Speaker 1: Hey, it's Holly. Just a quick note before we start.
Speaker 1: If you're enjoying Because the Buss Belongs to Us so far,
Speaker 1: please tell people. It makes a huge difference to us
Speaker 1: if you like, subscribe and review the show on your
Speaker 1: listening platform, and if you literally just tell your friends
Speaker 1: to listen. We are on a mission, after all, and
Speaker 1: for the sake of science, we need as many people
Speaker 1: as possible to go on this journey with us to
Speaker 1: get Bruce recognized.
Speaker 2: As a queer icon.
Speaker 3: You can do your bit too, And a producer note
Speaker 3: from me. This episode contains a discussion of homophobic verbal abuse.
Speaker 3: Take care listening.
Speaker 2: Is Bruce Camp?
Speaker 3: Yes he is.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: This is episode three of Because the Bus Belongs to Us,
Speaker 3: a podcast where two nerds who are convinced that Bruce
Speaker 3: Bristeen is a queer icon spend seven episodes on a
Speaker 3: question to get everyone else on our sidetam I'm Jesse
Speaker 3: and I'm.
Speaker 2: Holly, and we are riding high of a huge win.
Speaker 1: That's right, folks, it's official, Bruce Springsteen is Camp.
Speaker 3: We have ticked off the first light on our airtight
Speaker 3: queer icon checklist that we made up an episode one.
Speaker 2: Now the checklist Item two.
Speaker 4: I'm in a mixed CD for a girlfriend I had
Speaker 4: written in SHARPI you, Me and all the stuff We're
Speaker 4: so scared of, which is the line from Tunnel of Love.
Speaker 3: This is writer and Bruce Mega fan Naomi Gordon Lebou.
Speaker 4: And I love that line. It's like the lights go
Speaker 4: out and it's just the three of us, You, Me
Speaker 4: and all the stuff We're so scared of.
Speaker 3: Naomi wrote a really seminal article for The Nation back
Speaker 3: in twenty nineteen called The Queerness of Bruce Springsteen. It
Speaker 3: was one of the first pieces of queer Bruce content
Speaker 3: that I read, aside from Holly scenes.
Speaker 1: Naomi is a wordsmith, and that's why they're are experts.
Speaker 2: For this episode.
Speaker 1: We need someone who can dive deep into lyrics and
Speaker 1: get their head around the myths and stories that Bruce tells.
Speaker 1: We caught Nami up on where We've got to you
Speaker 1: so far on our queer icons checklist.
Speaker 5: Honestly, it's going pretty well so far us so.
Speaker 3: Our first tech point there was that queer icons have
Speaker 3: to be camp and that is like an esthetic choice,
Speaker 3: but it's also this like vibe, this truth telling, this
Speaker 3: like way of being that queer people recognize. And we
Speaker 3: have just woken to some camp experts and they agree
Speaker 3: with us that Bruce is camp.
Speaker 5: I'm sure that you're ald degree to I do agree.
Speaker 3: And our next checkpoint item, which is what we wanted
Speaker 3: to talk to you about, is we need to be
Speaker 3: able to identify with them as an underdog, making them
Speaker 3: relatable to the queer experience.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think underdogs is a great word for it. Actually,
Speaker 4: I really like that, and I also think it's a
Speaker 4: great word for Bruce.
Speaker 1: And there you have it, Naomi, god and Marble says,
Speaker 1: Bruce is an underdog.
Speaker 3: Thank you for listening to episode three because the bust
Speaker 3: alongst us.
Speaker 5: Okay, we're joking.
Speaker 1: We are professional queers in Stem. We're gonna need more
Speaker 1: evidence than that to see if Bruce really can be
Speaker 1: seen as an underdog.
Speaker 2: That's after the break, we're back.
Speaker 3: Talking to Naomi Gordon leb about the second item on
Speaker 3: our mate Bruce being seen a queer icon checklist? Can
Speaker 3: he be seen as an underdog? Since Naomi was a kid,
Speaker 3: they found themes in Bruce's music that felt relatable to
Speaker 3: their struggles as a queer person.
