The Essential Bruce Springsteen Overview
2003 career retrospective from the boss! This strictly limited Australian exclusive edition comes with a bonus disc of rarities, live and previously unreleased tracks on 3 CDs. Columbia.
The Essential Bruce Springsteen Specifications
Vastly expanding 1995's single disc Greatest Hits, The Essential Bruce Springsteen easily surpasses the earlier best-of set by serving up all its true essentials and tossing in less appreciated treats and a full disc of rarities. Disc one spans the first decade of Springsteen's recording career, serving up at least two tracks each from the six albums that laid the groundwork for his '80s burst into superstardom. Disc two picks up with his mainstream breakthrough, 1984's Born in the U.S.A., and carries on through 2002's The Rising, tossing in live recordings of "American Skin" and "Land of Hope and Dreams" for good measure. The selections and sequencing surpass those made on Greatest Hits, though there's not too much in the way of surprises, other than that it appears that Born in the U.S.A. hasn't aged all that well for the Boss; here, he selects only three songs from the hit-laden smash, one fewer than is found on the skimpy Greatest Hits. Disc three is where the fun really starts for all but neophytes. The live "Held Up Without a Gun" is as gutsy a one minute and 20 seconds as Springsteen as one could ask for, and the likes of "Trapped," "Countin' on a Miracle," and a cover of "Viva Las Vegas" rank with his signature songs. --Steven Stolder
Customer Reviews
The most important item in the music of the last 35 years, creating the most important recordings in the career of Bruce Springsteen on three discs (including a few cuts including never released outtakes really important that the inclusion in the first two missing discs counterpart) is not as no easy task. For every "Born To Run" and "Dancing In The Dark" is included, there is a "Growin 'Up" and "Backstreets", missed the cut that is.
"The Essential Bruce Springsteen" is theComposition in question, and despite the obvious omissions, it takes a good job as a whole. You can achieve the timeless rock anthems that are formed almost mythical figure in Bruce, now helped ("Born To Run," "Badlands"), the epic story with unforgettable characters and local songs ("Thunder Road", "Jungleland" ), the classic hit singles ("Hungry Heart," "Glory Days") and the performance of the last days ("The Rising," "Lonesome Day"). In the middle, you get a large number of forgotten gems, such asas (much better than the most famous Manfred Mann Cover), "Blinded By The Light," "For You", "Tunnel Of Love", and some of Bruce has underestimated the period 1992-1997 (The Haunting "Youngstown" is, unfortunately, missing another gem from this period). To launch a couple of superlatives in this collection are the songs remastered and sound fantastic.
The third disc also contains some welcome treat. Two songs, this collection of the 2003 version, still available only byinveterate collectors finally pop up "County Fair" and the sublime Outtake "Born In The USA", "None But The Brave." On "The River" Outtake "Held Up Without A Gun", with the common voice of Bruce and Little Steven Van Zandt, in his (to 2008) only presents live performances from the famous 1980 New Years Eve show at Nassau Coliseum. Among other gems "From Small Things (Big Things One Day Come)," the ethereal "Lift Me Up", written for the John Sayles film "Limbo", but neverBruce on compilations so far, and "Dead Man Walkin '," an unsettling composition by Sean Penn / Susan Sarandon film of the same name.
As already mentioned, had a number of classics of the career of Bruce, in order to make the cut, and its absence is certainly considerable and obvious. This does not mean that this is still a solid bottom for the beginning of Springsteen fans, a crash course on some of the greatest music ever recorded.
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