Bruce Springsteen wasn’t always a larger-than-life, alpha-male showman. As a child in Freehold, New Jersey, he struggled with nervousness, compulsive behavior, and a long family history of mental disease. “When I was young,” he told NPR’s Fresh Air in October 2016, “I was very shy, and that was my personality, you know? I was a pretty sensitive kid and quite neurotic, filled with a lot of anxiety.” He expanded on those neuroses during an interview with Rolling Stone, explaining, “I just chewed my knuckles until they were rocks, or blinked uncontrollably.”
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Springsteen famously found an outlet for that unease, funneling his feelings—along with his observations of day-to-day life in seaside New Jersey—into some of the best-selling albums in history. The memories of his troubled youth remain, though, and perhaps that’s why Springsteen has written so many songs about American adolescence. Here’s a quick look at several of his coming-of-age anthems.
5. “The River,” The River
At first glance, The River‘s title track is far more melancholy than inspirational. The song follows two working-class teens as they fall in love, become pregnant, and watch their childhood dreams quickly give way to the hard realities of an adulthood that’s come far too soon. Although the characters’ names are fictional, Springsteen wrote “The River” about his sister’s real-life experience as a teenage mother.
“Every bit of it was true,” says Virginia Springsteen Shave, Springsteen’s sibling, in the 2012 biographical book Bruce. “And here I am, completely exposed. I didn’t like it at first, but now it’s my favorite song.” In a happy twist of events, Virginia is still married to her child’s father, Mickey, who landed a construction job immediately after high school to support his growing family. Although “The River” could be interpreted as a safe-sex warning to promiscuous teenagers, the characters behind the song tell a much different story—one of commitment, endurance, and unyielding love.
4. “Glory Days,” Born in the U.S.A.
Nothing gold can stay. In this nostalgic hit from 1984, Springsteen takes a look backward. Joining him in those reflections are several friends from his high school days, including a retired baseball pitcher who can’t stop talking about his stats and a former beauty queen who’s struggling to raise her children as a single mother.
The song’s melody is relentlessly optimistic, though, which keeps “Glory Days” from sounding like a sad recollection of days gone by. Instead, it’s a celebration of the ways in which youth, inevitably, is wasted on the young. If there’s an unspoken message here, it’s a reminder to enjoy each moment, knowing it’ll eventually pass.
3. “Growing Up,” Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J.
When they said, ‘Sit down,’ I stood up! Springsteen sings on this track from his debut album. An ode to rebelliousness, “Growing Up” is less about growing up than it is about the absolute refusal to grow up. The song’s protagonist doesn’t take orders; instead, he marches to the beat of his own drum, remaining proudly out-of-sync with the rest of the parade. If Peter Pan left Neverland and relocated to the Jersey Shore, this song could’ve been his mantra, complete with twinkling-star piano arpeggios from David Sancious.
2. “Born to Run,” Born to Run
When you’re 16 years old, is there anything more compelling than a gassed-up car and a long stretch of blacktop? “Born to Run” is about the thrill of escape, preferably in a car that’s just hit 75 miles per hour. While introducing the song in late 1987, during a performance at the New York Children’s Health Fund benefit concert, Springsteen explained, “It’s about a boy and a girl that thought they wanted to run and keep running and never stop. And at the time, I thought that was me, and maybe it was…but I woke up one morning and realized that I wanted a home.”
[RELATED: Springsteen Talks Writing Autobiography ‘Born to Run’]
There’s no home to be found here, though. Instead, there’s just the lure of the open road, which Springsteen’s protagonist seems duty-bound to explore. Tramps like us, baby, we were born to run, he sings, turning his wanderlust into a birthright.
1. “No Surrender,” Born in the U.S.A.
Springsteen wrote “No Surrender” about youth, friendship, and the sheer energy of rock ‘n’ roll. We busted outta class, had to get away from those fools / We learned more from a three-minute record, baby, than we ever learned in school, he sings during the first verse, which channels all the youthful abandon of the first day of summer vacation. That spirit may be infectious, but the song’s triumphant tone still made him think twice about including it on Born in the U.S.A.
“It was a song I was uncomfortable with,” Springsteen said in the 1998 book Songs. “You don’t hold out and triumph all the time in life. You compromise, you suffer defeat, you slip into life’s gray areas. But Steve [Van Zandt] talked me into putting the song on the album in the 11th hour. He argued that the portrait of friendship and the song’s expression of the inspirational power of rock music was an important part of the picture.”
Thankfully, Springsteen listened to his friend and released “No Surrender” in 1984. For a full display of the song’s power, listen to the acoustic version from Live/1975-85, which relies on the words themselves—not the amplified bombast of the E Street Band—to deliver a knockout blow.
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