Speaker 4: I think I was always drawn to his gender admired it,
Speaker 4: related to it, like wanted to emulate it, and he
Speaker 4: just like had the exact aesthetic that I wanted for
Speaker 4: myself as a kid who was like a mask kid,
Speaker 4: like a kid who always felt like a boy. Even
Speaker 4: though we think of him, or I think of him,
Speaker 4: and I think a lot of people think of him
Speaker 4: as this kind of like icon of masculinity. Actually, so
Speaker 4: much of his music is about having a pretty complicated
Speaker 4: relationship to masculinity and struggling with it and feeling like
Speaker 4: never enough or never the right kind of masculine, or
Speaker 4: like feeling not right in some way. Have you guys
Speaker 4: heard the live recording of The River that's like twelve
Speaker 4: minutes long where he talks about his dad? Yes, yeah,
Speaker 4: I haven't, Oh Jesse, you gotta listen to okay. And
Speaker 4: there's like a twelve minute long or fourteen minute long whatever,
Speaker 4: live recording of the River, And during it he does
Speaker 4: the thing that he often does, which is he tells
Speaker 4: this long story that sounds very off the cuff, but
Speaker 4: I think it's actually probably pretty practiced, and it's a
Speaker 4: story about his dad. He talks about how his dad
Speaker 4: was always on his case and always giving him a
Speaker 4: really hard time about his hair being long, or saying
Speaker 4: to him, when the army gets you, they're going to
Speaker 4: make a man out of you.
Speaker 1: These beautifully crafted, intimate reflections are a big part of
Speaker 1: Bruce's live shows. I've seen him live so many times
Speaker 1: at this point that stories like this are really familiar
Speaker 1: to me. By my seventh show of The Wrecking Bottle,
Speaker 1: I could almost talk along with him like I'd learned
Speaker 1: these stories as lyrics. But it doesn't matter. The emotion
Speaker 1: is always there. You feel like the luckiest person in
Speaker 1: the world to hear about Bruce's internal life. The story
Speaker 1: he tells in this particular live recording of the River
Speaker 1: goes pretty deep into the struggles he had with his
Speaker 1: dad's expectations of masculinity.
Speaker 4: It's about him being an underdog right, not being able
Speaker 4: to live up to whatever the expectations are of him. Which,
Speaker 4: really I think that really shows is that, of course
Speaker 4: all of these things are constructed, and ultimately this like
Speaker 4: myth in our culture that masculinity or femininity or any
Speaker 4: like traditional gender rules or gender expressions are kind of
Speaker 4: just like biological and endemic to who we are. His
Speaker 4: music is in some ways about like what a falsehood
Speaker 4: that is right, which is very queer.
Speaker 3: Yeah, in some ways, you know, you've got like AT's
Speaker 3: muscle Breece and you've got these like esthetics and things.
Speaker 3: But then he sings a song like real Man. The
Speaker 3: chorus of real Man is He's that you can be
Speaker 3: on your chest, well any monkey can, but you make
Speaker 3: me feel like a real man. He's like, my deep
Speaker 3: romantic will love for you. It's whats my gender?
Speaker 5: And I find that really really comforting as someone who's
Speaker 5: trying to navigate what are those things?
Speaker 2: I think?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think that Bruce. I mean, I'm not gonna
Speaker 4: say he's like some kind of perfect feminist, and frankly,
Speaker 4: I just don't really know what his feminist politics are like.
Speaker 4: But I do think he's critical to some extent of
Speaker 4: masculinity and I appreciate that, Like I appreciate the ways
Speaker 4: that he talks about the taboo and kind of stigma
Speaker 4: around mental health struggles for men, Like I appreciate how
Speaker 4: honest and transparent he is about his mental health and
Speaker 4: his book.
Speaker 5: If we're looking for a sense of struggle from Bruce, something.
Speaker 3: That we can look to and think he's been through
Speaker 3: stuff like I've been through and he survived, so I
Speaker 3: will too. His relationship to masculinity could be one of
Speaker 3: those things.
Speaker 5: I want to believe that.
Speaker 3: Bruce is aware of masculinity as a thing that's separate
Speaker 3: from sexual gender and the complicated ways that plays out
Speaker 3: in a world that has expectations for you based on
Speaker 3: the gender you're assigned at birth. So that plus his
Speaker 3: intentional vulnerability around his own emotions.
Speaker 5: Feels like the kind of struggle we could see ourselves in.
Speaker 4: One of the ways that I see him singing about
Speaker 4: being an underdog in ways that we can kind of
Speaker 4: rude for him is he's singing about working people in
Speaker 4: the United States and like the great myths is the
Speaker 4: American Dream.
Speaker 1: We were just talking about Bruce's speech in the live
Speaker 1: version of the River, but the lyrics in the song
Speaker 1: itself are a great example of Bruce's writing on class.
Speaker 4: First walled about his sister, really and it's about these
Speaker 4: two people who get married and they're really in love
Speaker 4: and then like all the difficulties of real life as
Speaker 4: a working class person, kind of like seep in.
