Roll of the Dice: If I Was the Priest

Updated 10/23/20: Well, the first sentence of my original essay sure did age well. As of a few minutes ago, we finally have an officially released version of “If I Was the Priest,” and an E Street Band version to boot. I’m going to let my original essay stand unedited–I think the lyrical analysis holds up (the differences between the original and modern versions are minor), and while the tremendous E Street Band performance deserves some discussion (as well as Bruce’s vocals–he’s in full Dylan mode), I’ll save that for another day. For now, it’s enough to just rejoice in a terrific song finally realized fifty years after Bruce first played it.

If ever there was an early Springsteen outtake crying out for an official release, “If I Was the Priest” would be it.

After all, without “If I Was the Priest” there’s a chance we would never have heard of Bruce Springsteen let alone be discussing his work on a blog devoted to it.

The broad bones of the story are well known: Way back on May 2, 1972, Bruce’s manager Mike Appel smooth-talked and fast-talked his and Bruce’s way into the office of legendary Columbia A&R man John Hammond. Bruce played a few songs for the skeptical but intrigued Hammond, and by the time he was done, Hammond knew he had a star on his hands.

But the audition wasn’t without its bumps: Hammond loved “It’s Hard to Be a Saint in the City,” but wasn’t particularly enamored with “Mary, Queen of Arkansas.” Still not completely won over, he asked Bruce if he had anything “way out there,” something he wouldn’t dream of performing live.

Bruce obliged him with “If I Was the Priest” (even though he almost certainly played it during his 1971 residency at The Student Prince in Asbury Park).

Hammond was knocked out by the song’s mashup of Catholic and old west imagery, and the rest is history.

Bruce has never released “If I Was the Priest,” even though Alan Clarke covered it in 1975 and no less than three of Bruce’s performances exist in bootleg form.

Why? Who knows. It certainly doesn’t rank among Bruce’s best work, but then again this is a man who officially released “Baby I.” For historical significance alone, the vault cries out for its release.

The song itself is no slouch though–in fact, it may be the best early prototype of a Springsteen “epic” song, ambitious in its reach, audacious in its content, and in a departure for Bruce he performed it solo on the piano.

We don’t know how Bruce played it on that fateful afternoon of May 2, 1972 (he only had his guitar with him), but we actually have the recording he made at Columbia the following day:

Bruce cleaned it up a bit and rerecorded it a few weeks later, and it’s this later version we’ll use for our analysis, since it’s the clearer and brighter recording.

“If I Was the Priest” is a challenging song to get inside, and Bruce probably intended it that way. It’s an impressionistic piece, combining two themes that already separately dominated much of his work (and still does to this day, in fact): Catholicism and the American West.

But there’s a bit of internal conflict resolution going on as well, and Bruce lays it out for us in the opening lines:

Well, there’s a light on yonder mountain
And it’s calling me to shine
There’s a girl over by the water fountain
And she’s asking to be mine
And ain’t that Jesus, he’s standing in the doorway
With a buckskin jacket, boots and spurs, so really fine
He says, “We need you up in Dodge City, son
‘Cause there’s, oh, so many bad boys trying to work the same line”

On one hand, the dual temptations of fame and the flesh; on the other, the gravity of duty and community. That had to be a top-of-mind dilemma for an aspiring rock star.

Having imagined Jesus as western hero metaphor, he now paints an entire scene for us, transporting himself and his loved ones into the scene and losing himself in reverie:

Well, now if Jesus was the sheriff and I was the priest
If my lady was an heiress and my Mama was a thief
Oh, and Papa rode shotgun for the Fargo line
There’s still too many bad boys trying to work the same line

What comes next is, in my opinion, one of the best intact verses of Bruce’s early work:

Now old sweet Virgin Mary, she runs the Holy Grail saloon
Where for a nickel they’ll give you whiskey and a personally blessed balloon
And the Holy Ghost, he’s the host with the most, he runs the burlesque show
Where they let you in for free but, oh, hit you for your soul when you go
And Mary serves Mass on Sunday and then she sells her body on Monday to the boot maker who will pay the highest price
But he don’t know he got stuck with a loser, Mary’s a stone junkie, what’s more she’s a boozer
She’s only been made once or twice by some kind of magic

Wow. There’s a lot going on there, starting with the imagery: Bruce brings Mary (even then, it was always Mary) to life as a bartender by day, prostitute by night. (Let’s take a moment to acknowledge the brilliance of referring to a condom as a “personally blessed balloon”–a description that works on several levels and never once sounds obscene.) And the holy ghost as pimp? For a young Catholic man (Bruce was 21 at most when he wrote “If I Was the Priest”), that’s some serious audacity.

And that AAB/AAB rhyme scheme at the end of the verse–that’s some sophisticated songwriting right there.

Bruce has mentioned on more than one occasion that many of his songs can be distilled down to a single key passage. “If I Was the Priest” is no exception:

And, well, things ain’t been the same in heaven ever since big bad Bobby came to town
He’s been known to down eleven and then ask for another round
And me I got scabs on my knees from kneeling way too long
You gotta take a stand, be the man, up where you belong
And forget about the old friends and the old times
Because there’s just too many new boys trying to work the same line

That’s the song right there: the singer is gathering his courage, his fortitude, his determination to break away from the ties that bind, venture to parts unknown, and do whatever it takes to realize his dreams. Because there are a lot of pretenders out there reaching for the brass ring, too.

Now if Jesus was the sheriff and I were the priest
If my lady was an heiress and my Mama was a thief
Oh, and Papa rode shotgun for the Fargo line
There’s still too many outlaws trying to work the same line

Bruce rouses himself from his daydream now, returning to the present by revisiting the opening verse of the song. But this time, he answers Jesus: even though he may be needed by his family, friends, and community, he’s getting the hell out of Dodge. (A sly and clever choice of location, that.)

Now there’s a light on yonder mountain
And it’s calling me to shine
There’s a girl by the water fountain
And she’s asking to be mine
And Jesus, he’s standing in the doorway
With his six-guns drawn and ready to fan
He says, “We need you, son, up in Dodge City”
But I’m already overdue in Cheyenne

As I mentioned earlier, it’s believed that Bruce did indeed perform “If I Was the Priest” during his late 1971 residency at the Student Prince in Asbury Park. Bruce himself made reference to it in a 1974 interview, in fact. But no recordings of such a performance exist.

So here’s a bonus demo instead: earlier than both of the above performances, this one is a recording from Mike Appel’s office in April of 1972, one of the very first recordings he ever made for Appel, before he even signed with him.

If I Was the Priest
Recorded: April-June 1972 (solo), November 2019 (band)
Released: Letter to You (2020)
First performed: February 14, 2023 (Houston, TX) (but likely performed in 1971 as well)
Last performed: February 21, 2023 (Tulsa, OK)
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