Cloudy sunshine

Who isn’t a Springsteen fan? The man has had a 45-year long career (and counting), a near endless string of hits that will remain in music history as true classics, whilst managing to develop his unique style rather than ever having to change with the times (see: Madonna)… Although he is no Bob Dylan or Leonard Cohen, Bruce Springsteen is clearly one of the finest singers-songwriters we’ve ever had, and it’s truly heartwarming to see him go on the way he does, with an energy that his 3-hour+ live shows readily display to this day.

That being said… his latest outing is not his best, not by a landslide. Earlier this year, the great music man indeed came back with his nineteenth album, Western stars, introduced by the single “Hello sunshine”. That song features many of the key characteristics we’ve come to expect from Springsteen: a rather melancholic tone, fairly slow rhythm, a melody that’s quite tight so as to seemingly give way to the lyrics, story and mood… The problem, however, is that it effectively displays too much of all of that.

“Hello sunshine”, Western stars, 2019.

Simply put, the track is too slow to be truly engaging: it’s not unpleasant, simply leaves you with little emotional reaction afterwards. The melody borderlines on simplistic, with very minor — and rare — chord changes, to the point that you sometimes feel almost like listening to an uninterrupted musical loop. Production is not bad (it never is with artists of that magnitude) and strings do come to the rescue, but it’s already too late: we are already bored beyond repair by then…

The title song from the album, “Western stars”, is arguably a stronger tune with a richer melody and more sophisticated overall production and structure. Still, it shares the same “softness” that “Hello sunshine” suffers from; what others, less well intentioned people might very well call “easy listening”. As that, in the end, is the actual truth of the matter: if this song hadn’t been released by the great Bruce Springsteen, it would probably have gone quite unnoticed.

Which is somewhat disappointing from such a musical legend, but gives us hope he too will come to share this feeling — and start working on new material!