Speaker 1: The couple in the song grew up with big dreams
Speaker 1: for their lives, which are quickly dashed when the girl
Speaker 1: ends up pregnant while she's still at school. They marry young,
Speaker 1: and the guy spends his life working hard physical jobs,
Speaker 1: struggling to earn enough to support his family.
Speaker 4: Romance becomes harder as like economic struggle becomes more real.
Speaker 3: The guy in the river keeps comparing the way he
Speaker 3: imagined his life would go and the much more challenging
Speaker 3: reality that he's ended up with. That's pretending to not
Speaker 3: remember those dreams and his wife pretends not to care.
Speaker 3: You can really imagine this couple sitting next to each
Speaker 3: other on the sofa watching TV, silently holding their disappointments
Speaker 3: with the circumstances life has dealt them.
Speaker 1: He sings, is a dream a lie that don't come true?
Speaker 1: Or is it something worse? So many of Bruce's songs
Speaker 1: are about imagining another better life as possible dreams are
Speaker 1: running away and living a life of adventure and romance,
Speaker 1: and this line really stands out apart from those other songs.
Speaker 1: It's about grieving missed opportunities and the pain of even
Speaker 1: letting yourself want something more.
Speaker 4: But the refrain of the song and the chorus is
Speaker 4: all about sort of that there's still this element of
Speaker 4: romance there.
Speaker 1: The refrain of the song is about the couple going
Speaker 1: down to the river they used to swim in when
Speaker 1: they were young and first in love. Even when they're
Speaker 1: older and disillusioned, even when the river is dry, the
Speaker 1: couple keep returning to this place where once they felt
Speaker 1: free together.
Speaker 4: I think that that feeling of like kind of magic
Speaker 4: between you and another person, finding ways to make it
Speaker 4: possible even when things are really hard and are not
Speaker 4: they don't match the script we've been given for what
Speaker 4: romance looks like, that where everything's perfect and easy. I
Speaker 4: think that's a really distinctly queer feeling too, and maybe
Speaker 4: that's partly why I.
Speaker 5: Connected with that song.
Speaker 3: This comes up again and another of Naomi's favorite Bruce songs.
Speaker 4: Tougher than the Rest, is infurious song about how Bruce
Speaker 4: is not like all these other boyfriends that someone could have.
Speaker 1: The song because some girls they want a handsome damn
Speaker 1: or some good looking jar on their arms. Some girls
Speaker 1: like a sweet, talking room ya. Bruce is none of
Speaker 1: those things, but he's tough. The song is not like
Speaker 1: I'm tough, I'll protect you.
Speaker 4: He's saying I'm tough I'm here for the real shit,
Speaker 4: Like I'm here to go through hard things with you.
Speaker 4: Life is hard, Like there are hard things, and like
Speaker 4: I'm someone who can walk beside you through them.
Speaker 1: I like that because it's not like a typical strength
Speaker 1: of like I I'll protect you, like, don't worry about this,
Speaker 1: It's gonna be fine. It's like a strength through vulnerability.
Speaker 1: He's never he never shies away from vulnerability. He's like
Speaker 1: very open to like this scares me. I'm faithful of this.
Speaker 1: I don't know what's around the corner, but let's let's
Speaker 1: go together.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I love that, Holly.
Speaker 2: I love the way but that that's exactly right.
Speaker 4: He's not afraid to talk about being afraid and this
Speaker 4: feeling of like I don't know what's around the corner,
Speaker 4: but we've got each other. We're gonna look around the
Speaker 4: corner together. I think of it as a really queer
Speaker 4: thing too.
Speaker 1: Naomi felt something similar to this. One night when they
Speaker 1: were in college. They were sitting out in the porch
Speaker 1: with their brand new girlfriend.
Speaker 4: Making out and just being super happy and like totally
Speaker 4: oblivious to the world around us, just wrapped up in
Speaker 4: each other.
Speaker 3: And then this Copp was a full of drunk men.
Speaker 4: And shine this like bright flashlight out of their window
Speaker 4: so that we couldn't see them.
Speaker 1: They started shouting a bunch of grim threatening things at
Speaker 1: Naomi and their partner.
Speaker 4: She needs a real man, like come over her and
Speaker 4: I'm gonna show you what a real dick can do,
Speaker 4: like that kind of thing. And it was horrible. Obviously,
Speaker 4: it was like terrifying and upsetting, but it also had
Speaker 4: this thing of like disrupting this moment of just like
Speaker 4: blisp between us.
