“Religious”: The guitar solo that blew Bruce Springsteen’s mind
Music is made up of many things, but at the centre of all of it is great songwriting partnerships. You have John Lennon and Paul McCartney, Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel, and often one of the most overlooked dynamics: Tom Petty and Mike Campbell.
There is something incredibly special about a writing partnership where no one member is attempting to outshine the other. You have some where the desire to write great songs often becomes some kind of competition. Paul McCartney was happy to admit that he, John Lennon and the other Beatles often found themselves going toe to toe and having a competitive nature about their writing style.
“I suppose musically I’m competing with the other three,” said McCartney, discussing writing within the Beatles and also their respective solo careers, “Whether I like it or not. It’s only human to compete.”
Tom Petty and Mike Campbell didn’t have much of a rivalry. They championed the song as opposed to one another as individuals, with Petty having a knack for songwriting and lyrical ability, while Campbell was able to put together exciting blues lines and blistering solos. Petty was always incredibly happy about working with Campbell, and described him as one of the very best in the world.
“Mike really is the best in rock and roll,” said Petty. “I’d be lost without him. I’ve played with Michael since 1970, so I wouldn’t understand playing with anyone else. We write together, and we’ve developed a whole style of playing together.”
So, what is Campbell’s secret? He has a playing style that straddles the line between rock, blues and psychedelic music, which means he has a great range which he can take from when writing. Different riffs, chord progressions and solo opportunities present themselves in his broad range of musical preferences, which he utilises freely to make some of the most exciting solos in rock. He also uses spontaneity to his advantage, recognising that while putting together layered and thoroughly produced guitar work can sound clean, releasing something which was the by-product of a first take has a freshness to it.
“A lot of times we get one and then say, “Okay, let’s double it” or “Let’s keep that and see if we can get one that’s better.” Then we spend some time with it,” said Campbell, discussing his process when recording solos, “But 95% of the time we go back to the first one because it always seems to have a freshness about it.”
Many great musicians recognise this spontaneous style of playing as something exciting. Bruce Springsteen, whose affinity for music has never waned in the decades that he’s been making, once found himself incredibly drawn to one of Campbell’s solos as he was there while it was being recorded. Given Campbell used the first take of 95% of his solos, Springsteen got to witness the off-the-cuff playing style that steered him in the right direction so frequently. Tom Petty recalled the moment Springsteen saw Campbell in action, and described his reaction as “religious.”
“Michael has played a lot of classic solos; he’s very imitated,” said Petty, “ I heard the solo in ‘Even The Losers’ from Damn The Torpedoes on the radio the other day, and that’s pretty staggering. I remember Bruce Springsteen was sitting there with us when we did that solo, and old Bruce just got religious!”
