Bruce Springsteen has unveiled the foreword to his autobiography, “Born To Run”, which will be published on September 27 via Simon & Schuster.
The project see the legendary singer recount growing up in Freehold, NJ, his early days as a bar band king in Asbury Park, and the rise of the E Street Band.
The New Jersey rocker has been privately writing his story over the past seven years, starting in 2009 after performing at the Super Bowl’s halftime show.
Here is Springsteen’s foreword to the 500-page memoir in full:
I come from a boardwalk town where almost everything is tinged with a bit of fraud. So am I. By twenty, no race-car-driving rebel, I was a guitar player on the streets of Asbury Park and already a member in good standing amongst those who “lie” in service of the truth . . . artists, with a small “a.” But I held four clean aces. I had youth, almost a decade of hard-core bar band experience, a good group of homegrown musicians who were attuned to my performance style and a story to tell.
This book is both a continuation of that story and a search into its origins. I’ve taken as my parameters the events in my life I believe shaped that story and my performance work. One of the questions I’m asked over and over again by fans on the street is “How do you do it?” In the following pages I will try to shed a little light on how and, more important, why.
Rock ’n’ Roll Survival Kit
DNA, natural ability, study of craft, development of and devotion to an aesthetic philosophy, naked desire for . . . fame? . . . love? . . . admiration? . . . attention? . . . women? . . . sex? . . . and oh, yeah . . . a buck. Then . . . if you want to take it all the way out to the end of the night, a furious fire in the hole that just . . . don’t . . . quit . . . burning.
These are some of the elements that will come in handy should you come face-to-face with eighty thousand (or eighty) screaming rock ’n’ roll fans who are waiting for you to do your magic trick. Waiting for you to pull something out of your hat, out of thin air, out of this world, something that before the faithful were gathered here today was just a song-fueled rumor.
I am here to provide proof of life to that ever elusive, never completely believable “us.” That is my magic trick. And like all good magic tricks, it begins with a setup. So . . .
Springsteen recently wrapped up a European trek and he’ll resume The River Tour at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium on August 23.
The 3-week run across North America is in support of last December’s release of “The Ties That Bind: The River Collection”, a 7-disc collection of material from the sessions for 1980’s double album “The River.”
On September 23 - Springsteen’s 67th birthday – the singer will release “Chapter And Verse”, a new collection featuring unreleased tracks that doubles as an audio companion to the memoir.
See also:
Bruce Springsteen to release autobiography album Chapter And Verse
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Search Bruce Springsteen at hennemusic