Speaker 3: This is still so often part of queer dating, especially
Speaker 3: when you're also trans also POC. Part of your love
Speaker 3: story is this low level threat of violence from the public.
Speaker 4: We know that there are people and places in the
Speaker 4: world that are hostile to us, but we are together
Speaker 4: in it. And I feel like that is a kind
Speaker 4: of intimacy that is wrapped up in being a queer person.
Speaker 4: I'm thinking of I'm on fire when he talks about
Speaker 4: waking up, uh freight train running through the middle of
Speaker 4: his head. Yeah, he's not singing about queerness, but I
Speaker 4: think this feeling of like a freight train running through
Speaker 4: the middle of your head, this feeling of like there's
Speaker 4: something that's so achy and so insistent that it wakes
Speaker 4: you up in the middle of the night a certain
Speaker 4: kind of pain. It is like very real to me
Speaker 4: and very queer.
Speaker 1: Also, he's just so fucking emo, Like that imagery is
Speaker 1: so like he can tell. It's almost like he's a thet,
Speaker 1: a nerd or something, you know what I mean. It's
Speaker 1: just like so over the top imagery.
Speaker 4: It's so true. He's so emo. I love that description
Speaker 4: of Bruce. He's so emo. It's true, he really is.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I do worry that loneliness is like the ultimate
Speaker 1: queer feeling really paints into a corners, just like that's
Speaker 1: how fait, We're just doomed to be lonely. But it's
Speaker 1: a different type of loneliness. It's that disconnected like I
Speaker 1: need my people, I need a future, I need hoop,
Speaker 1: I need healthcare, or needs somebody.
Speaker 2: Who gets what this is. Like, it's a.
Speaker 1: Real physical like, oh, I feel like I'm torn away
Speaker 1: from something.
Speaker 4: That is the other side of Bruce's music as I
Speaker 4: feel like he expresses this fundamental yearning, but he also
Speaker 4: there's always a sort of hint of like, but there's
Speaker 4: something else out there for us, you know. It's very beautiful,
Speaker 4: and I think classic underdoc I would say.
Speaker 1: Okay, so in terms of our chatlist, we're looking pretty good.
Speaker 1: Naomi definitely thinks there are struggles in Bruce's stories that
Speaker 1: feel relatable to the queer experience.
Speaker 3: But and forgive me for saying this, who is Bruce
Speaker 3: brings Seen which Bruce Bringsteen are we talking about here?
Speaker 3: Some of Bruce's songs are about him, but sometimes he's
Speaker 3: singing it from the perspective of a character he's made up.
Speaker 3: We can definitely relate to lots of different struggles in
Speaker 3: the lyrics of his songs. But what about Bruce the
Speaker 3: man himself?
Speaker 1: That's next, Holly Jesse, because the boss belongs to us.
Speaker 3: Before the Break, Naomi made a strong argument for a
Speaker 3: bunch of themes in Bruce's song and the stories he
Speaker 3: tells being relatable to the queer experience, and Holly made
Speaker 3: the case that he's an emo, and both of those
Speaker 3: things are important entry.
Speaker 1: But we're still not quite satisfied in our agenda point
Speaker 1: underdog status right now, it's hard to separate the man
Speaker 1: from the music. Is Bruce an underdog or is it
Speaker 1: just the characters in his songs? Does that even matter
Speaker 1: if we can take our own meanings from them.
Speaker 6: Early on, I knew I had a bad desire from
Speaker 6: bailing my fists into my eyes and blasting thunder road.
Speaker 6: In Bruce, I found a safer masculinity, a weight of
Speaker 6: place to put that longing, a boyhood. You're not mad
Speaker 6: enough for me to hate woman enough for kissing. This
Speaker 6: yearning inspired a move across the sea to set free
Speaker 6: that bad desire. I changed my clothes, my hair, my face,
Speaker 6: and somewhere I met a similar heart who shared that
Speaker 6: bad desire. And sometimes weel it with our four heads
Speaker 6: pressed together.
Speaker 1: That's one of my friends, Lex reading a Bruce Springsteen
Speaker 1: inspired love poem that they wrote for their partner Legs.
Speaker 3: Sometimes we yell it with our four heads pressed together.
Speaker 3: I feel that so much in my little heart.
Speaker 1: Lex is another of my friends that I met through
Speaker 1: being queers who love Bruce Springsteen. They actually live in
Speaker 1: New Jersey in Asbury Park. Every day they walk around
Speaker 1: on the same street that Bruce has walked on a
Speaker 1: million times, And.
