If you caught Bleachers on Saturday Night Live last weekend and thought he was paying tribute to a certain New Jersey icon, there’s a reason for that.
Sure, Bruce appears on the bands’ recent single, “Chinatown,” but the influence runs much deeper and further than that. Bleachers’ music (both Jack Antonoff and his band go by the name Bleachers) is thoroughly infused with Springsteen’s sound and spirit. He mixes it with his own immense talent and songwriting expertise from his previous group fun. and his collaborations with Taylor Swift, St. Vincent, Lorde, Lana Del Rey, Carly Rae Jepsen, among others.
Last summer, he explained his deep affinity for his fellow New Jerseyan’s music to NME: “You have different lives and different experiences, but the feeling behind it [is the same]… ‘This is how I feel. I understand what this person is talking about, I’m dying to fucking get out of [New Jersey]– but I love this place’.”
Surprisingly, though, it’s pretty rare for Bleachers to cover one of Bruce’s songs in concert. Even when he played the Summer Stage at The Stone Pony last summer, the closest he got was a cover of “Jersey Girl,” and that’s not even a song Bruce wrote.
But Bruce Brunch host Tom Cunningham scored a major get in the summer of 2017 when Antonoff joined him on his Sunday morning radio show (which really should be essential weekly listening for Springsteen fans–you can listen to the show live here). Jack played two songs that morning, one of which was an acoustic cover of Bruce’s “Hungry Heart.”
“Hungry Heart” is a song of restlessness, loneliness, and an ache for fulfillment–none of which comes through in Bruce’s original poppy arrangement.
Antonoff gets it, though, and his version lays it bare with yearning, almost heart-breaking vocals that will have you hearing Bruce’s song in a new light.
