Not atypical of a debut, Greetings From Asbury Park saw The Boss leaving the gate with something of a limp. It would take a couple more albums for him to dial in his writing and match it in the studio to the Phil Spector sounds running around in his head, but for the time being Springsteen was content to announce himself as a post-industrial troubadour, a sort of middle child between Bob Dylan and John Prine. For all of its unevenness, however, Greetings had, and still has, much to recommend it. "Growing Up" hints at the future bombast of Born To Run, while "Does This Bus Stop at 82nd Street" renders, with a curiously abstract clarity, the lives of America's runaways, rejects and hustlers, a ragged cast of characters that Springsteen would continue to flesh out on subsequent releases. Early stabs at balladry "Mary Queen of Arkansas" and "The Angel" carry the weight of an earnestness just a bit too forced, while piano rocker "For You" sounds a little more like Oyster Bay, Long Island than Asbury Park, New Jersey. Closer "It's Hard to Be a Saint in the City" is a pure Springsteen song, marred by an odd nasal affect that falls somewhere between Dylan and Cher. The song everybody will recognize, of course, is opening track and Springsteen's first single, "Blinded By the Light." It failed to chart until Manfred Mann's Earth Band resurrected it five years later, giving it an arena rock treatment along with the occasional lyrical adjustment (e.g. "Cut loose like a Deuce" became "Revved up like a Deuce," the last word being famously mis-pronounced). The original, with its acoustic guitar and crowded lyric, bears a somewhat Subterranean Homesick Blues quality, and holds up much more favorably over time than Mann's more successful version.
Some other thoughts:
#378, Toots and the Maytals' Funky Kingston: This record lacks the formulaic approach and herbally infused inertia that's turned me off to so much of the reggae canon over the years. Toots was not one to shy away from carrying a substantial load, and on Funky Kingston he and his band invoked the soul of Sam Cooke, the funk of James Brown and the playfulness of Desmond Dekker. The stand-out title track sounds like sunshine itself, and will surely be making its way into my BBQ mixes this summer.
#377, TLC's CrazySexyCool: One unfortunate consequence of the introduction of the compact disc was the format's looser time limitations as compared to those of the LP. Suddenly, nine or ten tracks became fifteen or sixteen, and few bands or artists used this new freedom to good effect. TLC is no exception; there's an awful lot of filler on this record. That said, I always did like "Waterfalls." For my money, it's CrazySexyCool's redeeming track.
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