FEATURED REVIEW................................................09 MAY 2005
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Artist:
BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN |
We really shouldn't be reviewing this album, but we have the sneaking suspicion that more than a few alt.country fans might be intrigued enough to buy the Boss' latest release. Mr. Springsteen is literate, after all (which cannot be said of most middle-aged rockers from New Jersey), and Devils & Dust has been getting some darn good press as of late.
Rolling Stone, for example, gives the album 4½ stars (out of 5), describing it as "subdued, mostly acoustic...Springsteen's most audacious record since the home-demo American Gothic of 1982's Nebraska." That's intriguing, right? (Yes, we know--it's been decades since anyone considered Rolling Stone the paragon of music journalism, but old reading habits die hard.)
It's not just Rolling Stone, though. The Evil Bean Empire (aka Starbucks) found Devils & Dust too raw to distribute, and that certainly bodes well. They've been selling ear-cheeze with their poverty beans for a while now--Norah Jones, Ray Charles, and other sickly-sweet concoctions to caffeinate by--so if they gave Devil's & Dust a miss, hey, maybe the Boss is back.
Nope. The Boss isn't back. He's as flabby and bloated as ever. Starbucks merely objected to the lines "Two-fifty up the ass" (from "Reno") and "I ain't gonna f*ck it up this time" (from "Long Time Comin'"). Unfortunately, Mr. Springsteen did.
Devils & Dust is another schlock-fest--a turgid, overproduced hunk of processed cheeze food. While most of the E-Street slicksters stayed at home for this one, Springsteen teams up with an atrocity known as the Nashville String Machine. (No, we're not making this up.) The Nashville String Machine is a real, live string ensemble that provides smooth, countrypolitan strings to any aesthetically-impared producer foolish enough to shell out the dough. (In this case, Brendan O'Brien. ) What's most absurd, however, is that the Nashville String Machine prides itself on sounding--if you can believe this--like a synthesizer. Yep, you got that right--living, breathing musicians standing in for a Casio. Welcome to hell.
The swelling sounds of these postmodern pranksters (we're just kidding--these guys are NOT being ironic) mar a significant chunk of the album. Notably, the String Machine ruins "Reno," "Silver Palomino," "Leah," and "The Hitter."
It's not just the sound of swelling strings that renders this album unpalatable, however. Brendan O'Brien seems to have borrowed a few production pointers from Brian Eno. "Black Cowboys," in particular, has a lush synthetic rumble reminiscent of the Eno-produced Dylan outtake "Series of Dreams" (or a half-dozen lousy U2 tracks). Not a good sound.
Elsewhere on the album--"Maria's Bed" and "All I'm Thinkin' About" to name but two examples--superfluous back-up singers contribute to the bloated mess. Springsteen sings "All I'm Thinkin' About," moreover, in a painful cracking falsetto. (What on earth was he thinking?)
Despite his many other shortcomings, the Boss can usually be counted on to hold his own lyrically. Not this time. Check out this line from "Matamoros Banks": "I long, my darling, for your kiss, for your sweet love I give God thanks." Or this verse from what's sure to become the next Christian Contemporary crossover hit, "Jesus Was an Only Son":
"In
the garden at Gethsemane,
He prayed for the life he'd never live.
He beseeched his Heavenly Father to remove,
The cup of death from his lips."
Bruce, we beseech you--hang it up.
In summation: As Dan Bern sang (in "Talkin' Woody, Bob, Bruce & Dan Blues"): "Don't talk. You look pale, Boss--not at all well." Three-and-a-half cheezeballs.
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A NOTE ON THE RATING SYSTEM:
5 CHEEZEBALLS = UNLISTENABLE SCHLOCK
3 CHEEZEBALLS = A DIFFICULT SLOG
1 CHEEZEBALL = THE ODD FORGIVABLE MISSTEP
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