Millennials Hate Bruce Springsteen

Salon ^ | FRIDAY, AUG 30, 2013 | EJ Dickson

[nickcarraway]

An entire generation has dismissed The Boss' music as lame "dad rock." Here's why they're all wrong

Every few weeks or so, I’ll be talking to someone at a bar or club or house party, and the conversation will inevitably turn toward Bruce Springsteen. The exchange is usually as follows:

BAR PATRON/PARTY GUEST: So, what kind of music do you listen to?

ME: Oh, a little bit of everything … blues, jazz, funk, Bruce Springsteen (brief pause) … you know, my tastes are super eclectic.

BAR PATRON/PARTY GUEST: Um, why do you like Springsteen?

ME: So, you don’t like Bruce Springsteen?

BAR PATRON/PARTY GUEST: Ugh. No.

(Long pause)

ME: (Shuffling away while muttering angrily, like an elderly woman being chastised for feeding pigeons) Well, you should.

This person will then enumerate the list of reasons why he dislikes Bruce Springsteen, usually employing four out of six of the following arguments:

He’s old. He sucks. He sucks because he’s old. He’s old because he sucks. He sings about being a member of the working class even though he’s made millions and millions of dollars over the past 30 years “Born in the USA” sucks. In my 24 years as a die-hard Bruce fan, I have had this conversation approximately eight or nine hundred thousand times. While the people on the other end tend to skew toward a specific demographic — white, male, in a creative profession, dating someone with bangs and an Egon Schiele tattoo — they come from a wide range of socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds, from Bushwick installation artists to a bouncer I met in Ireland, who used his loathing for “Born in the USA”

[dfwgator]

The only other thing Bruce was good for was when Robin Williams imitated Elmer Fudd singer “Fire”.

[Celtic Conservative]

Seconded.

CC

[dforest]

He sounds like a mashed cat. ugh, never liked him.

[nickcarraway]

I thought you loved the Looking Glass.

[sauropod]

Watch a few of his shows on YouTube, then look me in the eye and tell me he doesn’t fit into your life, somehow; that he doesn’t make you feel exhilarated and overwhelmed and joyful and heartbroken and hot-blooded and alive.

I looked the idiot writer in the eye. He's been measured and found wanting.

[Mad Dawgg]

"The only good thing about that band was Steve Van Zandt — not his playing, but the fact that his visibility from playing with Springsteen landed him the gig playing Sylvio on the Sopranos."

Then you should check out "Lilyhammer" on Netflix. He is the star of the show. Its about a Mob Boss who turns states evidence and they relocate him in Lillehammer Norway...

[nickcarraway]

The Springsteen version of that sounds like Van Morrison. What about “Fire” by the Pointer Sisters or “Pink Cadillac” by Natalie Cole?

[ilovesarah2012]

Used to like his music but he is an insane liberal. I can do without him.

[RedStateGuyTrappedinCT]

Only one good band has come out of Jersey....The Smithereens.

Thank You! I thought I was the only one :-)

[nickcarraway]

Wow. You can’t get decent scungilli in Norway?

[Celtic Conservative]

I like Kim Carnes version better. The robin williams imitation was drop dead funny. Another imitation on one of his albums was classical opera singer Beverly Sills singing Rod Stewarts "if ya think i'm sexy". Also drop dead funny. It was some of his earlier stuff if I recall

CC

[dfwgator]

“I’m dwiving in my cawww....you turn on the wadio....”

[MamaB]

Me, too. Never was impressed with him.

[Mad Dawgg]

"Wow. You can’t get decent scungilli in Norway?"

And that pretty much IS the show. Him adapting to life there while showing the natives a thing or two "Jersey Style"...

[freekitty]

Me too.

[Celtic Conservative]

Bruce's music is tolerable to me usually if it is covered by someone with singing talent like the pointer sisters or Natalie Cole. So I guess I give him props as a writer but not a singer.

CC

[Albion Wilde]

I skeeve from Springsteen because he sold out long, long ago. When he started out, playing college auditoriums and clubs the size of my living room on the Jersey shore, I was one of his first fans. I went backstage to meet him. I called him on the phone when he was appearing on college radio stations. I loved his musicianship on the first two albums. He had great originality. Then came the "Born in the USA" era, he began to mimic all the loud, loud bands, the driving beat, and the amplifiers the size of sports cars stacked three high. I was taken so by surprise by that at the Tower Theater in Philly that I think my slight hearing loss happened at that concert. But I was still willing to give him an open mind until he dumped his wife and went off with his electric violinist. I really don't care that they have stayed together.

And all that was even before his ridiculous sell-out to the Social Democrat Union Labor Grievance Entitlement Party.

Ptui.

[Revolting cat!]

Can we impeach Bruce Springstein?

[nickcarraway]

The problem with that is, I think, that someone like that would stick out too much in Lillyhammer. Does Witsec actually relocate people outside the U.S.?