A deep cut from Bruce Springsteen:
That’s on his four-CD “Tracks” collection of B-sides and other unreleased or miscellaneous tunes. The man was a nonstop songwriting machine. Most of what’s on “Tracks” is stuff you probably don’t know unless you’re a hardcore Bruce fan. Or alternately, a Southside Johnny and the Jukes fan, since recording Springsteen’s other works was their bread and butter:
Back in olden times, when radio stations were local and independent, I became familiar with Southside Johnny thanks to New York’s seminal rock station WNEW. I bought Southside’s “At Least We Got Shoes” because of the songs from that album I heard on WNEW, and I held onto that record long enough to rip it to MP3 nearly 30 years later. You’d never hear a group like Southside Johnny on the radio these days, outside of a college station perhaps. This is one of those times I’m glad I grew up when I did. It sure was a dark day when WNEW changed formats. I’ll quit here before I go into full-on “get off my lawn” mode.