joshg2fl's Full Review: Dave Marsh - Bruce Springsteen on Tour 1968-2005
The 16 oversized pages of Dave Marsh’s introduction to On Tour could be one of the best things ever written about Bruce Springsteen. A year or two ago I stopped attempting to answer the “Why do you like Bruce Springsteen so much?” question. I now have a new answer, read Marsh’s Introduction. It’s full of focused, pointed observations of what “Bruce Springsteen the verb” is all about.
Marsh’s Introduction begins a 324-page book that discusses each of Bruce’s tours through Devils & Dust. He spends about 20 pages on each tour, leaving plenty of space for pictures. Marsh has a good feel on the subject of Bruce Springsteen for several reasons, including the fact that he’s married to one of Bruce’s managers (Barbara Carr). He’s also written two and a half other biographies on Springsteen, Born in the USA, Glory Days, and Two Hearts. He’s opinionated, sometimes annoying, but overall worth your time if you’re a Springsteen fan.
On Tour reveals an author who I believe really grasps what Springsteen’s music is about and understands the basic elements of why it works. Some would argue that he’s too much of a fan to write anything of a critical nature about Bruce. In one sense, they would be correct, Marsh rarely sees anything Bruce does as short of genius (a slight exaggeration). However, I think his biased perspective offers a valuable key to interacting with Bruce’s music. I’d argue that his book builds in power similar to a Springsteen show, and similar to Bruce’s career.
A Springsteen show usually builds in exponential energy for 3 hours. To get to those high energy levels Bruce has to start from scratch every night. Think of a football game or a basketball game, as the game begins, no one knows exactly what’s in store for them, both teams will interact with each other, forcing the experience to become something different each time. As the lights go down and Bruce takes the stage, the crowd is in that anticipatory state, unsure of the path of the evening’s interaction. By the end of the night by strategically placing song upon song Bruce has built a sense of unity between himself and his audience. Marsh’s book has a sense of this atmosphere.
Marsh lays the story’s foundation at the beginning. Each chapter builds off this foundation showing how Bruce has taken each of his musical experiences and built off of them, continually moving forward in his career. There’s a sense of continuity in the chapters. We see Bruce slowly becoming more political. We see Bruce’s interest in having a large band even from his earliest days of performing in Dr. Zoom and the Sonic Boom and in The Bruce Springsteen Band. There are echoes of familiarity all over the place in On Tour. This builds to a feeling of accomplishment by the end of the book. Bruce couldn’t have done the Ghost of Tom Joad shows without the “growin’ up” of the Tunnel of Love album/tour, he couldn’t have done Devils & Dust properly without the Tom Joad tour under his belt. In other words, Bruce didn't hit his peak in the 70s or 80s, instead he's still moving foward and artistically (not commercially) he's still discovering new ground.
There’s more than skilled writing going on in this book. There are too many different threads that weave their way through this book for “skill” to be the only factor. Marsh writes as a guy who lives and breathes Bruce Springsteen, because of this, these continuity-threads naturally weave their path as Marsh attempts to honestly convey the thoughts and feelings he’s experienced over the years.
There are downsides to Marsh’s love of Springsteen. The most obvious one comes as he describes the Human Touch/Lucky Town tour with “the other band”. In this chapter, he stereotypes the fans who didn’t like this show into “the cult” category…meaning, the cult who only likes old E-Street band material. The cult who doesn’t want Bruce to expand musically. He almost implies racism. He implies that people didn’t get the new style of drumming. He implies all sorts of things, but he doesn’t seem to get the fact that all-star teams mean nothing if they don’t have charisma together.
The E-Street band has a bond together, they grew up in similar neighborhoods, they toured with each other for years and years. There’s something that happens when a group of people with that deep of a bond play music together, in a sense it’s all over the place in Marsh’s book. That unsaid piece was missing on the Lucky Town/Human Touch tour (just watch the MTV Plugged show). Additionally, you can call these people “a cult”, but at the risk of name-calling and overall immaturity…isn’t a person who won’t admit the lameness of “the other band” compared to one of the best back-up bands ever…isn’t that guy showing more “cultish” behavior than someone who will admit that Bruce has occasionally made mistakes?
There are two sides to everything, though. And, I can understand the fans Marsh is talking about. I bought 4 tickets to the Seeger Sessions show in Milwaukee for about 2/3 of what one E-Street band ticket cost on the Rising tour, because without the E-Street band there was no demand for tickets. It was one of the best Springsteen shows I’ve been to…some fans are frustrating in their refusal to try something new. So, I’m a little forgiving toward Marsh’s harshness.
Personally, I don’t think that Marsh’s writing can be criticized too much. He has a unique ability to boil the tours down to their key shows and moments and casually reference other noteworthy odds and ends. I kept waiting for Marsh to leave out little details (like Bruce’s version of The Promised Land on The Ghost of Tom Joad Tour or Bruce’s story about Ducky Slattery at the Main Point)…I’m no expert when it comes to obscure Springsteen trivia, but everything I was waiting for made it in the book, anything I’d mention would be nitpicking (except maybe his lack of mentioning Rosalita’s request being denied and then granted on the Reunion tour). Additionally, he has a timeline that runs across the bottom of each page, which is full of key dates for Springsteen memories.
However, I think there is one valid criticism that Dave Marsh should be held accountable for, and that is inaccuracies/proofreading. As I said before, I'm not a Springsteen expert as some are, but some small errors even popped out at me (County Fair being on Tracks?...Backstreets was unreleased when The River came out?***). I suppose it's debatable whether these errors are small are not, it might depend on how big of a Springsteen fan you are. But, I do think this does some damage to the book's credibility. Marsh has been accused of this in his previous works as well.
Criticisms aside...in an overall sense, On Tour is a high quality document offering a quick run through of all of Springsteen’s tours (through 2005). Marsh’s eternal optimism of Bruce is occasionally frustrating, but overall, I think it’s what keeps a certain sense of honesty in the book. Springsteen is an important person in Dave Marsh’s life, for more reasons than I’ve mentioned in this review. Expressing his feelings any other way might blur the genuineness of the picture he’s painted for us.
So, to many of Marsh’s critics out there…well, I just have to wonder if these folks are jealous of him. …because in many respects, I suppose I am…and, the Springsteen access On Tour reveals just makes things worse. On Tour is one that I’d recommend for every Springsteen fan’s library.
***See the comment section for a list of On Tour's errors as compiled by a fan from Ireland.
Authorized by Bruce Springsteen, written by his longtime biographer Dave Marsh, and packed with photos from Bruce s personal collection, this retrospe...More at Buy.com
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