Roll of the Dice: Blinded by the Light

“It’s basically about sex.” — Bruce Springsteen, February 20, 2003

 

“Don’t overthink the whole thing.” — Bruce Springsteen, April 4, 2005

What do you do if you’re a hot-shot 22-year-old would-be rock star with big dreams, a recording contract, a wide-open future, and the only thing standing in the way of your voice on vinyl is a record exec who can’t hear a single?

You go home and write one.

But what do you write about? Pressed for time, Bruce Springsteen wrote what he knew: the sexual escapades of an itinerant aspirant feeling his oats on the Jersey Shore. The year was 1972, however, so slipping his off-color misadventures past sensitive ears required wrapping them in coded metaphors, Dylanesque sobriquets and rhymes within rhymes within rhymes.

With his debut album almost in the can (except for the elusive single) and the Bruce Springsteen Band dispersed across the eastern seaboard, Springsteen summoned the only two players he could find on short notice: Madman drummer Vini Lopez and Clarence Clemons, saxman for a local band called Norman Seldin’s Joyful Noize.

Together with award-winning Broadway conductor, composer and orchestrator (and future Dancing with the Stars musical director) Harold Wheeler on piano, the quartet came together in the studio on September 11, 1972 and walked away with what would become the two best-known tracks from Springsteen’s debut album: “Spirit in the Night,” and “Blinded by the Light.”

Written hurriedly and contemporaneously, “Blinded” and “Spirit” are cut from similar cloth. Both feature an exotic cast of hedonists in eternal summer; neither bother with plot, character arc, or any kind of deep meaning. But whereas “Spirit in the Night” flaunts its literary influences (it’s practically a scene out of A Midsummer Night’s Dream), “Blinded by the Light” dazzles with internal rhymes that whiz past us like stones skipping across Greasy Lake.

In fact, if there’s any deserved criticism to levy at “Blinded by the Light,” it’s the song’s too-much-by-half cleverness. The first verse uses technical artistry to paint lucid if impressionistic scenes; by the end, Bruce is clearly opting for rhyme over reason (an admission that prompted Bruce’s “Don’t overthink it” advice above).

When Bruce described the song’s origin in his VH-1 Storytellers episode, he bemoaned the banality of the “what came first” question before admitting that in this case, the lyrics preceded the music.

That’s not entirely true. It’s possible that he composed the main melody upon completing his lyrical acrobatics. However, we know the bridge arrangement pre-dates “Blinded” by at least a couple of months, because it appears in “Henry Boy,” recorded in June 1972 and performed live on August 10th. That was the same day Bruce submitted his completed (he thought) album to Columbia, only to be sent home by Clive Davis in search of a single.

And as for the electric guitar riff that opens both the track and the album (the only time an electric guitar appears anywhere on Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J.), it’s too close to the one that opens The Doobie Brothers’ second album for coincidence. “Listen to the Music” debuted in July and was climbing the Hot 100 the very week Bruce recorded “Blinded” in September. Take a listen below and compare for yourself.

While at least some musical ingredients might have ripened on other trees, there’s no doubt Springsteen’s lyrics flowed freely from his fertile imagination and his rhyming dictionary. They’re too metrically unique to have come from anywhere else.

On more than one occasion, Bruce has led his audience through a line-by-line exegesis, admitting at times that even he doesn’t know what certain passages are about. I’ll do some of that here, too. But to spend too much energy analyzing the lyrics (“overthinking it,” Bruce would say) is to miss the trees for the forest. And these are some hella impressive trees.

Madman drummers bummers and Indians in the summer with a teenage diplomat
In the dumps with the mumps as the adolescent pumps his way into his hat
With a boulder on my shoulder, feelin’ kinda older I tripped the merry-go-round
With this very unpleasing sneezing and wheezing the calliope crashed to the ground

The first verse sets the stage: our teenage hero spends his summer splitting his time between his band of hardscrabble musicians (bummers, featuring a cameo by Mad Dog Vini Lopez, singled out here only because of his contribution to the rhyme scheme) and his baseball team, the Indians. He does what any teenage boy does on the Jersey Shore: sulks, rebels against authority, hangs out on the boardwalk, and occasionally causes chaos.

As for that “pumps his way into his hat” reference: Wikipedia authoritatively cites Bruce’s Aunt Dora explaining Bruce’s refusal to take off his hat while playing baseball. That’s very sweet. I don’t doubt that it’s the explanation Bruce gave her. I’m sure I would have told my Aunt Dora that too, if she asked me to explain my masturbation reference.

But let’s pause for a minute, because those internal rhymes! This was one of Bruce’s favorite techniques from his younger days. We can see it on display in released tracks like “Growin’ Up” and the aforementioned “Henry Boy,” as well as unreleased early works like “Marie,” and “All I Wanna Do Is Dance.” (He was still using it as recently as “Moonlight Motel.“)

But nowhere in his catalog does he ever before or since approach the level of wizardry he employs here. He even gets an extra credit point for sneaking in some bookending alliteration!

