Bruce Springsteen - Next Deluxe Box Set Speculation Thread

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Bink, May 5, 2018.

  1. Sean Murdock

    Sean Murdock Forum Intruder

    Location:
    Bergenfield, NJ
    Oh, no -- I don't assume they were "finished" and then discarded; rather, I assume that Bruce did at least a dozen takes of each (maybe multiple dozens) and then gave up in frustration. What I'm hoping is that he can go back to them -- with 35 years of hindsight -- and realize that some of them were pretty good as-was, and are worth releasing on a box set. It wouldn't be unprecedented; Bruce hated that London 1975 show so much that he ran around the city tearing down his own posters -- then 30 years later he heard the tapes and was like, "You know, that was a pretty good show!"
    Well, eventually he was happy enough with the 1982 "This Hard Land" to release it on Tracks in 1998. I think the 1995 re-recording is just another example of Bruce being so gosh-darn stubborn and refusing to do what someone around him must realize is the sensible thing. (Witness "The Promise" being left off Tracks, and then Bruce only allowing a latter-day re-recording on 18 Tracks in 1999. And when he finally relented to the fans almost 20 years later, he slathered it with overdubs and edited out the gut-punch verse -- it seemed almost spiteful.)
    I totally agree with you -- and graveyardboots listed all the offenders after your post -- but I'm curious to see if, say, there are 15 takes of a 1982 band version of "Mansion On The Hill," maybe Bruce goes back and realizes, "Ya know, Take 12 was pretty good. Why didn't we use that?" Sometimes it takes time to clear your head and see (and hear) things clearly. I am also hoping that with each passing year, it gets harder and harder for Bruce to "secretly" embellish these songs -- especially with vocals -- and lets things out a little more "raw." If the press release for the BITUSA box proudly announces "We found the legendary "Electric Nebraska" ... let's just say I will be highly skeptical.
    My instinctive reaction is "No way!" but honestly, I haven't listened to the 1995 one a single time since Tracks came out. I do remember thinking the re-do was a pale copy of the beloved booted 1982 take...
    Dylan has had albums where there were upwards of 20 other songs recorded and not used. There are rumors that Paul McCartney has recorded dozens and dozens of songs for each of his last two albums. But Bruce probably takes the cake for the career total of unreleased songs and albums -- I'm still waiting for the "country trip-hop" album from the late 1990s or whatever that was!
     
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  2. Sean Murdock

    Sean Murdock Forum Intruder

    Location:
    Bergenfield, NJ
    Yes -- this x 1000.
    Emphatically yes!
    Yup.
    Totally agree.
    Nor do I -- in the sense of "here are 10 band recordings of the Nebraska songs that could have been released as an album." Bruce's frustration with those sessions is too legendary for that to be believable. However, I do think it's possible for Bruce & Co. to find a perfectly listenable take for each Nebraska song they attempted with the band in 1982. They might even realize that some of them are really good! How many years did Max have to tell anyone who would listen that "This Hard Land" was Bruce's greatest unreleased song before he finally listened? (Answer: 16 years, apparently)
     
  3. JoeF.

    JoeF. Forum Resident

    Location:
    New Jersey, USA
    With all due respect, I can assure you that I am NOT waiting for that "country-hip-hop" album from the late '90's or whenever....
     
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  4. FingerPickin'Triumph

    FingerPickin'Triumph Forum Resident

    Location:
    Washington, D.C.
    the only thing I ask is that Bruce stops editing/adding/overdubbing outtakes and demos.
     
  5. let him run...

    let him run... Senior Member

    Location:
    Colchester, VT USA
    Yeah, he's not going to do that...unless he wants to. I don't think the E Street Band started referring to Springsteen as The Boss, because of a collective fondness for irony.
    We should really be used to how he works by now. We know he has always saved everything in his notebooks, he seem to throw nothing away.
    Lyrics and melodies have moved freely back and forth and to his credit, always in service of the song. He may be the Boss, but the song is king.
    I wouldn't assume the notebooks have disappeared. But, I'll guess that over the years, the studio has become a more sophisticated type of notebook.
    It appears he's still in service of the song and he's not going to release what he thinks is unfinished (for whatever reason he deems, makes it unfinished) for the sake of historical continuity.
    I think for this guy, who throws nothing away, everything is a work in progress until it hits the street.
    Pretty sure he's going to keep doing what he's been doing, which is doing it the way he wants to.
    I've pretty much got to be good with that, doing whatever he wants got this stuff on tape to begin with, I'm not going to complain about how he chooses to get the stuff to the street, he's the Boss.
     
