ABSTRACT
In the first months of 2009, Bruce Springsteen performed at arguably the two most iconic events in American culture: the Presidential inauguration and the Superbowl. The ritual quality of the inaugural performance was strengthened by its setting in front of the Lincoln Memorial and by the redrobed choir that backed him, while the Superbowl show framed him as both preacher and ultimate referee. Clearly, these events seemed to suggest, this music by this performer means something. While not all reviews of his halftime performance were raves-some wincing at his near collision with a cameraman following a cross-stage slide perhaps better left to a younger rocker-these appearances suggest that Springsteen’s stature as an American institution is firmly resolved. And while such gigs may be seen as trophies awarded to has-beens, Springsteen’s commercial success has never been greater. According to Billboard, Springsteen had the second-highest-grossing tour of 2008, bringing in more than $204 million (Billboard 2008). The story of Bruce Springsteen as American culture hero is one I am
steeped in. I grew up in an assortment of East Coast suburban towns, where devotion to Springsteen was like a local dialect. I remember lying on the
living room floor with my sisters, studying album covers and fantasizing ourselves as Mary, the archetypal girlfriend in “Thunder Road,” dancing out the screen door to meet Bruce, who would drive us away to meet our destinies. Years later, I would return to those same songs with feminist rage. Still, I was moved and challenged by the later Springsteen’s tender portraits of struggling workers, illegal immigrants, and 9/11 widows, for whom the American Dream had slipped out of sight, even while I bristled at the fact that those songs were written in the comfort of a multimillion-dollar southern California mansion. And I would still point to Springsteen concerts as some of the most transcendent experiences of holy community I have ever had. Apparently, I am not alone in my highly charged response to this musician. Like only a few other popular musicians, Springsteen is the subject not only of glossy fan panegyrics, but of major academic analyses pursuing such themes as his relation to the American literary tradition of Whitman and Twain and the dynamics of gender in his lyrics.1 Relatively few fans read studies like these, but they contribute to a consensus formed among critics, cultural analysts, and politicians who have invoked his music that there is something going on in this music that is more significant than the stuff of most Top 40 hits. Such assessments are conceivable and often compelling because Spring-
steen is linked with a myth much larger than himself, a myth that reaches back not only to the formation of American identity, but to the Bible. Specifically, Springsteen’s work and person invite analysis in terms of the biblical themes of exodus and promised land, themes widely invoked in his lyrics, but also applicable to the phenomenon of Springsteen’s performances, social commentaries, and status as cultural icon. By virtue of that mythic connection, Springsteen’s music and persona become contested sites for ongoing negotiation over what is good and true-and ugly and shameful-about America. Certainly, the mythic lens I employ here is only one among several possible
interpretive tools for this music; much of it is better read as standard-issue rock-and-roll celebrations of freedom, sex, and rebellion. And I do not impute intentionality to musician or fan in the religious meanings I read in their words and behavior (though often these meanings are explicit). But I am convinced by the pervasiveness of this imagery that analysis of the symbols of exodus and promised land provide one useful route into one place in the culture where real conversation about the spiritual meanings of being an American is occurring.