Internal rhyming is the practice of rhyming interior words within or between lyrical lines, rather than simply focusing (as most songwriters do) on rhyming the words that end each line. In each line of “Blinded,” Bruce serves up not just one but two (and sometimes three) internal rhymes, and if it sometimes means that meaning slips by the wayside, it’s remarkable that the song holds together at all.

Still, as impressive as that first verse is, let’s hold Bruce’s beer. Check this out:

Some all-hot half-shot was headin’ for a hot spot snappin‘ his fingers clappin‘ his hands
And some fleshpot mascot was tied into a lover’s knot with a whatnot in her hand
And now young Scott with a slingshot finally found a tender spot and throws his lover in the sand
And some bloodshot forget-me-not whispers, “Daddy’s within earshot, save the buckshot, turn up the band”

Holy freaking moley.

There’s so much going on in that verse that I can’t even use bold type to highlight it all, because much of the technical wizardry overlaps. Let’s start with that first line, because it may be the most astonishing line of the whole song. In those mere fifteen words, we have:

• a quadruple internal rhyme (all-hot, half-shot, hot spot)
• followed by a double internal rhyme (snappin’ and clappin’)
• threaded with quintuple alliteration (hot, half, headin’, hot, hands)

…all while clearly painting a visual scene for the listener. You try doing that in fifteen words, and please pardon me if I don’t wait.

Bruce isn’t done yet though, because the second line features a quadruple internal rhyme, the third has a triple (and another alliterative run), and the fourth another quad. But what should really blow our mind is that the entire four-line verse uses the exact same internal rhyme! There are fourteen internal “-ot” rhymes in a single verse! Who needs deep meaning when you can make magic like this?

If you’re wondering anyway: Bruce is the snappin’, clappin’, slingshottin’ all-hot half-shot Scott getting a hand job from his fleshpot mascot and blue balls from his forget-me-not.

And she was blinded by the light
Oh, cut loose like a deuce another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
She got down but she never got tight, but she’ll make it alright

And there’s our famous chorus. Although he uses it first to describe his love interests, the titular phrase is Bruce’s way of saying he was in it for the living. When you open your eyes wide enough to experience all that life has to offer, the light can be overpoweringly bright–and that just means you’re doing it right. We’ll return to this thought at song’s end, along with a certain lyrical alteration that gave Bruce his first and only Number One single.

As the song progresses, Bruce’s lyrics get increasingly impressionistic.

Some brimstone baritone anti-cyclone rolling stone preacher from the east
He says, “Dethrone the dictaphone, hit it in its funny bone, that’s where they expect it least”
And some new–mown chaperone was standin’ in the corner all alone watchin’ the young girls dance
And some fresh-sown moonstone was messin’ with his frozen zone to remind him of the feeling of romance

Once again, Bruce threads a single internal rhyme scheme–this time a baker’s dozen–as our hero surveils the authority figures standing between him and a dance with his moonstone that would surely send him home limping in discomfort.

Some silicone sister with her manager’s mister told me I got what it takes
She said, “I’ll turn you on sonny, to something strong if you’ll play that song with the funky break”

I’m giving up on the bold-type at this point, because there’s just too much going on. But check out that first line that features a pair of internal rhymes, each within its own alliterative pairing. Wow! It’s almost a triple feat, actually, if Bruce could have figured out a way to match some silicone sister with one more word to make manager’s mister a full alliterative triple of its own.

In any event, as Bruce likes to point out, his silicone sister is a candidate for the first appearance of breast enhancements in popular music. She might also be at least loosely based on his former girlfriend who used to invite A&R reps to scout her boyfriend’s band only to sleep with them instead.

And Go-cart Mozart was checkin’ out the weather chart to see if it was safe to go outside
And little Early-Pearly came by in her curly-wurly and asked me if I needed a ride
Oh, some hazard from Harvard was skunked on beer playin’ backyard bombardier
Yes and Scotland Yard was trying hard, they sent a dude with a calling card who said, “Do what you like, but don’t do it here”
Well, I jumped up, turned around, spit in the air, fell on the ground
Asked him which was the way back home
He said, “Take a right at the light, keep goin’ straight until night, and then, boys, you’re on your own”

And now in Zanzibar a shootin’ star was ridin’ in a sidecar hummin’ a lunar tune
Yes, and the avatar said, “Blow the bar but first remove the cookie jar we’re gonna teach those boys to laugh too soon”
And some kidnapped handicap was complainin’ that he caught the clap from some mousetrap he bought last night
Well I unsnapped his skull cap, between his ears I saw a gap and figured he’d be all right

Bruce admits to having no idea who or what the “go-cart Mozart” line is about, or for that matter much of the last verse. (“Rhyming dictionary,” he shrugged in a 2003 performance.)  Early Pearly, however, was another notch in his belt, and although it’s one of the song’s least coded metaphors (I’ll let you work out mousetrap on your own) Bruce confesses some experience with professional sex workers.