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  6. graveyardboots

    graveyardboots Resident Patient

    Location:
    Atlanta, GA, USA
    Springsteen's approach to his outtakes frustrates me. I'd much prefer he present the outtakes as purely vintage recordings - bluffed lyrics, bum notes, false starts, and all. I know now (after having purchased The Promise and, to a lesser extent, The Ties That Bind) that the presumably forthcoming Born in the USA box set will contain all kinds of anachronistic modern overdubs on the outtakes including new lead vocal overdubs.

    Yes, Springsteen is the artist, they're his songs, and he's free to release them in whatever manner he's sees fit. But I do pine for greater transparency in the presentation of those tracks.

    The Promise came with a sticker highlighting "21 newly released recordings from the Darkness sessions." That implies that he's presenting previously unreleased vintage tracks, not newly (partially or fully) re-recorded tracks that may have originally been conceived during the Darkness sessions.
     
  7. OptimisticGoat

    OptimisticGoat Everybody's escapegoat....

    I don’t disagree with anything you said .. including disclaimers ... but we will get what the Boss gives us. And we will be thankful because he is the Boss. I could do without a 45 second take of Bobby Jean interrupted by some comment or a band instrumental of Atlantic City with no vocal because they all agreed it did not work. The cutting room floor is there for a reason. And if some stuff was not left there .... well we might not be the fans we are today. Privacy is undervalued today. I’d like a 1982 vocal but if there is not one,... I’ll take what I’m given by the Boss.
     
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  8. budwhite

    budwhite Climb the mountains and get their good tidings.

    Location:
    Götaland, Sverige
    If no vocal excist, get it out as is. Or keep it in the vault. If he must record new and tired vocals, present the song as a new one, because that's what it will sound like.
     
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  9. graveyardboots

    graveyardboots Resident Patient

    Location:
    Atlanta, GA, USA
    The Devils and Dust album is a good example of him doing exactly that. The core recordings for most of the songs that comprised the album had been in the vault for nearly a decade at that point before he spruced them up with newly recorded overdubs and presented those tracks as his new album. I have no objection whatsoever to that approach.

    The difference with The Promise is that he presented those partially re-recorded tracks as vintage recordings, which is a bit disingenuous. Personally, I tend to appreciate The Promise more when I think of it as the follow up to Working on a Dream.
     
  10. JAuz

    JAuz Forum Resident

    Location:
    US
    How much of that was due to the state of the Darkness or River sessions? What I mean is, in how many instances did Bruce replace a vintage full, usable and seemingly complete (to us) vocal track with a newly recorded one? I'm sure there's a list somewhere.

    Bluffed vocals, rehearsal takes, and stuff like that, I can understand Bruce redoing. And don't get me wrong, I love that rough draft stuff. I can listen to "Crazy Rocker" all day long (with Bruce calling out the chord changes and no real lyrics).

    For some reason I feel like the BUSA outtakes are in a more complete state than the Darkness or River ones. And to be fair, Tracks was mostly (not completely) all vintage, and I can live with that. I think the Nebraska songs that were done electric would also be complete takes. That's a lot of hope from my part perhaps, but I'm feeling optimistic about the Born In The USA outtakes.
     
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  11. PacificOceanBlue

    PacificOceanBlue Senior Member

    Location:
    The Southwest
    Well, I am thankful for the mostly vintage outtakes. I am not thankful for some of the other recordings, for example, I will probably never play “Because The Night,” “Fire,” “Rendevous,” “Gotta Get That Feeling,” “Meet Me In The City,” “Whitetown” or “Chain Lightning” again. Springsteen did me no favors releasing that material with contemporary vocals and overdubs.
     
  12. FingerPickin'Triumph

    FingerPickin'Triumph Forum Resident

    Location:
    Washington, D.C.
    The Born in the USA outtakes I have heard could use a sonic upgrade of course but I think have the best chance of coming out without contemporary vocals or too many other over dubs. There are some great songs and demos that reveal how great some of the material is without the 80s production. I love Born in the USA but the outtakes and demos more clearly reveal something stark, lonesome and almost country inspired.
     
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  13. JoeF.

