Bruce Springsteen stands out as one of the greatest lyricists of the rock era. For most of his career, he managed this through Everyman-style tales and laments. And he seemed to choose the names for these folks based on how easy they’d be to fit into the meters (Sonny, Billy, and so on). We thought it’d be fun to take a closer look at some of the wilder characters from Bruce Springsteen songs.
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In his earliest days, Springsteen delivered wild, shaggy anthems full of characters whose ill-advised behavior couldn’t hide their undeniable charisma. These larger-than-life folks usually possessed larger-than-life names. Let’s count down the ten most unforgettable monikers the Boss decided to lay on these cats and kittens.
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10. Hazy Davy (from “Spirit in the Night”)
Springsteen peppered a lot of cool names into this story of randy youths let loose on a summer evening. Killer Joe, Wild Billy, G-Man, and Crazy Janey all make appearances. We chose Hazy Davy because of how his name seems to reflect the fogginess that clouds his judgment. After all, he’s the one who tears half-naked into Greasy Lake at song’s end and ends up really hurt.
9. Catlong (from “Kitty’s Back”)
Seriously, Catlong? If you’re going to come up with a longer name for a dude named Cat, why not Catexander? Or Catamaran? In any case, this poor guy spends the whole song moaning for Kitty and lamenting her infidelity, while remaining utterly oblivious to the exciting machinations of the street going on all around him. Maybe he deserved that goofy name.
8. Zero (from “Zero and Blind Terry”)
C’mon now, if you didn’t think that Springsteen was going to rhyme Zero with some form of the word hero at some point, you’re just not paying attention. Zero is the leader of the Pythons (we could probably fill another article with great Springsteen gang names) whose hunted by the duplicitous father of his girlfriend Blind Terry. At song’s end, Springsteen leaves us guessing as to his fate. He’s either dead or has morphed into an immortal ghost rider.
[RELATED: 5 Times Bruce Springsteen Paid Tribute to Americana Icons in His Music]
7. Ragamuffin Gunner (from “Lost in the Flood”)
This one might deserve an asterisk, as this could be more a description of the character (or a new special at Dunkin’ Donuts) than a name. But others in the song do refer to him as Gunner, so that’s good enough for us. “Lost in the Flood” is one of the few Springsteen songs of the early era where all these streetlife shenanigans play out in tragic rather than romantic fashion, and the Ragamuffin Gunner is the doomed antihero.
6. Early-Pearly (from “Blinded by the Light”)
Springsteen has talked about how he basically walked around with a rhyming dictionary composing “Blinded by the Light,” which also turned out to be one of his most sexual songs, containing a lot of sly double entendres. When Early-Pearly comes along to ask if the narrator needed a ride, something tells us that it might be a stationary one.
5. Little Dynamite (from “Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)”)
“Rosalita” stands as the quintessential Springsteen tale of shambolic youthful behavior, and, as such, it’s filled with crazy names. Little Dynamite wins out by a nose, if only because of his insistence on hanging in the belfry, playing with the bats, while all his counterpart Little Gun does is stand out in front of Woolworth’s.
4. Dog Man Moses (from “Song for Orphans”)
Springsteen threw his obsessive fans a major bone when he included newly-recorded versions of “Song for Orphans” and a few other songs he wrote in the early years on his 2020 album A Letter to You. In this Dylanesque track, Dog Man Moses serves as a kind of Catcher in the Rye for all the wayward characters within the song looking for a home.
3. Bad Scooter (from “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out”)
Springsteen started to leave the wacky names behind on Born to Run, with this one and one more to come on this list being the exceptions. “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out” acts as a kind of origin story for the Springsteen myth as a whole. Hence, you have Bad Scooter (initials BS, in case you missed it) meeting with the Big Man (Clarence Clemons’ nickname) and watching his fortunes change almost immediately.
2. Power 13 (from “The E Street Shuffle”)
So many questions here. Is Power 13 a human being or some kind of sentient isotope? Is he related to the late, great Deadwood actor Powers Boothe? Can we assume that Powers 1 through 12 exist somewhere on this timeline? And, if so, is there a Power 14 out there now, and did he disappoint his wildman father by doing something straitlaced and respectable like insurance sales? Get Springsteen on the phone so we can get some answers, please!
1. The Magic Rat (from “Jungleland”)
The appearance of the Magic Rat marks one of the final times that Bruce would create one of these fantastical names. Which was fitting, because he largely said goodbye to the types of songs that would include them from Darkness on the Edge of Town on forward. But what a sendoff. The Magic Rat is such a screw-up that he can’t even get the blaze-of-glory finish quite right. (He ends up wounded, not even dead.) But his name manages to capture the push-and-pull of wondrous dreams set against gritty reality that characterized so many of Springsteen’s heroes and heroines.
Photo by Rob DeMartin
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