Skip to main content

The Manual may earn a commission when you buy through links on our site.

New Music Monday: Bruce Springsteen

new music monday bruce springsteen photo
Image used with permission by copyright holder
TTB artBorn to Run may have celebrated the 40th anniversary of its release this year, but it was a different Bruce Springsteen record that saw a box set released in its honor in 2015: The River. Titled The Ties That Bind: The River Collection, the set contains a wealth of content, including (deep breath): a remastered version of the original double album, the collection of songs that comprised Springsteen’s scrapped initial version of the album, outtakes from the recording of The River, songs that were dropped from the final tracklist, a documentary about the making of the album, two and half hours of concert footage from the 1980 tour, and footage of Springsteen and the E-Street Band rehearsing for that tour. All in all, The Ties That Bind has 52 tracks and four hours of video, not to mention a hefty coffee table book. Suffice to say, it’s quite the package.

Originally released in 1980, The River was Springsteen’s followup to Darkness on the Edge of Town, and in many ways the record came out of its predecessor. After finishing Darkness, Springsteen found that he had more to say about the themes he had addressed on the album. There were tracks that did not fit on Darkness for one reason or another, but which still needed to see the light of day. Those songs would eventually become part of the The Ties That Bind, Springsteen’s initial (but unreleased) take on The RiverThe Ties That Behind, however, was not what Springsteen wanted for his followup to Darkness. As the artist himself noted, “Originally [The River] was a single record. I handed it in with just one record, and I took it back because I didn’t feel it was big enough. I wanted to capture the themes I had been writing about on Darkness. I wanted to keep those characters with me and at the same time added music that made our live shows so much fun and joy for our audience.”

Bruce Springsteen - Out In the Street (The River Tour, Tempe 1980)

Springsteen spent another year writing and recording The River, adding that music to make his live show exciting. The decision proved a wise one; the record cleverly moves from barn-burning anthems to darker songs dealing with the realities of life in the working class. The combination, which in less skilled hands might have simply been jarring, instead sets a deliberately ambivalent tone that complements The River‘s themes.

Bruce Springsteen - The River (The River Tour, Tempe 1980)

Given its sheer volume of content, The River Collection presents itself as one for diehards only, but casual fans should not be intimidated by its length. The addition of The Ties That Bind provides something of an introduction to the themes and songs on The River, and the outtakes are excellent tracks in their own right, rather than leftovers dished out for hardcore fans. The River Collection gathers just about all it can from the years Springsteen worked on The River not for its own sake, but because the material from that time period is worth collecting.

Bruce Springsteen - Party Lights (The River: Outtakes) [Lyric]

Bruce Springsteen’s The Ties That Bind: The River Collection is out now on Columbia Records and available on Amazon and iTunes.

Terence Praet
Terence Praet contributes to The Manual’s New Music Monday column. He studied Philosophy and History at Skidmore College…
Everything points to Apple TV+ making a change you’re not going to like
Is an ad-supported tier coming to Apple TV+?
The Apple TV Plus Logo

It turns out that TV worked pretty well under its old model. According to a new report from Business Insider, Apple TV+ may be the latest streaming service that's set to introduce an ad-supported tier and charge those who don't stream with ads a premium fee to access their great shows and movies.

At this point, the report is still speculation, but Apple has made several recent hires in the advertising space that seem to suggest the direction they're planning to take. The company recently hired former NBCUniversal ad executive Joseph Cady to serve as executive vice president of advanced advertising and partnerships, a move that comes following the company's hiring of another former NBCUniversal executive, Jason Frum, who joined Apple's video ad sales team.

Read more
From Gilda Radner to Ali Wong, these are the best female comedians of all time
These women from all generations will make you laugh out loud
Ai Wong comedian 2017 Moontower comedy festival

Hot take: I don’t care for straight male comedians. It’s not that they’re not funny, they’re just … I don’t know, boring? Maybe that’s reductive of me, but I never seem to leave a straight male comedian’s set feeling particularly inspired. And though some may argue that it’s not important for a set to "inspire" its audience, I’d actually argue that the opposite is true. For me, I want to see a comedian use humor to address real issues and say real things about the world, even if they do it in a completely goofy way.

Therefore, I tend to prefer female and female-identified comedians. They’re sharp, tough, and have often seen shit that makes their comedy feel raw and true. Undoubtedly there are male comedians who do this, too, but to a much lesser degree, in my very humble and very personal opinion.

Read more
12 classic sci-fi books everyone should read
If you love science fiction and reading, these classic sci-fi novels are a must
Man reading a book and drinking coffee

It may feel like we were recently living in a science-fiction dystopia life -- and in some ways, we were -- but that doesn't mean that we should simply avoid an entire genre of writing. Hardly. In fact, this is probably the perfect time to explore classic sci-fi books, to see what the masters have written, and maybe even see if someone predicted anything like this. Many, though, simply ignore sci-fi wholly and completely because of an association with robots, aliens, and the like.

Long story short, if you think you don't like sci-fi, you have never read great books from the genre. But indeed, many such books abound, including a number that has delighted generations of readers going back well over 150 years. In fact, one of the best things about so many sci-fi books is their very timelessness. As by definition, this type of fiction breaks away from the norms of the everyday world -- whether slightly twisting things or taking place on entire other worlds -- the stories often feel as fresh and relevant today as when they were published decades ago.

Read more