    JoeF. Forum Resident

    Location:
    New Jersey, USA
    Fine. But as I've said about a million times on this --and similar --threads. Edit, overdub new vocals 40 years after the fact, anything he wants. He is The Boss of his work. But don't sell 99.9% new recordings as old. He --and Landau--want too have it both ways. Sell the idea of "lost recordings from the vault" but deliver virtually new recordings--that fool no one.
     
  14. JoeF.

    JoeF. Forum Resident

    Location:
    New Jersey, USA
    Tracks may have been mostly "vintage" when it came to the '90's stuff. Not on the '70's things though.
     
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  15. Dr. Zoom

    Dr. Zoom Forum Resident

    Location:
    Monmouth County NJ
    I could be wrong, but I think this box set is going to boil down to whether Electric Nebraska tracks exist, and whether they are included or not.
    If they are, it could be a very intriguing collection. If not, it could still be good, but I have doubts. Like The Ties That Bind, I wonder if most of the good BITUSA outtakes got gobbled up by Tracks and Essential.
     
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  16. PacificOceanBlue

    PacificOceanBlue Senior Member

    Location:
    The Southwest
    With regard to how Springsteen put the Darkness and River outtakes collections together, yes, a lot of core BITUSA outtakes have been issued (although there are additional band outtakes such as "Protection" and "Sugarland), and if he follows the same approach for the BITUSA box set, there will undoubtably be a lot of recycled material. That said, with BITUSA, the aforementioned electric Nebraska recordings and Thrill Hill West garage recordings could make for very intriguing inclusions. And of course, there are various titles of other songs, allegedly in varying degrees of completion. No one should expect a vault dump, and most likely, he will again cherry-pick a few songs from all phases of the recordings, leaving much of the session work in the archives.
     
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  17. Dr. Zoom

    Dr. Zoom Forum Resident

    Location:
    Monmouth County NJ
    Those Thrill Hill West demos give me a headache. (But to be fair, he surely never intended for them to be heard by the public.)

    I’m most interested in material from the 1982 NYC recording sessions. It seems that’s where the meat of the really good stuff took place.
     
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  18. budwhite

    budwhite Climb the mountains and get their good tidings.

    Location:
    Götaland, Sverige
    So did Bob Dylan do any new vocals on the More Blood More Tracks box?
    :unhunh:

    Springsteen should do as Dylan. Leave it alone.
    A man's gotta know his limitations
     
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  19. Dr. Zoom

    Dr. Zoom Forum Resident

    Location:
    Monmouth County NJ
    Bob Dylan seems to have has zero interest in the past, including his archival stuff. I'm sure he tells Jeff Rosen "if it will make a buck, sure, put it out there. But I'm not lifting a finger to work on it"

    By contrast, Springsteen seems to really like looking back in the past, and tinkering. Often to the point of diminishing returns. With the notable exception of Save My Love, there are no modern touches to either box set that distinguish themselves to me. And some of them sound pretty bad.
     
    Last edited: Dec 11, 2018
  20. INSW

    INSW Senior Member

    Location:
    Georgia
    Drop On Down And Cover Me
    the eight minute BUSA
    unedited Glory Days
     
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  21. budwhite

    budwhite Climb the mountains and get their good tidings.

    Location:
    Götaland, Sverige
    The horns on the Darkness outtakes? I have no idea if they are new or not, but since Springsteen almost never used anything other than Clemons they sound out of place to me. So does the violin on the alternativ Racing in the street.
     
    Last edited: Dec 11, 2018
  22. Dr. Zoom

    Dr. Zoom Forum Resident

    Location:
    Monmouth County NJ
    Its not the horns or the violin that I dislike (he used both frequently in the 70s). It's the vocals. His breathy, crooning mid 2010's voice just doesn't mesh with the vintage sound of those records. And when his wife (who was in middle school when these records were released) starts warbling those pasted-on background vocals, I hit the stop button. That's not the Darkness or The River that I know..
     
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  23. INSW

    INSW Senior Member

    Location:
    Georgia
    I like Meet Me In The City. The only other option was a boom box take.
     
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  24. Dr. Zoom

    Dr. Zoom Forum Resident

    Location:
    Monmouth County NJ
    Yeah, that one's ok.
     
  25. John C Bradley Jr

    John C Bradley Jr Forum Resident

    Location:
    Columbia, SC
    My biggest "The Ties that Bind" disappointment was "Night Fire." I love the rough version that's appeared on various Darkness era outtake boots and was so looking forward to a cleaned up version once I saw it was going to be part of the the River Box. The version that we got is nothing like that version, unfortunately.
     

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