Speaker 3: Since Bruce Springsteen is of course from New Jersey, we
Speaker 3: needed a person on the ground who could take us
Speaker 3: around Bruce's home to to understand where he came from.
Speaker 1: Our exec producer, Jasmine JT. Green went to visit Lex
Speaker 1: at their flat in Asbury Park.
Speaker 5: High Works.
Speaker 7: Good to see her too. It's beautiful, there's so much stuff.
Speaker 1: Lex moved to Asbury Park partly because they love Bruce
Speaker 1: Springsteen so much. They were born in New York but
Speaker 1: grew up in England. They'd visit New Jersey as a
Speaker 1: teenager and always just vibed with the culture of it.
Speaker 6: Michael Maca, Romancebury, Springsteen, the Sopranos, Weird New Jersey, the magazine.
Speaker 6: This state has everything to offer. You've got mountains, beach,
Speaker 6: farmland city. If you want it, it's got it, and
Speaker 6: it's got people that are incredibly honest. I just fell
Speaker 6: in love with it. Weirdly, it just became a goal
Speaker 6: to move here. So when the opportunity arose, I thought,
Speaker 6: let's do it. That's what brought me to New Jersey,
Speaker 6: almost like a fandom magic, Like I was just obsessed
Speaker 6: with it. New Jersey, specifically Asbury Park, was the space
Speaker 6: that I was able to start the medicalized side of
Speaker 6: my transition.
Speaker 7: And then from being here for it will be my
Speaker 7: fish year.
Speaker 6: You know, I've found myself and I've grown from being
Speaker 6: this very scared human being, scared and shy human being
Speaker 6: into I'm still shy, but I'm not scared anymore. Like
Speaker 6: I'm living as myself, and I don't think I could
Speaker 6: have achieved that in any other state.
Speaker 7: Alongside the culture that I get, it was with.
Speaker 6: Bruce's music that when I first arrived, I thought I'd
Speaker 6: assimilate into straight culture, which is.
Speaker 7: Which is such a joke now considering.
Speaker 6: But it's also with Bruce how I strengthened a lot
Speaker 6: of my queer relationships. He's one of us folx.
Speaker 1: The myth and folklore of Bruce Springsteen is totally bound
Speaker 1: up with the myth and folklore of New Jersey itself.
Speaker 1: New Jersey is an underdog in its own right.
Speaker 7: People are horrible about this state.
Speaker 6: They are negligent towards the art that comes out of it,
Speaker 6: the people that come out of it.
Speaker 7: It's almost like a throwaway for some folks.
Speaker 6: And that's why Bruce, I think, is such an important
Speaker 6: icon for this state. He's been able to shine a
Speaker 6: light into a space that's usually ignored or just sort
Speaker 6: of like thrown away.
Speaker 3: Lexic Jasmine on a tour of some of their Bruce
Speaker 3: Bits of New Jersey.
Speaker 1: They started at Convention Hall, a big exhibition center on
Speaker 1: the boardwalk in Osbury Park.
Speaker 6: I love this building because it's old, and there's not
Speaker 6: that many old buildings that have been kept quite like this.
Speaker 6: It's looking a little bit worse for wear, but it's
Speaker 6: still got a lot of character.
Speaker 7: I think, like for me, it feels like an old
Speaker 7: train station, is what it looks like.
Speaker 6: It feels like it does emulate a train station, but
Speaker 6: it is just it is just a space with bars
Speaker 6: as a theater and then a hall as well.
Speaker 3: Convention Hall hosted the premiere of Blinded by the Lights,
Speaker 3: a film based on the memoir of journalist Sarfresmunzo, who
Speaker 3: moved to England at three years old from Pakistan in
Speaker 3: nineteen seventy four. As a teenager in a very white
Speaker 3: neighborhood in the late eighties, sar Forrest found meaning in
Speaker 3: Bruce Springsteen's music. On the day of the premiere, Lex
Speaker 3: was working at a soap shot inside Convention Hall that evening.
Speaker 6: I was just doing my job and I started to
Speaker 6: hear people yelling Bruce, like just yelling Bruce. And I
Speaker 6: don't know if you've heard more than fifty people say
Speaker 6: the same name.
Speaker 7: It's pretty jarring.
Speaker 6: So I ran outside the shop to see what was
Speaker 6: going on, and it turned out that he had actually
Speaker 6: turned up for this premiere. And I stood on a
Speaker 6: box and I cried like old white men cry at
Speaker 6: football whilst I looked at this man walk in to
Speaker 6: see his film in the city that loves him so much.
