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eye_of_a_catI think I just got the Bruce Springsteen thing.
Not, that is, the reason women want to marry him (still puzzling) or the reason he's popular (never puzzling). The Bruce Springsteen Thing is the anger, annoyance, or intermediate level of grumble, that incredibly rich Bruce can sing first-person songs about being poor. I used to scoff and roll my eyes at this on the dual grounds that a) it's unfair to trap people in some bizarre cycle of negative-success, where if his songs about poor people are good enough for people to make them popular then he shouldn't be allowed to sing them, and b) the world does not need any more songs about how existentially horrific it is to be a famous rich white man. (See: Randy Newman's 'It's Lonely At The Top'. See also: What's Wrong With 'Goodbye Yellow Brick Road', viz. "you, Elton John, have a plough. That you are going back to.")
Anyway, so. I didn't get the Bruce Springsteen thing until 11.21pm last night, when I was listening to 'Car Wash', in which a woman works a low-wage dead-end job in guess where, and it contained the following lines:
"Well, some day I'll sing in a night club
I'll get a million dollar break
Some handsome man will come here with a contract in his hand
And say 'Catherine, this has all been some mistake.'"
I still stick to my guns re: unfair fame cycle and no more rich-kid angst, but, um. Bruce, draw a line before you get to singing about poor people whose impossible dream of escape involves a multi-million dollar record deal, would you?
Not, that is, the reason women want to marry him (still puzzling) or the reason he's popular (never puzzling). The Bruce Springsteen Thing is the anger, annoyance, or intermediate level of grumble, that incredibly rich Bruce can sing first-person songs about being poor. I used to scoff and roll my eyes at this on the dual grounds that a) it's unfair to trap people in some bizarre cycle of negative-success, where if his songs about poor people are good enough for people to make them popular then he shouldn't be allowed to sing them, and b) the world does not need any more songs about how existentially horrific it is to be a famous rich white man. (See: Randy Newman's 'It's Lonely At The Top'. See also: What's Wrong With 'Goodbye Yellow Brick Road', viz. "you, Elton John, have a plough. That you are going back to.")
Anyway, so. I didn't get the Bruce Springsteen thing until 11.21pm last night, when I was listening to 'Car Wash', in which a woman works a low-wage dead-end job in guess where, and it contained the following lines:
"Well, some day I'll sing in a night club
I'll get a million dollar break
Some handsome man will come here with a contract in his hand
And say 'Catherine, this has all been some mistake.'"
I still stick to my guns re: unfair fame cycle and no more rich-kid angst, but, um. Bruce, draw a line before you get to singing about poor people whose impossible dream of escape involves a multi-million dollar record deal, would you?
