd almost think, listening to the albums, that those early Springsteen shows would attract relatively diverse crowds, esp. c. the 2nd album, but I have no idea.

Is there one Seger album whose deep (that is, non-single) cuts are so great they'd convince me?

short answer is no

long answer is:
http://doomandgloomfromthetomb.tumblr.com/post/5450595340/never-mind-the-bullets-bob-seger-1966-1974-i

I liked Born in the USA and Tunnel of Love when I was a teenager but have long soured on Brooooce. His appeal is a perennial mystery to me.

Ramblin' Gamblin' Man is a GREAT album. my favorite of all his albums.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BwBjfExLCk

uh, in answer to the seger deep cuts album to get...

Oh, should have said, I have that garage rock stuff already, but I don't count it.

I've yet to get tired of Bruce, and every time I take a break some months later I either catch him live or re-listen to a bootleg and he convinces me all over again. I'm a sucker for the sound, the romance of it, and honestly a lot of his anger/frustration/catharsis. And lately his weird optimism in the face of the former.

yeah idk I find his whole blue-collar-manly-man-playing-REAL-rock-n-roll-with-the-gang schtick just totally unappealing. almost offended by the reactionary conservatism of the aesthetic tbh, there's just no way into that for me.

Springsteen may well be the greater or better artist re songwriting, but I'm too lazy to do the cherrypicking(after the 70s) probably required to prove it. Seger's seemingly effortless risin' rasp has always seemed to have more starpower than Springsteen's sometimes strained warble-yelp, and in this century I'm more inclined to listen to him, often starting with those singles, often re-posted over the years by Myonga and Tyler (thanks so much, guys)

Also thanx to Scott for RGM!

xpost I can see that, but that's sort of how I feel more about bands like, I dunno, the Strokes, who are ten times the poseur than Springsteen ever was. I believe (foolishly?) in the myth of Bruce's man of the people authenticity, because that has overwhelmingly been what people have claimed and reported of him.

I know by now his schtick definitely scans as conservative, but I've always thought his dedication to that particular aesthetic sort of rebellious, the same way punks worshiped girl group sounds and rockabilly. Or at least far more rebellious than any other multi-millionaire legacy act these days. He's still engaged and pushing hard without losing his innate Bruce-ness.

Regardless, Springsteen has multiple great albums post-70s, so not much need to cherry pick!

fair enough, although Brooce's authenticity is not the issue for me. While I unreservedly love a lot of his sources - Dylan, Spector, Motown, etc. - he slots them into a framework that just has zero appeal to me. He strips out the otherness and odd edges of those sources and makes them into an all-american muscle car. And as much as I respect and am sympathetic to his blue-collar-lefty bona fides, as music it just seems like he took a bunch of interesting stuff and made it boring/safe(r).

I'm sure I've said all this before on some other Bruce vs. somebody thread...

makes them into an all-american muscle car

listen harder.

I've tried, but even the hits don't hit me. I can't even remember how Born to Run goes, and I must've heard it a hundred times.

WTF

Let's rank Seeg's top forty singles.

yeah idk I find his whole blue-collar-manly-man-playing-REAL-rock-n-roll-with-the-gang schtick just totally unappealing. almost offended by the reactionary conservatism of the aesthetic tbh, there's just no way into that for me.

I got a really nice copy of Nebraska today, great album. Love love love “highway patrolman”

One thing I will say for Bob Seger, he's surprisingly good at/interested in writing from a female perspective. My favorite is "The Fire Inside," where "you" go out to a club, pick up a guy, bring him home, and then lie awake waiting for him to leave so you can lock the door behind him. That detail of the door impresses me every time.

That said, though, Bruce all the way. I like Seger just fine, but Springsteen is just on another level as a writer and artist.

Nebraska was the album that converted me from casual fandom to full-on Bruce insanity.

I love them both and will never choose between them

It seems that there should be some type of late 70s LA crime love triangle movie that uses "Hollywood Nights" as the big theme tune.

"I'm just another consensus on the street."