Bruce Springsteen explains why Chuck Berry is “rock’s greatest practitioner”
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The first solo Bruce Springsteen ever learned was a Rolling Stones classic
Bruce Springsteen’s life was changed when he heard The Beatles on the radio. The sweet sounds seduced him and connected him to a life of rock music. From that precious moment onward, it was all that Springsteen cared about, and discovering another British invasion band, The Rolling Stones, was another pivotal point in his musical journey. in fact, the Stones offered something entirely different.
For Springsteen, The Rolling Stones are the epitome of rock ‘n’ roll, and his journey began by trying to replicate them in his bedroom. Little did Bruce know that years later, he’d get the opportunity to exchange licks on stage one day with the band and become an honorary member of The Stones.
Growing up, Springsteen even had a recurring dream that he’d be plucked out of the crowd at a show by The Rolling Stones and replace Mick Jagger, who fell sick. “I fell asleep at night with dreams of rock ‘n’ roll glory in my head,” he once recalled. “Here’s how one would go: The Stones have a gig at Asbury Park’s Convention Hall, but Mick Jagger gets sick. It’s a show they’ve got to make, they need a replacement, but who can replace Mick?”
He continued: “Suddenly, a young hero rises, a local kid, right out of the audience. He can ‘front’: he’s got the voice, the look, the moves, no acne, and he plays a hell of a guitar. The band clicks, Keith is smiling, and suddenly, the Stones aren’t in such a rush to get Mick out of his sickbed. How does it end? Always the same…. the crowd goes wild.”
The Stones were an obsession for Springsteen they took over his dreams and helped hi accomplish them. During an appearance on the BBC radio programme Desert Island Discs, Bruce spoke about his teenage ambition to be Brian Jones and how he’d even accessorise his hair to cosplay as the guitarist. “I would use my mother’s hair clips to pin my hair down, then I would sleep on it exactly right, because I had Italian curly hair so I would pin it down until it was as straight as Brian Jones’,” he innocently recalled.
When confessing his 1960s coiffeur, Springsteen was speaking about his love of The Stones’ track ‘It’s All Over Now’, which he named as a song he’d like to take with him if he was stranded on a desert island. Whenever Bruce listens to the effort, it’s a poignant reminder of when he stayed up all night and learnt to play his first guitar solo.
‘The Boss’ explained ‘It’s All Over Now’ “held a special place for me because when I got thrown out of my first band, I went home that night and I was pissed off, so I said ‘All right I’m going to be a lead guitar player’. And for some reason, that solo felt like something I might be able to manage. I put the record on and I sat there all night until I was able to scrape up some relatively decent version of Keith’s solo. It was a very important record for me as it was the first solo I ever learned.”
This incident was a life lesson to Springsteen, and it made him realise that nothing was unachievable if he put his mind to it. Furthermore, Bruce was also fuelled by a desire to prove his former bandmates wrong for sacking him, and he poured that energy into successfully conquering the solo in ‘It’s All Over Now’.
