Bruce Springsteen
Magic

THE REVIEW

Everything and the opposite of everything. Anticipation violated by the internet. Enthusiasms suppressed and then exploded. Suspected, awaited, and feared disappointments, then exploded even more strongly.

People waiting for him at the Milan Forum as if expecting the messiah, and people who believe he's over and not what he used to be.

For some, the intimate albums are much more beautiful, for others "there's no one like the E Street."

Undoubtedly, the only thing that cannot be denied is that Bruce Springsteen, the Boss, cannot help but be talked about. But again, certainly there is someone willing to spew sophisms to prove that he is a modest character, fluff inflated by the very bad market (the bogeyman that serves to dumb down the young and reassure the hysterics with his objective ultra-presence), and that he doesn't have the fresh appeal of the Franz Ferdinand (just to name a name in the very youthful and meteoric current landscape...).

The fact remains that this story that began in the early seventies has today written another chapter, a chapter difficult to read, easy to label, in short, challenging to definitively evaluate. Yes, because the album is apparently similar to many others, with the "stadium" track, the committed and the carefree ballad, the interesting string arrangement and the thrilling guitar part, the scratched tenor riff, the protagonist's scream and whisper.

In short: the Boss is back, and moreover with the E Street, in one of those periodic comebacks that excite, annoy, bore, outrage, making people shout about both miracles and scandals.

The album, because after all it has to be talked about, is rock, provided that rock still means distorted guitars, Hammond organs, decisive drums, and ancient and solid walls of sound.

It is therefore a record "from the old days", always assuming that one convinces oneself that rock is dead (and I am quite convinced of this... or fear that, at least, it's not doing well...).

Non-trivial lyrics, catchy and singable music, diversity, and great professionalism.

Trivial things...? Perhaps. But I am convinced that, just as in jazz, it's difficult to say something with a tenor sax after Trane, in rock and songwriting it's incredibly difficult to say something new, or at least good, after the Stones, Dylan, and the few other greats who didn't just write great pages, but turned the pages, accomplishing that event today completely unknown and unprecedented which is the "step forward."

And the Boss, who has turned a few pages, says nothing new here, but what he does say, he says very well. This is the effort of honesty that should be allowed, without shame and not succumbing to pseudo-musical progressivism which often hides nothing other than the inability to accept the passage of time and the obstinacy to consider one's own era worthy of memories it can neither have nor sow.

Impossible to deny value to these tracks written by someone over fifty and played (always very well) by another handful of oldies or almost (Clemmons is heading for seventy and rumors have it this will be his last tour, Federici seems not in the best of health, etc...).

Impossible to deny that, here as elsewhere, old masters shine more, saying very well the nothing new that they say, rather than the too many young shooting stars sold to us as geniuses (understood or not understood, it doesn’t matter...), clean-shaven and warbling, academic and useless. Absolutely indistinguishable for the simple reason that distinguishing them is an activity as unnecessary as it is destined to be outdated from one week to the next.

Here there is an old house, an old couch, familiar and very comfortable. But, as often happens, if you throw it away, you immediately regret the seemingly perfect replacement from Ikea.

In America, they wrote that "rock is dead but they forgot to tell Bruce Springsteen."

A nice phrase, also interpretable in two ways, like everything concerning the Boss: rock is dead and he pathetically hasn't noticed, or it's dead, and he, rightly, doesn't give a damn?