Bruce Springsteen – Devils & Dust
[…]
Alas, it’s not as consistently satisfying as ‚Born To Run‘ or ‚Born In The USA‘, and Springsteen’s voice, always gravely at the best of times, has taken on an increasingly wizened air that sometimes renders it frustratingly impenetrable. But, while he may be distancing himself somewhat from his glorious past – indeed, there are several tracks here that paint him or his characters as fugitives – his songwriting retains some of its classic tics. ‚All The Way Home‘ would be a great single, somewhere in the region of a marginally bluesier ‚Dancing In The Dark‘. The sparser instincts that suffused ‚Nebraska‘ come to the fore once more on the beautiful ‚Silver Palomino‘, and the otherwise esoteric ‚Long Time Comin“ shows he can still give good shouty busk. In essence, he’s a damn sight closer these days to filling Johnny Cash’s shoes than anyone alive, and, impressively, he’s got more fight in him than anyone so established and so Establishment has any right to deliver. Still tougher than the rest, and all the more remarkable for it.
Iain Moffat
reviewed on 22 Apr 2005
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