31 Days: Finishing Up
28. Prodigal Son
And the mercury men with hydraulic joints
They bribe with a smile and hold you up in the alley at pinpoint
And ask you to bend over that they may anoint
You with the holy water of your profession
When the line between love and hate gets so thin
And your body takes over when your mind gives in
And your lady lover demands that you pin her to the floor
But its too late your reflexes are shot
So anyone who thinks Bruce has only just now gotten political should probably take a quick look at this song. It's got verses about poverty, about war, about crime, about disillusionment in America and American culture - everything that comes out over the course of the next 35 years of his career was written and recorded in 1972. The song itself is sort of boring, in the same way The Angel is boring. But the lyrics are a great insight and really neat to see, if you're at all interested in how the songs of Magic, Devils & Dust, or even Nebraska, BitUSA and Darkness came about.
Full lyrics
29. Child Bride
Well I saved up my money and I put it all away
I went to see her daddy but we didn't have much to say
Said "Now son can't you see that she's just a little girl
Who don't know nothing 'bout the meanness in this world"
Lyrically, this is almost exactly, word for word, Working on the Highway. Working on the Highway, from BitUSA, was darkly hilarious; the melody gave the creepy lyrics about a guy who ran off with a girl who was just a bit too young a total "lol wtf" edge, and you don't really sympathize with him so much as you just think he had it coming and he's telling it in a sort of weirdly funny way. This is a lot different. The melody's sadder, and you're supposed to really, really sympathize with a guy who is basically a statutory rapist, in the same way that you're supposed to sympathize a bit with the mass murderer of Nebraska. I can see why it got dropped from every album ever, but it's still pretty stellar.
Full lyrics
30. Guilty
George been speeding, running down his mother
Oh, stabbing his wife and strangling her lover
Well the court is ready to hear your plea
Son, are you guilty or not guilty
Jury all got up to hear his plea
He's guilty, he's guilty, don't let that boy go free
This is the song that Bruce wrote because he got caught sneaking onto the beach . . . It's got a really great intro! Honest!
Okay, fine. Seriously, it's noteworthy because it's another Steel Mill era song, and that kind of guitar talent in 1970, when he was just 20 years old, you could hear only better things to come. It's also got those weird early vocals, so it's interesting to see how his vocals changed over the decades.
Full lyrics
31. Born in the USA, and Vietnam
Out of all the songs I've posted this month, I'd say these two are probably the most interesting, as they're so different from what they eventually become. Born in the USA is either his most famous song, or one of his three most famous songs, and I think it's fun to see just how it came to be. The official BitUSA has a narrator who's still got it in him to be angry, who still might end up fighting the system he's in; the guy in these two songs has very clearly given up on himself and society. This has a very Nebraska sound to it, that same deadly freefalling liberation that Johnny 99 had. I don't even know where to find lyrics for this version of BitUSA. It's a strange, expanded version of BitUSA, that starts a bit earlier in the character's life than the "official" BitUSA starts, going a bit more into detail about the hellhole the guy was born in, and the crappy choices he faced. Vietnam starts similar to Shut Out the Lights, and mixes the themes of that and the official BitUSA. They're broken up into two different songs, but they share the same simple, upbeat melody, and they're really just two chapters of the same book. He doesn't have either song down, repeating different sections in places, pausing in others, and you even hear him turning the pages of his lyrics sheets at one point in Vietnam.
Again, it's two different songs, so it's two different files to download.
Full lyrics for Vietnam
And the mercury men with hydraulic joints
They bribe with a smile and hold you up in the alley at pinpoint
And ask you to bend over that they may anoint
You with the holy water of your profession
When the line between love and hate gets so thin
And your body takes over when your mind gives in
And your lady lover demands that you pin her to the floor
But its too late your reflexes are shot
So anyone who thinks Bruce has only just now gotten political should probably take a quick look at this song. It's got verses about poverty, about war, about crime, about disillusionment in America and American culture - everything that comes out over the course of the next 35 years of his career was written and recorded in 1972. The song itself is sort of boring, in the same way The Angel is boring. But the lyrics are a great insight and really neat to see, if you're at all interested in how the songs of Magic, Devils & Dust, or even Nebraska, BitUSA and Darkness came about.
Full lyrics
29. Child Bride
Well I saved up my money and I put it all away
I went to see her daddy but we didn't have much to say
Said "Now son can't you see that she's just a little girl
Who don't know nothing 'bout the meanness in this world"
Lyrically, this is almost exactly, word for word, Working on the Highway. Working on the Highway, from BitUSA, was darkly hilarious; the melody gave the creepy lyrics about a guy who ran off with a girl who was just a bit too young a total "lol wtf" edge, and you don't really sympathize with him so much as you just think he had it coming and he's telling it in a sort of weirdly funny way. This is a lot different. The melody's sadder, and you're supposed to really, really sympathize with a guy who is basically a statutory rapist, in the same way that you're supposed to sympathize a bit with the mass murderer of Nebraska. I can see why it got dropped from every album ever, but it's still pretty stellar.
Full lyrics
30. Guilty
George been speeding, running down his mother
Oh, stabbing his wife and strangling her lover
Well the court is ready to hear your plea
Son, are you guilty or not guilty
Jury all got up to hear his plea
He's guilty, he's guilty, don't let that boy go free
This is the song that Bruce wrote because he got caught sneaking onto the beach . . . It's got a really great intro! Honest!
Okay, fine. Seriously, it's noteworthy because it's another Steel Mill era song, and that kind of guitar talent in 1970, when he was just 20 years old, you could hear only better things to come. It's also got those weird early vocals, so it's interesting to see how his vocals changed over the decades.
Full lyrics
31. Born in the USA, and Vietnam
Out of all the songs I've posted this month, I'd say these two are probably the most interesting, as they're so different from what they eventually become. Born in the USA is either his most famous song, or one of his three most famous songs, and I think it's fun to see just how it came to be. The official BitUSA has a narrator who's still got it in him to be angry, who still might end up fighting the system he's in; the guy in these two songs has very clearly given up on himself and society. This has a very Nebraska sound to it, that same deadly freefalling liberation that Johnny 99 had. I don't even know where to find lyrics for this version of BitUSA. It's a strange, expanded version of BitUSA, that starts a bit earlier in the character's life than the "official" BitUSA starts, going a bit more into detail about the hellhole the guy was born in, and the crappy choices he faced. Vietnam starts similar to Shut Out the Lights, and mixes the themes of that and the official BitUSA. They're broken up into two different songs, but they share the same simple, upbeat melody, and they're really just two chapters of the same book. He doesn't have either song down, repeating different sections in places, pausing in others, and you even hear him turning the pages of his lyrics sheets at one point in Vietnam.
Again, it's two different songs, so it's two different files to download.
Full lyrics for Vietnam