The Bruce Springsteen song about the bitter relationship with his father
He’s widely regarded as one of the finest musicians of American pop music, and Bruce Springsteen has built that impressive reputation on his own back. A powerhouse performer, and affectionately known as ‘The Boss’, Springsteen’s songwriting is what has shined most of all and landed him in the upper echelons of music-making alongside his heroes Bob Dylan and Paul McCartney.
Whether he is trying to restart the rhythm of America’s heartland with his blue-collar tales of hot rods and grease-covered love-ins or simply providing some of the most tortured love songs the world has ever known, Springsteen knows that honesty is the quickest route to creating a great track.
“I always wanted my music to influence the life you were living emotionally – with your family, your lover, your wife, and, at a certain point, with your children,” the songwriter once shared. Over 21 studio albums, ever-the-performer Springsteen, has left no stone unturned and provided a searing group of works that not only outline his own life but act as a chronicle of the American people, too.
His best form of attack in operating as America’s unofficial biographer is by using his own life as a conduit for creating connections with his audiences. There are many songs which Springsteen could label as autobiographical but then appropriate themselves as universal anthems when they hit the airwaves. One need only look at his most pertinent love songs for examples of that. However, there is one relationship which is perhaps even more important to the musician, the one with his father.
It’s not strange to see a performer with a difficult paternal relationship, and Springsteen is another musician who has endured a bittersweet connection to his father. This is accurately typified in his song ‘Adam Raised A Cain’, which, given the title alone, allows the audience to bear witness to the highly charged father-son relationship.
Of course, the song is steeped in religious undertones. Cain, in the bible, is Adam and Eve’s rebellious son, overshadowed by the goodness of his brother Abel. After becoming offended that God prefers Abel’s offering to Cain’s, the latter murder his brother. The act is seen by God and damns Cain to a life as a troubled nomad. In Springsteen’s song, he looks more closely at the role of Adam in raising such a son.
Labelling the song “emotionally autobiographical”, Springsteen uses the track to reflect on his own paternal connection, which was both loving yet painful: “Our actual relationship was probably more complicated than how I presented it. Those songs were ways that I spoke to my father at the time, because he didn’t speak and we didn’t talk very much.”
Considering the generation of Springsteen, enamoured with The Beatles and rock ‘n’ roll and that of his father, who likely suffered far greater hardship, the musician demonstrates a truth in the 1978 song that many of his generation could have connected with.
It is never easy to outwardly express the feelings one holds towards our parents, but Springsteen not only managed to convey his message in the texturally brilliant tune, but he also gave a voice to others who perhaps struggled to do the same.
