No, it’s not a coincidence.
Just as its name implies, “Death to My Hometown” is a direct sequel to “My Hometown“–certainly thematically, and a strong argument could be made for literally as well.
Both songs are narrated by fathers passing along life lessons to their sons; both are set in towns ravaged by economic downturns; both feature two verses told in flashback, a revelatory bridge, and a torch-passing final verse.
But whereas the narrator of Bruce’s 1985 Top Ten single passively and nostalgically accepted his town’s fate, the narrator of his 2012 Wrecking Ball track isn’t about to accept a damn thing.
If we assume the son in “My Hometown” was the same age as his father was in his reverie, that would make him 35 in 2011… a nice bit of parallelism should we (and we should) consider him now fully grown and the narrator of “Death to My Hometown.”
Both songs are products of their time; the former embodying the economic malaise that had not quite faded when Bruce recorded “My Hometown,” the latter capturing the populist rage that gave rise to the Occupy Wall Street movement mere months before the release of Wrecking Ball.
It’s easy to imagine that our “Death to My Hometown” protagonist remembers his family abandoning their home a quarter-century earlier and isn’t about to allow his community to suffer the same fate. He tells his story arranged, as Bruce characterized it in a 2012 interview with Jon Stewart, as “an Irish rebel song, but it’s all about what happened four years ago. I want to give people a sense that this is something that’s happened over and over and over again; what happened in 2008 happened before the turn of the century, and just after the turn of the century – it’s a repetitive, historical cycle that has basically landed on the heads of the same people.”
Lyrically, “Death to My Hometown” is as straightforward as Bruce ever gets; he takes no chances of anyone mistaking his message. Our first two verses are flashbacks, just as they were in “My Hometown.” There’s no nostalgia on display here, though: both verses dwell on the town’s destruction.
Well, no cannonballs did fly, no rifles cut us down
No bombs fell from the sky, no blood soaked the ground
No powder flash blinded the eye, no deathly thunder sounded
But just as sure as the hand of God, they brought death to my hometown
They brought death to my hometown, boys
No shells ripped the evening sky, no cities burning down
No army stormed the shores for which we’d die, no dictators were crowned
I awoke from a quiet night, I never heard a sound
The marauders raided in the dark and brought death to my hometown, boys
Death to my hometown
Our narrator keeps us in the dark for the first half of the song. We know his town was devastated, but we don’t know how or why. We know what it wasn’t, though: it wasn’t a war. There were no weapons, no armies, and no signals–just swift, merciless destruction in the metaphorical night by faceless marauders.
Only in the bridge do we get our first clue that the death he speaks of is an economic one–which, we should note, is exactly where “My Hometown” takes its turn as well.
They destroyed our families, factories, and they took our homes
They left our bodies on the plains, the vultures picked our bones
Compare that bridge with the one from 1984:
Now Main Street’s whitewashed windows and vacant stores
Seems like there ain’t nobody wants to come down here no more
That stark contrast tees up the final verse of “Death to My Hometown,” where the son of “My Hometown” addresses his own son years later. Instead of telling his sons (it appears he has at least two) to take a good long last look around before their family leaves town, he urges them to take up arms–metaphorically at least.
So listen up, my sonny boy, be ready for when they come
For they’ll be returning sure as the rising sun
Now get yourself a song to sing and sing it ’til you’re done
Yeah, sing it hard and sing it well
Send the robber barons straight to hell
The greedy thieves who came around
And ate the flesh of everything they found
Whose crimes have gone unpunished now
Who walk the streets as free men now
They brought death to our hometown, boys
Death to our hometown, boys
Death to our hometown, boys
Death to our hometown
The winds of change are blowing, and the father senses the same forces that gutted his boyhood hometown returning to attack his new one. Stand firm, he warns his kids. Stand firm, and resist.
Get yourself a song to sing. Resist. Protest. Organize. Unionize.
It’s unclear whether the “robber barons,” “the greedy thieves” committed legal crimes or just moral ones, but the results are the same regardless: they brought death to our hometown, boys.
“Death to My Hometown” ends on a note just as unresolved as “My Hometown” — parallel to the end. Will the lessons learned by the father lead the son to a better outcome? We’ll never know, but that’s not Bruce’s point anyway.
If there’s a message in “Death to My Hometown,” it’s to learn from the past. Our narrator isn’t about to be a victim twice–his family may lose their battle in the end, but at least they’ll go down fighting.
“Death to My Hometown” may be lyrically straightforward, but musically it’s fascinatingly dense and layered, one of the more complex tracks Bruce has ever recorded. It rewards multiple listens, especially with headphones–you’ll pick out strings, a hurdy-gurdy, Kevin Buell in his only appearance in Bruce’s studio catalog (he plays the drums and provides backing vocals), and even –at the 2:42 mark–an AK-47 assault rifle.
But the most distinctive musical element in “Death to My Hometown” is surely the folk song sample from “The Last Words of Copernicus” by the United Sacred Harp Musical Association, recorded in 1959. Skip to the 0:53 mark, and you’ll hear it clearly.
That sample was reportedly the song’s seed. Bruce was taken by it, imagined a song layered above it, and wrote a song to fit.
With such careful construction, “Death to My Hometown” might seem like a challenge to translate to the concert stage, but when a super-sized E Street Band went on tour behind their Wrecking Ball album in 2012, it worked surprisingly well–thanks largely to the expanded horn section and the expressive guitar of Tom Morello, who made frequent guest appearances throughout the tour.
“Death to My Hometown” has been a set list staple ever since its debut–it hasn’t missed a tour since its original release, and its appearances are regular enough to disqualify as cameo or rare. It remains as relevant today as it was a decade ago, and it’s a good bet that we’ll be hearing it live again soon.
Bonus: There are several great professionally shot live performances to choose from, but here’s the earliest: the debut of “Death to My Hometown” from Bruce’s appearance on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon from March 2, 2012.
Death to My Hometown
Recorded: 2011
Released: Wrecking Ball (2012)
First performed: March 2, 2012 (New York City, NY)
Last performed: July 13, 2017 (Copenhagen, Denmark)
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