Speaker 6: And then after the screening he walked straight across and
Speaker 6: did a small show in the hall opposite, and it
Speaker 6: was a moment.
Speaker 7: Of just pure bliss.
Speaker 6: This person that I'd made up to be this like
Speaker 6: myth this gender marker almost for me like this, like yeah,
Speaker 6: everything that I wanted to be was just stood there,
Speaker 6: casually walking and just soaking it all up, like really
Speaker 6: humbly as well. And I think it's probably my casual
Speaker 6: Bruce story. Everybody has one here, whether it's they've seen
Speaker 6: him do a shot of tequila or they've just waved
Speaker 6: at him on the beach, like every person that has them.
Speaker 6: That day, I got my New Jersey points.
Speaker 7: I guess.
Speaker 1: Bruce Ringsteen has such an interesting image in New Jersey.
Speaker 1: He's at once a real man who everyone seems to
Speaker 1: have a story about seeing in the flesh, and he's
Speaker 1: the stuff of myth imagend. Every place Lex and Chasmine
Speaker 1: walk past has a Bruce story attached to it.
Speaker 7: Maybe you can duck into the arning. Yeah, you think
Speaker 7: they'll kick us out.
Speaker 6: So we are looking directly at the Stone Pony music
Speaker 6: venue in Asbury Park.
Speaker 7: It's tiny inside.
Speaker 6: It looks ginormous, but the actual bar is minuscule. The
Speaker 6: Stone Pony is actually in front of the in front
Speaker 6: of Porter, which is the building in which Clarence Clements
Speaker 6: and Bruce Springsteen met.
Speaker 1: Clarence Clemens is such an important figure in New Jersey
Speaker 1: and in Bruce Sprinkstein's life. He was Bruce Brinstein's best
Speaker 1: friend and saxophonist. The building Lex and Jasmin are standing
Speaker 1: outside Porter used to be called the Student Prince.
Speaker 3: As the myth goes on a dark and stormy night,
Speaker 3: Clarence went to the Student Prince to see Bruce and
Speaker 3: his band play.
Speaker 6: It's rumored that when Clarence Clemens went to open the door,
Speaker 6: the wind took it down the streets. So it's kind
Speaker 6: of it's a nice effect that it's so windy for
Speaker 6: us today, because it's as windy probably as it.
Speaker 7: Was that very night, right.
Speaker 6: So the stone pony itself is monochromatic, So there's a
Speaker 6: big black pony painted on the side of it, and
Speaker 6: it's got giant letters as well, so you can't miss
Speaker 6: it from whichever direction you're looking at. And that is
Speaker 6: in contrast to Porter, which is a big blue rectangle building.
Speaker 7: I think, so you're fine, have a nice day, guys.
Speaker 7: Where did I leave it distracting?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 7: No, I mean like people think you're like the the
Speaker 7: unofficial person of the I wonder why.
Speaker 2: It's a couple of people color outside.
Speaker 7: Yeah, so just like he sorry, the rumbling wind. All right,
Speaker 7: So we're heading back to the car.
Speaker 3: Next on the tour Lextic Jasmine to Freehold, where Bruce
Speaker 3: grew up.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think you're on my liming visible and this
Speaker 6: object is not a good I'm just gonna hold my hands.
Speaker 6: So we are in Freehold looking at the building in
Speaker 6: which is in place of the rugmill factory where Bruce's
Speaker 6: dad used to work. I think it's important to note
Speaker 6: that on our way here, driving here, there was a
Speaker 6: sense of tension that filled the car. I think where
Speaker 6: we saw a change in the flags. No longer were
Speaker 6: they're Pride flags. It was instead a lot of cop flags,
Speaker 6: a lot of American flags, which is a different kind
Speaker 6: of standard to what I'm used to. I don't know,
Speaker 6: things just feel a little bit more tight, like you
Speaker 6: can't breathe, like there isn't space to do anything else.
Speaker 7: I don't know, how do you feel like?
Speaker 6: It was a sense of like there was like a
Speaker 6: bit of a warmness that was in Asbury that coming
Speaker 6: here is very much like the sense.
Speaker 7: That I usually feel whenever I go to any sort
Speaker 7: of suburban space. And this is not me.
Speaker 6: I'm sure there are pockets of freehold that are beautiful
Speaker 6: and really kind and welcoming, But where und stood right now,
Speaker 6: I don't see that.
Speaker 1: Lex and Jasmine are stood looking at an apartment block
Speaker 1: where the factory once stood, where Bruce Springsteen's dad worked.
Speaker 1: Factory is one of my all time favorite Springsteen songs,
Speaker 1: and it reminds me so much of my dad.
