Song Lyric Sunday: The Boss

I feel a bit of a fraud. Somehow, as you can see from his post, Name That Tune, Jim is giving me the credit for today’s Song Lyric Sunday theme. But I think he should share in that: all I did was comment when he posted Layla some weeks ago that it had a recognisable intro, and he leapt on that as a theme for future use. So here we are. For me, apart from that one – which I played in the most recent Tuesday Tunes anyway – there can only be one song for this. It isn’t the longest intro, coming in at around 15 seconds, and I wouldn’t be surprised if someone else chooses it too, but when those chords crank up I know instantly what is coming. See what I mean:

And here are the lyrics:

In the day we sweat it out on the streets
Of a runaway American dream
At night we ride through the mansions of glory
In suicide machines
Sprung from cages on Highway 9
Chrome wheeled, fuel injected, and steppin’ out over the line
Oh, baby this town rips the bones from your back
It’s a death trap, it’s a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we’re young
‘Cause tramps like us, baby, we were born to run
Yes, girl, we were

Wendy, let me in, I wanna be your friend
I wanna guard your dreams and visions
Just wrap your legs ’round these velvet rims
And strap your hands ‘cross my engines
Together we could break this trap
We’ll run ’til we drop, baby, we’ll never go back
Oh, will you walk with me out on the wire?
‘Cause, baby, I’m just a scared and lonely rider
But I gotta know how it feels
I want to know if love is wild
Babe, I want to know if love is real
Oh, can you show me

Beyond the Palace, hemi-powered drones
Scream down the boulevard
Girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors
And the boys try to look so hard
The amusement park rises bold and stark
Kids are huddled on the beach in the mist
I wanna die with you, Wendy, on the street tonight
In an everlasting kiss

The highway’s jammed with broken heroes
On a last chance power drive
Everybody’s out on the run tonight
But there’s no place left to hide
Together, Wendy, we can live with the sadness
I’ll love you with all the madness in my soul
Oh, someday, girl, I don’t know when
We’re gonna get to that place
Where we really wanna go and we’ll walk in the sun
But ’til then, tramps like us
Baby, we were born to run

Oh honey, tramps like us
Baby, we were born to run
Come on with me, tramps like us
Baby, we were born to run

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Bruce Springsteen

Born To Run lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC

Five minutes of the most incredible, high octane rock music that have ever been created. That song and its album came out forty seven years ago and I never tire of hearing it, and I never will. The basic facts are that the Born To Run album and single were both released on 25 August 1975. The album was Bruce’s third, and was packed full of great tracks, so much so that this wasn’t even the opener, as you might have expected: it started up side two, back in those days when we all bought our music on vinyl. It was very much Bruce’s breakthrough album in the US, where it got to #3 and has gone on to sell more than 7m copies. It fared less well here in the UK, reaching only #36 on its original release, though it has since peaked at #17 on a re-release. To my mind, that is still criminally low for such an iconic record. Cumulative sales over the years have qualified it for a Platinum Disc, though, so at least we haven’t failed him completely. By comparison it has achieved 7xPlatinum status in the US! The single got to #23 in the US and #56 in the UK, though a live version did better here, making #16 in 1987.

I was already a fan of The Boss after his first two albums, and couldn’t wait for his next one. But wait I did, as this record came out the week I got married, so my purchase had to follow our return from honeymoon. But I had my priorities right: even though cash was tight as newlyweds and we had a flat to furnish, a stand for the stereo system and a new album to play on it were high on the list! It is an incredibly good album, and as I said it is one that I still play to this day. Sadly, I’ve never been to one of his epic live shows: the closest I got was around ten years later when our ad agency had a spare ticket for a client for his gig at Wembley Stadium. Despite knowing that I was a huge fan they took a colleague instead: well, she was much prettier than me so I didn’t stand a chance, did I? But at least it created a new fan for him. I looked it up out of curiosity: they played two nights, with twenty three songs across two sets, plus a seven song encore. They saved Born To Run until the second song of their encore: that’s what I call confidence!

I hope you’ve enjoyed my choice for ‘my’ theme – see you again soon 🤘