Again, though, to beat a thoroughly deceased horse: decoding the lyrics doesn’t particularly enhance our appreciation of “Blinded by the Light.” I’m pretty certain Bruce wasn’t trying to write a masterpiece; he was trying to quickly finish an album and feeling both playfully clever and cocksure in so doing.

At best, “Blinded” is a boardwalk mural and a songwriter’s sandbox, and on both counts it succeeds soaringly. It’s impossible to listen to “Blinded by the Light” without grinning and marveling at its audaciousness.

However, Bruce makes sure to slip in at least one key takeaway for the listener, and it comes at the end of the song:

Mama always told me not to look into the sights of the sun
Whoa, but mama that’s where the fun is

If there’s a moral to “Blinded by the Light,” here it is: excitement often comes wrapped in risk, and sometimes life is most thrilling when we’re out on a trapeze without a net. It’s the carpe diem clarion call of youth.

Not many artists score a Number One hit single with the first song on their first album, but Bruce Springsteen can claim membership in that club. It comes with an asterisk, though. Columbia issued his first-ever single in February 1973, shortly after the January release of the album. It tanked without ever charting, as did the album. (Greetings sold only about 23,000 copies the year of its release.)

Then Manfred Mann came along. Mann and his Earth Band recorded a seven-minute cover of “Blinded” for their 1976 album The Roaring Silence. It wasn’t the first time Mann had covered one of Bruce’s songs, and it wouldn’t be the last. But it would certainly be the most successful, topping the charts in both the U.S. and Canada.

That’s probably at least in part due to a certain lyrical change in Mann’s version that caused millions of listeners to wonder, “did he really just say that?” The irony is while Mann did indeed make an alteration to Bruce’s words (from “cut loose like a deuce” to “revved up like a deuce,” he didn’t change the part that revved everyone up.

Even fans familiar with Bruce’s version thought they heard Mann sing “wrapped up like a douche” instead of “revved up like a deuce.” That’s because of an issue reportedly introduced during editing, where the azimuth of the tape head distorted Mann’s vocals just enough to cause the confusion. Although it’s a fantastic prog rock interpretation regardless (featuring a non-ironic “Chopsticks” interlude that works amazingly well), there’s no doubt that the error cued a lot of curiosity and close listening.

Today, Springsteen milks the mistake for laughs, crediting it (perhaps accurately) for its Number One status. One wonders, however, how Bruce might have reacted had he heard the recording prior to its release… and he almost did.

Mann wanted Bruce to make a guest appearance on the track, singing the part at the end of Mann’s version where the first verse repeats over the chorus. He actually called Bruce to make the request himself.

“I didn’t want to go through managers or publishers,” he told Classic Rock, “so I got the number of the hotel where he was on tour and I phoned up. It was mid-morning his time, but maybe he’d had a late night because I just got this really tired voice saying: ‘Uh huh?’. So I said: ‘Oh, are you a bit tired?’, and there’s no reply, just a grunt. So I said: ‘Okay, I’ll call back’. But I lost my bottle and I couldn’t phone again. It’s a shame, he’d have been great for it.”

As a result, Mann sings that part of the song himself, and it’s one of the very rare times Mann’s voice can actually be heard on a record.

Mann’s “Blinded by the Light” may have shown the world how a little imagination and some talented players could transform Springsteen’s mostly acoustic track into an epic showstopper, but Bruce and the E Street Band had already been doing that in concert.

Barely a year after its release, “Blinded” was almost unrecognizable when the E Street Band (in its brief Boom Carter era) performed it in a funky ten-minute arrangement that spotlighted the incredible David Sancious and sounded a lot more BSB than ESB.

More than three decades later, Bruce took “Blinded by the Light” in an even more daring direction with his short-lived Sessions Band.

For a song as well-known as “Blinded by the Light,” it’s surprising that Springsteen has only performed it 81 times over the past fifty years, and 30 of those were in 1972-1976. After that, it completely dropped off Bruce’s set lists for seventeen years, before finally returning for occasional cameo appearances (typically in acoustic form) from the mid-nineties onward.

“Blinded by the Light” remains a rarity to this day. You’ll find it on many fans’ chase lists, and it’s a badge of honor among fans to know all the words when it turns up for one of its rare appearances (at least once on any given tour). On the last tour, a ten-year-old girl did herself (and her parents, I’m sure) proud when she held up a sign request for “Blinded” that promised, “I know all the words. Try me!”)

Bruce did.

Bonus: If there is any segment of E Street Nation that doesn’t care for “Blinded by the Light” it might be the American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters who deserve combat pay for trying to keep up with Springsteen’s lyrics. Watch Bruce’s 2001 Asbury Park community performance below to see a confident interpreter give it her best shot (and apparently do a commendable job).

Blinded by the Light
Recorded: September 11, 1972
Released: Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J. (1973), The Essential Bruce Springsteen (2003)
First performed: December 7, 1972 (New York City, NY)
Last performed: April 6, 2022 (Colts Neck, NJ)

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