Roll of the Dice: Mary’s Place

There’s a party in the middle of The Rising.

A house party, in fact. And if that seems out of place in one of Bruce Springsteen’s darkest albums, it’s only because we haven’t looked at the address on the invitation.

“Mary’s Place” is about how we move forward in the face of loss. Our friends, family and community give us the strength to carry on, along with our faith that we’ll meet our ghosts again someday in the afterlife.

The titular place exists on two planes at once: in the earthly realm, a local tavern where we gather in celebration of a life; and in heaven, where the promise of everlasting reunion is fulfilled. In the aftermath of September 11, 2001, many of us took solace in the former and held the latter close to our hearts.

The verses of “Mary’s Place” operate on both levels:

I got seven pictures of Buddha, the prophet’s on my tongue
Eleven angels of mercy sighing over that black hole in the sun
My heart’s dark but it’s rising, I’m pulling all the faith I can see
From that black hole on the horizon I hear your voice calling me

Familiar faces around me, laughter fills the air
Your loving grace surrounds me, everybody’s here
Furniture’s out on the front porch, music’s up loud
I dream of you in my arms and I lose myself in the crowd

On earth, we turn to whatever religion offers us succor to help us rise above our grief and despair, and we turn to our friends and neighbors to remind us of all that is still good and joyful in the world. In heaven, all religions meet and meld and call us home when it’s our time. (There’s a reason our narrator calls it Mary’s place.) Our ghosts are there to greet us with the celebration that for now we can only dream about.

Those are the verses. When the chorus kicks in, we realize just how subversive a song this is. In most songs, the verses are earthbound and the chorus takes flight. The verses despair while the chorus delights.

In “Mary’s Place,” Bruce inverts the formula: the verses offer us hope and support and the promise of an eventual reward, but the chorus reminds us of the merciless now.

Meet me at Mary’s place, we’re gonna have a party
Tell me how do we get this thing started

Meet me at Mary’s place, we’re gonna have a party
Tell me how do you live brokenhearted

Our departed loved ones may wait for us at the end of our journey, but we have miles to go before we sleep. How do we get started again? How do we live brokenhearted?

The choruses of “Mary’s Place” remind us that we have a long workday ahead of us before the relief of that great house party in the sky.

It’s in the chorus, too, where Bruce overtly tips his hat to his inspirations. Bruce’s lyrics are cloaked in the thinnest of disguises. a pair of Clark Kent glasses on the chorus of Sam Cooke’s 1966 track, “Meet Me at Mary’s Place.”

Meet me at Mary’s place
We’re gonna have us a ball today
Why don’t you meet me at Mary’s place

Cooke’s song isn’t the only influence at work in “Mary’s Place.” Bruce transitions from verse to chorus with a little help from Eric Clapton and his 1972 single “Let It Rain” which has something of its own to say about the power of love to cut through grief.

All the while, the mighty E Streeters serve as our house party band, playing in traditional fashion and classic sound–the only track on The Rising that sounds (intentionally) like 1970s E Street. The songs builds toward its climax, where earthly and ethereal realms merge and it’s no longer clear whether today is the day after our loved one’s passing or the day after our own.

I got a picture of you in my locket, I keep it close to my heart
It’s a light shining in my breast, leading me through the dark
Seven days, seven candles in my window lighting your way
Your favorite record’s on the turntable, I drop the needle and pray 
Band’s counting out midnight, floor’s rumbling loud 
Singer’s calling up daylight, waiting for that shout from the crowd 
Waiting for that shout from the crowd

Either way, we’re at Mary’s place, and when we’re at Mary’s place we’re surrounded by love and filled with hope. And any second now, we’ll see them again.

“Mary’s Place” is a fine track in its studio form, but it’s on the concert stage–of course–where it truly comes alive. How could it be otherwise? This is a song about the power of community to carry us through our grief; it’s only fitting that it requires an audience to breathe life into it and lift it to the heavens with cries of “Turn it up!”

In concert, Bruce often introduces “Mary’s Place” by quoting Major Lance’s 1963 hit single, “The Monkey Time.” It’s a brilliant mash-up, because both songs operate simultaneously on the corporeal and spiritual planes.

Over the course of the Rising Tour (which featured “Mary’s Place” as its nightly centerpiece), the song grew in scope, power, and duration. By the end of the tour, it stretched to almost three times the length of the already six-minute album track.

“Mary’s Place” made return engagements on later tours, but removed from its album set context, it lost much of its emotional power, becoming a showcase for political schtick, or a reliable crowd-pleaser when the heavens actually did let it rain.

On one occasion, Bruce even attempted it acoustically on the piano, with uneven results.

Still, in the right setting, at the right moment, and with the right feeling, “Mary’s Place” can be the adrenaline shot that lifts an already stellar show into the stratosphere. While never commonplace in the years since 2004, “Mary’s Place” makes return appearances from time to time and will likely continue to do so for as long as fans continue to meet there… and turn it up.

Mary’s Place
Recorded: February-March 2002
Released: The Rising (2002)
First performed: July 25, 2002 (Asbury Park, NJ)
Last performed: September 3, 2023 (East Rutherford, NJ)

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