How Suicide influenced Bruce Springsteen album ‘Nebraska’
It can sometimes be difficult for artists to find inspiration for their music, and an ability to draw from others to create original art is often what separates a good musician from a great one. When you consider someone like Bruce Springsteen, who has released a mass of albums over the decades, it is hardly a surprise that various aspects of life have inspired different projects. In the case of the 1982 album Nebraska, Springsteen was heavily influenced by the minimalist, synth-punk band Suicide.
“That’s one of the most amazing records I think I ever heard,” The Boss said when asked about his appreciation for the band’s 1977 debut, “I really love that record,” he added. Springsteen, in particular, took a shine to the song ‘Frankie Teardrop’, which is a ten-minute-long horror story that follows a war veteran and laid-off factory worker who kills his family and then himself. On the face of it, there may not be that many similarities between the music of Springsteen and Suicide, but you’d be surprised after digging a little deeper.
Firstly, the creation of Nebraska itself is undoubtedly punk. Springsteen had already cemented himself as a rock star by this point, what with the release of Born To Run in 1975 and Darkness On the Edge of Town in 1978. Granted, the predecessor to Nebraska, The River, was one of The Boss’ more haunting LP’s, but going from that to a wholly sparse and chilling album made up of self-recorded demos can’t be described as anything but a punk move.
“We first met Springsteen in 1980,” said Suicide singer Alan Vega, “He was recording The River and we were recording our second album in New York…we had a playback meeting for our album. There were three or four big shots from our label, and Bruce was there, too. After we played the album, there was deathly silence… except for Bruce, who said, ‘that was fucking great.’ He made a point of telling us how much he loved it.”
That playback and interaction with Suicide will have been a significant influence on Springsteen, one that made him want to record a much sparser LP with haunting narratives and some borderline experimental vocals.
Unsurprisingly, their musical tastes align somewhat as the two artists grew up at a similar time, learning from the same people and interpreting the lessons differently. Influences included the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis, Gene Vincent and Elvis Presley.
“I never heard anything avant garde,” confirmed Vega, “To me it was just New York City blues.” It’s likely Bruce heard those influences buried in Suicide’s synth and wanted to try something new with his next record as a result.
The visual aspects of Springsteen’s Nebraska are not dissimilar from Suicide’s. While their debut relies heavily on blood spatter, Bruce opts for a more subtle image, one that is still bleak and invokes feelings of dread. The subject matters touched upon in the album highlight America when it was at its most vulnerable and desperate. Springsteen writes about murder, creates dark folk music and isn’t afraid to yelp in the song ‘State Trooper’, not dissimilar to his punk rock counterparts. “I remember walking into my label just after it came out,” said Vega, “I thought it was one of my albums that I had forgotten about. But it was Bruce!”
When someone has a back catalogue as extensive as Springsteen’s, it’s interesting to look back on it and see what might have influenced various albums. It’s a surprise at first to find out just how much Suicide played a part in his album Nebraska, especially given they sound nothing alike, but when the themes of both LPs are held up side by side, the similarities are easy to spot. As a result, one of The Boss’ most obscure albums starts to make a lot more sense.
