The song that taught Bruce Springsteen to play lead guitar: “I was pissed off”
There’s a distinct difference between the lead guitar player and the vocalist in the band. The former is the technician who paints the outlines of the picture, while the vocalist colours in between, providing theatre and character that brings a song to life on stage.
Then, every now and then, you get artists who adopt both roles, artists like Bruce Springsteen.
The New Jersey musician fits the bill of an earnest songwriter. His ability to pen a story about the working-class experience while grinning beneath his scruffy beard and ragged tank top provides the proper presentation of a musical troubadour. There’s a soul to Springsteen’s songs that rightly captures your attention from the very outset.
But then you take a closer look and notice how integral a role the guitar plays in that. It’s his trusted companion that helps bring these stories to life, and so even without the words, the emotion of Springsteen the artist can be understood through the instrument. Sure, he’s less of a virtuoso and more of a feel player, focusing on a rhythmic drive that serves the song, but nevertheless, he has mastered it. In fact, he said it best on ‘Thunder Road’ when he sang, “I’ve got this guitar, and I learned how to make it talk.”
Given this, you would expect the more humble guitarists of old to have inspired him, blues singer-songwriters like Muddy Waters or folk storytellers like Bob Dylan, perhaps. And sure, while they certainly made their mark on Springsteen, it was in fact one song by one particular artist that inspired him to double down and master the instrument that would become his musical confidante.
Springsteen labelled The Rolling Stones’ cover of ‘It’s All Over Now’ by The Valentinos. Released in their early cover days, it focused less on projecting their own personality as it did their ability as a band, and for Springsteen, that was all that was needed to light a spark of influence.
He said the song, “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.’”
He continued, “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.”
Those sorts of humble anecdotes compound this idea that Springsteen is the artist for the people, making his gigs nothing more than an extension of that old bedroom where he learned his trade. It’s also no coincidence that the guitar through which Springsteen became best known was the Fender Telecaster, the very same model Richard used in his career. Without knowing it, on Richard’s version of ‘It’s All Over Now’, he passed the torch of influence to Springsteen, encouraging him to take rock into a bright new future.
