Or else TAKE IT BACK!!
MUD
FRegards
Or else TAKE IT BACK!!...MUD
(3/5/03, 10 a.m. ET) -- Bruce Springsteen came out against a potential war with Iraq (news - web sites) at his 2003 tour opener in Duluth, Georgia, on Friday (February 28).
The Backstreets fanzine paraphrased Springsteen's introduction to "Born In The U.S.A." as, "I hope there's a peaceful solution to the situation in Iraq...get our troops home safely...I don't want to have to write this song again."
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution quoted him as saying before the song, "I wrote this in 1983 about the Vietnam War. I don't want to have to write it again."
The newspaper also reported that after playing "Empty Sky" from The Rising, Springsteen said, "I'm going to send this out as a prayer for peace."
-- Bruce Simon, New York
That is significant when Bush and others have cynically fanned anti-Arab feelings in their preparation for the war against Iraq.
For the same reason Paradise - an attempt to get inside the mind of a suicide bomber - is thought-provoking. The song doesn't say who it is he's describing, but the sense you get is that it is Palestine he's talking about.
Earlier this year, Springsteen said publicly that the bombing of Afghanistan seemed justified to him, but his most recent interview, after visiting Ground Zero, suggests that his sense of working class solidarity isn't yet completely lost.
SPRINGSTEEN: "I found that sight deeply moving. There's nothing that I think could prepare people.
"And that goes to some central point about how people experience their duty, their place in the world, their connection to the people alongside themselves and to complete strangers.
"It casts a great contrast to what you see going on at the corporate level right now, and the acquiescence of the current administration, their willingness to look the other way."
The Rising will not necessarily lead people to join an anti-war campaign. It speaks of human tragedy and sadness, but it also calls for "the walls to be torn down" (in Let's Be Friends).
It's a liberal message - but there's precious little else to turn to in a pop industry that's only interested in waving the Stars and Stripes.--S.S.V
Well, what say you Celebrity Judges; about: "THE BOSS"?
FRegards,
FBD