Cover Me, Allan Clarke: If I Were the Priest

“I still don’t know what it means!” remarked Allan Clarke in a 2014 interview about his cover of “If I Was the Priest.”

“I was introduced to Bruce Springsteen’s music back in the early 70s when he was coming on the scene. I went to a music publisher which a friend of mine was running. He said ‘I’ve got this guy from America who’s just sent me quite a few of his songs. I think he’s gonna be quite big.’ I said ‘Let’s hear it’.

“So we sat down and he put the tape on and two hours later after listening to some brilliant, brilliant music I said ‘Wow, is there any chance of having any of these songs?’ He said ‘Well, there’s nothing planned in terms of bringing anything out but I suppose it would be ok.’

“So I chose three songs that I liked which were ‘Born To Run’, ‘Sandy’, and a very unknown song called ‘If I Were The Priest’ which I don’t think that he ever put on an album.”

Clarke had good taste: at the time he selected them, “Born to Run” hadn’t yet been released, and Clarke’s recording of “If I Were the Priest” (Clarke changed the title’s mood to the proper subjunctive) would have the field to itself for 46 years until its songwriter finally came around and released his own version.

Clarke released “If I Were the Priest” on his 1974 eponymous solo album. Initially unavailable in the U.S., enterprising Springsteen fans managed to track down copies once Born to Run catapulted Bruce to stardom and word got out that an unreleased Springsteen-penned song was floating around in the form of a cover.

Philadelphia DJ Ed Sciaky was one of those fans. Sciaky got his hands on a copy and surprised Bruce with it during an in-studio radio interview on November 3, 1974–much to 25-year-old Bruce’s audible annoyance.

Sciaky played the cover in full for Bruce and the band; we can only imagine the reactions taking place in the studio for those four minutes.

The thing is, though: it’s a great cover. Clarke not only captured the spirit of the song, he managed to summon the early E Street sound as well–the arrangement sounds very much like what we would have expected if Bruce had played it live on his 1973-74 tours (except for maybe that funky but tantalizingly brief mid-song break).

After listening to Clarke’s version, Bruce complimented the harmonies but seemed eager to change the subject, which they quickly did.

Bruce may have wished he could put that genie back in the bottle, but we can hear in his voice that he already knew he couldn’t. Several bootleg versions of Bruce singing “If I Was the Priest” would surface over the years to come, and in 2019 he finally decided to release it officially.

With 46 years between Clarke’s cover and Bruce’s own version, “If I Were the Priest” holds the record for the longest head start for a Springsteen cover.

(You can hear Clarke’s cover of “Born to Run” here.)