newcritics

Glad you wrote this, Jason, as it makes me want to check this song out. That matters because I listened carefully to “Radio Nowhere” and agree with you completely–it’s lame. So I had written off the album on that basis. I’d bet the rent money that RN was chosen as the single by some record company stooge doing a paint-by-numbers audience profile.

i am still going through the three listens i try to give every record before i form an opinion. when i’ve done that, i’ll post my thoughts here at newcritics too.

i do like girls in their summer clothes. very nice song for sure.

Fred, I’m really anxious to hear your thoughts, but I also want you to take your time. I just wanted to bang out a quick thought because, in pop music in particular, first impressions are everything. An album needs a single and a single needs to hit the listener w/ the hook w/in 10 or 15 seconds before he surfs off to another station.

That said, first impressions sometimes don’t hold up, its true. And conversely, stuff can grow on you.

The days when a new Springsteen record is a zeitgeist-capturing, shared soundtrack are long gone (like 20+ years gone). But that’s what happens in pop music, careers go on long after the thrill of capturing the zeitgeist is gone.

Like you, I’m still trying to form an opinion, but one thing I’m already certain of is that “Radio Nowhere” was a lousy choice for an advance single. I know it rocks, and the guitar playing and guitar tones sound great there and throughout the album. But it’s not much of a song. It’s hook-free. And I think it illustrates just how disconnected from the zeitgesit Springsteen is. For him, “I just wanna hear some rhythm” means this kind of song–a re-write of “867-5309″–to today’s pop listener it mean Kanye West’s “Stronger,” Daft Punk sample and all.

A great lead single sells an album by connecting both with the artist’s personal story and with the zeitgeist (Jon Landau deliberately drove Springsteen to write “Dancing in the Dark” specifically because he was looking for a lead single for BITUSA which would accomplish this). A lead single hits by becoming something that speaks to the shared experience of the audience AND the personal experience of the artist (Kanye’s single is a perfect example). I think “Girls In Their Summer Clothes” comes a lot closer to connecting 50-something Springsteen to pop culture in Sept. 2007 than “Radio Nowhere,” which left both Estiv and I with the impression that we shouldn’t have high expectations for a new Springsteen album at this point.

Estiv, I dunno if lame would be my adjective of choice for “Radio Nowhere” but it’s flat for sure, in every way–there’s no real change in the song, no dynamic build in the song, and my brother, who is an audio engineer, said he wasn’t feeling it because there was no definition and clarity in the sound. Flat.

“soundtrack to the dying summer”?

How about Squeeze’s “Footprints” from back in the 80’s:

I had too many parties I had too much time
I got so lazy and fell well behind
Now the summer is over I can count the cost
Footprints on the beaches are now
Footprints in the frost
The summer is over I can count the cost
Footprints on the beaches are now footprints in the frost

[...] Click to listen to I’ll Work For Your Love And then there is the song Jason posted about last night, Girls In Their Summer Clothes, which sounds like it could have been on The Rising, but also has something new that I haven’t heard in a Bruce song before. [...]

I agree that ‘Girls In Their Summer Clothes’ is great. My only disagreement is that you didn’t give it the full 5 stars. The melody, lyrics, production and Bruce’s singing are all spot on. I too wasn’t holding out much hope after hearing ‘Radio Nowhere’. Check out ‘Your Own Worst Enemy’ another great track with an arrangement reminiscent of Linda Ronstadt’s ‘Different Drum’.

Jason, you hit the nail on this text. I agree with you 200% on how this song makes me feel.

Jason,

I go along with all you say and your reflections on the lyrics was very insightful. For me Summer Clothes is an important song in the Spingsteen canon. I’m not sure that zeitgeist-capturing is, or ever has been, a significant activity for Springsteen. If and when he did coincidence with the zeitgeist I suspect it was just that; a happy coincidence. (probably ‘85 with Born in the USA?). However if you have boarded Springsteen’s bandwagon at some point and stayed there for a while I think Magic and Summer Clothes in particular are significant works and have the feel of the closing of a cycle. Musically and lyrically the album feels to me to be summative of his work as far back as Lucky Town & Human Touch through Joad, Devils and Dust and the Rising. However he also manages to convey a sense of when one cycle closes another opens, there is disaffection, dislocation and uncertainity aplenty in here that have hallmarks of his recent (if not all) of his work but there is also optimism and strength. the cynicism in the title track is tempered but the acceptance that lies in Summer Clothes. I feel as theough the central character in Summer Clothes knows that changes have come and more will follow but there is still some joy in the world, still reasons to get up and go out and be alive. I would go so far as to say Summer Clothes is the opposite bookend to Thunder Road and is its musical and lyrical peer, which, for me, is some achievement.

Just on Radio Nowhere, whatever you think of the songs individual merits when I first heard it bounce out of the radio I knew one thing for sure. Magic was going to be different from Devils and Dust and the Seeger Sessions and as an introduction to a return to the “big noise” it worked for me.

“GIrls in Their Summer Clothes” is a great song, but it’s a blatant rip-off of a melody line from the Who’s “The Kids Are Alright”… But it’s a great melody line in either event.