Speaker 3: Through the mansions of fear, through the mansions of pain,
Speaker 3: I see my daddy walking through them factory gates in
Speaker 3: the rain.
Speaker 1: My dad worked in the textile factory, very similar to
Speaker 1: the environment Bruce's dad worked for about thirty five years
Speaker 1: for my entire childhood. I watched him walk through the
Speaker 1: gate to this huge, imposing, old stone warehouse. As a kid,
Speaker 1: I was so so proud of my dad. He was
Speaker 1: my hero, going off to this important, physically demanding job.
Speaker 1: But that job ultimately wrecked his health and chipped away
Speaker 1: at who he was.
Speaker 3: Back toor he takes his hearing back to, he gives
Speaker 3: him life, the work. We're working, just the working life.
Speaker 1: My dad's factory closed down years ago, but the building
Speaker 1: is still there, he says, it's all been sold off
Speaker 1: to random companies. Now there's a new apartment block standing
Speaker 1: where Bruce's dad's factory used to be.
Speaker 7: It's just a hepo concrete. It doesn't have the same feel.
Speaker 1: Over forty years after Bruce wrote the song Factory, there
Speaker 1: are still people with few options but to work physically demanding,
Speaker 1: low paid jobs that don't leave space for actually getting
Speaker 1: to live your life. New Jersey might look very different
Speaker 1: to how it did in the seventies, but when Springsteen
Speaker 1: plays Factory live, even today, it still stands as a
Speaker 1: contemporary anthem for working class hardship.
Speaker 6: So that escaping, that needing to get out, you know, that,
Speaker 6: to me is the essence of an underdog. You've gotta go,
Speaker 6: you got to go, and you'll do anything to make
Speaker 6: sure you don't have to go back. Even though he
Speaker 6: was not a factory worker, he's still writing about an
Speaker 6: experience that is helpful and honest for a lot of people.
Speaker 6: That's why his music is so good, because people can
Speaker 6: put themselves in his shoes, right, and that's how he's
Speaker 6: able to be so relatable. He still taps into that
Speaker 6: underdog status for these people like that they think that
Speaker 6: he's achieved all that there possibly is. He is still there,
Speaker 6: Bruce Springsteen. I just think because every generation feels that
Speaker 6: way at some point the life, out of touch, undesirable,
Speaker 6: people who feel like they're on the bottom of the heap,
Speaker 6: because that's a feeling that doesn't go away.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 1: It's an amazing skill that Bruce Springsteen has. He's now
Speaker 1: a multi millionaire, but he somehow manages to stay relevant,
Speaker 1: stay loved by this city, and have people who were
Speaker 1: demographically so different to him still find him relatable. But
Speaker 1: how deep does that relatability actually go if it merely
Speaker 1: comes from lyrics written before he made his millions? When's
Speaker 1: the expiration date?
Speaker 6: It's really hard to see him as an underdog when
Speaker 6: you know he has like so much money, you know,
Speaker 6: like the wealth right there.
Speaker 3: Right Until recently, Lex has felt frustrated by Bruce's lack
Speaker 3: of investment in his hometown.
Speaker 6: You know, it was a little disheartening being here and
Speaker 6: seeing spaces that were being dilapidate, that were becoming you know,
Speaker 6: we're almost turning into to rubble and ruin when they
Speaker 6: were meant to be so important to him.
Speaker 3: He has donated to a bunch of different things in
Speaker 3: New Jersey over the years, But what does that even mean?
Speaker 3: Can philanthropy be counted as solidarity? Especially if it's proportionately
Speaker 3: such a small amount of your wealth When you've reached
Speaker 3: that level of financial success, hundreds of millions of dollars,
Speaker 3: multiple huge properties, no longer worrying.
Speaker 5: If you can make.
Speaker 3: Rent, or afford healthcare or support your family financially, can
Speaker 3: you still be an underdog?
Speaker 5: What a question? Yeah.
Speaker 3: Also, if Bruce's lyrics appeal to people who have felt
Speaker 3: downtrodden in life in different ways, it makes sense.
Speaker 5: That he's got a very broad fan base.
Speaker 3: Almost anyone can hear his lyrics and feel seen by
Speaker 3: them in a.
Speaker 5: Way that's really beautiful.
Speaker 3: But it also means that he attracts groups of fans
Speaker 3: who don't necessarily relate to each other.
Speaker 6: Like when I went to go see him, it was
Speaker 6: a very interesting crowd, you know. It was a very
Speaker 6: like why heteronormative from where I was.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I have been to see Bruce a lot
Speaker 1: of times, and I'm always so conflicted by the experience.
