Bruce Springsteen really loves Halloween – he loves it more than songs with the word ‘born’ in the title and he loves it more than muttering about AIDS.
In fact, Bruce Springsteen loves Halloween so much that he’s decided to dress up as the devil and release a brand new vaguely spooky song entitled A Night With The Jersey Devil on his website for free, just because today happens to be Halloween.
It’s a clever move. And it’s prompted other old rockers to follow – next week Rod Stewart will release a song called Bonfire Night (Of My Heart) on his website, followed by Huey Lewis posting a song called I Give Thanks To You, Baby on November 27 and then Elton John releasing Woo, It’s The International Year Of Astronomy! on January 15, just because he couldn’t wait an extra month and do one for Valentine’s Day, the impatient sod.
When Bruce Springsteen likes something, he has to go out of his way to display that love to everyone. For instance, Bruce can’t just be quietly fond of, say, the notion of shagging an old whore up the bum – he has to actually go and write a song about it. There are probably other examples of this, but the whore-bumming is the only one that springs to mind at the moment.
Oh, Halloween, too. Bumming whores and Halloween, they’re the two things that Bruce Springsteen likes enough to write songs about. But only those two things.
We don’t know why Bruce Springsteen likes Halloween so much. It’s probably because both ‘Springsteen’ and ‘Halloween’ end with ‘een’. That also explains Bruce’s other main loves – queens, spleens, teens, screens and Charlie Sheens.
Anyway, in the Webthump earlier today, we mentioned that Bruce Springsteen wasn’t doing a big Halloween display at his house this year because of fears of overcrowding. That news was probably incredibly disappointing for anyone who a) lives quite close to Bruce Springsteen’s house, b) likes Halloween and c) thinks that standing outside the house of someone richer than them and gawping at plastic cauldrons is an acceptable way to spend an evening.
But Bruce Springsteen doesn’t want to disappoint anyone – not even if they’re as essentially worthless at the people who go and look at all the decorations on his house – and so he’s come up with a clever backup plan. Bruce Springsteen has recorded a special new Halloween song and put it up on his website for free. MTV reports:
It being Halloween and all, the Boss is … offering a new song and video called “A Night With the Jersey Devil.” On his Web site he writes, “Dear Friends and Fans, If you grew up in central or south Jersey, you grew up with the ‘Jersey Devil.’ Here’s a little musical Halloween treat. Have fun! Bruce Springsteen”.
Yeah, nice try Bruce Springsteen, but we can see right through your little plan. ‘A little musical Halloween treat’ indeed. It’s just an excuse not to give children any trick or treat candy isn’t it, you massive tightwad. Well, it’s not going to work, because we can guarantee this exact scenario will be played out at least 50 times tonight:
Kids: “Trick or treat!”
Bruce Springsteen: “What? No. Didn’t you see my website today? My treat to you is the song A Night With The Jersey Devil, which I recorded as a little musical treat.”
Kids: “Yeah, we saw that. To be honest, we thought it was a lazy and somewhat derivative blues standard that you clearly hadn’t put much thought into, accompanied by a video that does little more than reference the fact that you’ve seen the promo to Hurt by Johnny Cash at least once. With that in mind, Mr Springsteen, we’d probably prefer some Haribo.”
Bruce Springsteen: “But… but… the song. I don’t have any Haribo.”
Kids: “It’s a trick, then. Egg him, boys.”
Watch A Night With The Jersey Devil by Bruce Springsteen now.
Joe says
I don’t know anything about “I give thanks to you, baby” but Huey Lewis and the News did put a song out for their fans called “Your Love is Killin’ Me” about a week ago. It is at http://www.hln.org
The Dread Pirate Sausage! says
Huey Lewis and the News!?
Seriously!?
And why .org? Is this an organization to help fans afflicted with HLN (the virus that causes Huey Lewis & The News fanhood) learn to cope with their condition?
Or are there just that many HLN+ people running in circles wearing Raybans from 1983 and screaming, “HUEEEYYYYY!!!!”
The Dread Pirate Sausage! says
…and why is that image of Springsteen unsettling?
Is it because he looks so natural dressed that way?
I knew his music was from Hell but I had no idea.