Speaker 1: So I always go early and a queue, and I
Speaker 1: end up having so many conversations with strangers who I
Speaker 1: perceive a straight guys, mostly who take one look at
Speaker 1: me and think this person can't be a real Bruce fan,
Speaker 1: and then kind of quiz me on Bruce trivia in
Speaker 1: quite an aggressive way.
Speaker 3: A there is just a feeling that you get as
Speaker 3: a queer person when you're confronted by a rowdy mass
Speaker 3: of what looks like white, straight dudes, which is like
Speaker 3: a run.
Speaker 5: It makes me feel like it is their space and
Speaker 5: you're just in it.
Speaker 1: And we're both white in that sense, we are in
Speaker 1: the majority at Bruce Giggs, So I imagine that this
Speaker 1: feeling must be even more intense when you're one of
Speaker 1: the few people of color in the audience.
Speaker 5: We talked to Naomi Gordon label about this too.
Speaker 7: Just real talk.
Speaker 4: When I went to his concert in New Jersey, I
Speaker 4: was surrounded by white people and it's real and like
Speaker 4: sometimes well, of course it's not the case that like
Speaker 4: all his fans are white, but I think it's undeniable that,
Speaker 4: like a lot of what he's singing about is a
Speaker 4: certain specific experience that is largely about white working class
Speaker 4: people in this country. I don't I don't want to
Speaker 4: disconnect him from his whiteness.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's lots of elements of our relationships to Bruce
Speaker 1: and what he represents that feel complicated. Is one thing.
Speaker 1: Saying that queer people can find themes in Bruce's music relatable.
Speaker 1: And yes, there are so many more queer fans and
Speaker 1: POC fans of Bruce's music than you might expect.
Speaker 3: And it's not that you have to be the same
Speaker 3: as someone to find meaning from their work. But what
Speaker 3: does it mean when the majority of people in your
Speaker 3: icons fandom probably don't share your identity, your life experiences,
Speaker 3: or even your politics.
Speaker 4: Sometimes I feel a little icky about it. Like one
Speaker 4: thing I would say about him is that, like, I
Speaker 4: don't think he's ever been like really out there with
Speaker 4: rat it left lyrics like, there are other straight whites's
Speaker 4: man musicians who I think arguably have been much more
Speaker 4: political than him. I think it's important to be able
Speaker 4: to admire his work, appreciate his work, be fans of
Speaker 4: his work, be moved by it, and also be realistic
Speaker 4: about his limitations. I think it's important not to put
Speaker 4: him on a pedestal. I wouldn't call Bruce a queer
Speaker 4: hero like. Ultimately, these are stories that many queer folks
Speaker 4: have connected to, and this is music that many queer
Speaker 4: folks have connected to. But that doesn't mean that he's
Speaker 4: infallible in any way. For me, it's important to be
Speaker 4: a fan, but not to mythologize him and not to
Speaker 4: give him that to cast him in that queer hero light.
Speaker 7: Hmm.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this whole series is about getting Bruce recognized as
Speaker 1: a queer icon, to cast him in that queer hero
Speaker 1: light that Miomi just said they would never do.
Speaker 5: Maybe we shouldn't be doing this.
Speaker 2: That's next episode.
Speaker 3: Because Because the Boss Belongs to Us is a production
Speaker 3: of Martin Hart and I Heart Podcasts. We're hosted by
Speaker 3: Jesse Lawson and Holly Cassio.
Speaker 1: The series is executive produced by Jesse and Holly and
Speaker 1: created by Jesse Lawson.
Speaker 3: This episode was produced and sound designed by Jesse Lawson,
Speaker 3: with production assistants from Mariah Dennis and Tess Hazel.
Speaker 5: Michelle Macklam is our mix engineer.
Speaker 1: Our original music and theme is by Talk Bizarre at
Speaker 1: Talk b A Z A R Underscore.
Speaker 3: Our show was designed and illustrated by Holly Cassio at
Speaker 3: Holly c A s I O.
Speaker 1: Fact checking by Selina Serlin. Legal services provided by Rowan,
Speaker 1: Moran and File.
Speaker 3: Our executive producer from Malton Hart is Jasmine J. T.
Speaker 5: Green.
Speaker 3: Our executive producer from iHeart Podcast is Lindsay Hoffman.
Speaker 1: Don't forget to review the show on your podcast platform.
Speaker 3: And tell your friends so listen. It makes a huge difference.
Speaker 2: Bye Bye