{"id":4788,"date":"1980-07-20T11:00:02","date_gmt":"1980-07-20T18:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/estreetshuffle.com\/?p=4788"},"modified":"2026-09-22T18:40:23","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T01:40:23","slug":"roll-of-the-dice-living-on-the-edge-of-the-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/estreetshuffle.com\/index.php\/1980\/07\/20\/roll-of-the-dice-living-on-the-edge-of-the-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Living on the Edge of the World"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This is one of the essays I&#8217;ve been dreading, but I knew the dice would turn it up eventually.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s not that I don&#8217;t like the song&#8211;in fact, it&#8217;s such a gloriously hot mess that I can&#8217;t help but love it.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s just that &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World&#8221; is indeed a hot mess&#8211;its lyrics and lineage are so entangled with other songs, and its musical elements are such a crazy hodgepodge of rockabilly punk and TexMex, harmonica and handclaps, oom-pa-pows and woo-woos, that I can&#8217;t figure out why it works.<\/p>\n<p>But it does work, maybe because it barrels ahead so fast and furiously that we don&#8217;t have time to consider the reasons why.<\/p>\n<p>Check it out and see what I mean:<\/p>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"758\" height=\"427\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_sU7VAP2GU4?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p>I&#8217;m gonna give myself a hall pass on analyzing the lyrics, because a) they almost all turn up in other officially released Springsteen songs, and b) content-wise, &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World&#8221; from 1979 is essentially the same song as &#8220;Open All Night&#8221; from 1982&#8217;s\u00a0<em>Nebraska<\/em>\u00a0&#8212;\u00a0 even when the lyrics differ.<\/p>\n<p>Both songs focus on the same poor schmo, stuck working the night shift while his girl works the days at a roadside diner two hours away (in &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World&#8221; it&#8217;s a HoJo at Exit 24; in &#8220;Open All Night&#8221; it&#8217;s the Bob&#8217;s Big Boy on Route 60). Each morning before dawn, our hero races back to his girl, racing down a deserted New Jersey turnpike across a state so quiet and empty it&#8217;s &#8220;like a lunar landscape.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Working the night shift all alone, driving that lonely road&#8211;it&#8217;s enough to make a man feel like he&#8217;s almost disconnected from the world, living on its very edge.<\/p>\n<p>That pretty much the song. Both songs. Some details get longer or shorter shrift, but in essence they&#8217;re the same.<\/p>\n<p>Some verses appear in complete form in both songs:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><em>Early North Jersey industrial skyline<\/em><br \/>\n<em>I&#8217;m a all-set cobra jet creeping through the night time<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Gotta find a gas station, gotta find a pay phone<\/em><br \/>\n<em>This turnpike sure is spooky at night when you&#8217;re all alone<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><em>Now the boss don&#8217;t dig me, so he put me on the night shift<\/em><br \/>\n<em>It takes me two hours to get back to where my baby lives<\/em><br \/>\n<em>In the wee wee hours your mind gets hazy<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Radio relays towers, won&#8217;t you lead me to my baby<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Underneath the overpass, trooper hits his party light switch<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Good night good luck, one two power shift<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><em>Radio&#8217;s jammed up with gospel stations<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Lost souls calling long distance salvation<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Hey mister deejay won&#8217;t you hear my last prayer<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Hey ho rock &#8216;n roll deliver me from nowhere<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Others vary a bit:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><em>Radio, radio, hear my tale of heartbreak<\/em><br \/>\n<em>New Jersey in the morning like a lunar landscape\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&#8230;and some details (like the name and employer of the aforementioned girl) differ.<\/p>\n<p>But even when the lyrics identical, they&#8217;re often all out of order. In fact, if you listen carefully to the November 1979 rehearsal sessions below (it&#8217;s hard to make out the vocals, but if you concentrate, you can), you&#8217;ll realize that Bruce was constantly swapping around the order of lines and verses, suggesting that &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World&#8221; is less of a narrative and more of a portrait (or perhaps the stream-of-consciousness late-night rambling we might all fall victim to in the same circumstances).<\/p>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"758\" height=\"427\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/hshkgRrbZIs?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"758\" height=\"427\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/yMVAp21uWZ8?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"758\" height=\"427\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/RSIt_ZWG4nY?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p>See what I mean?<\/p>\n<p>Except it&#8217;s not just &#8220;Open All Night&#8221; that intermingles its lyrics with &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Both:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><em>Down past the refinery towers where the great black river flows<\/em><\/p>\n<p>and<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><em>In the wee wee hours my mind gets hazy<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Relay towers, won&#8217;t you lead me to my baby<\/em><\/p>\n<p>appear in &#8220;State Trooper&#8221; as well, along with references to radio stations jammed with gospel (&#8220;Living&#8221;) or talk show (&#8220;State Trooper&#8221;) stations.<\/p>\n<p>But even <em>that&#8217;s<\/em> not all&#8211;check out this 1981 home demo of &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World.&#8221; (yes, Bruce was\u00a0<em>still<\/em> working on the song two years later, although by now it had a new name, &#8220;Open All Night,&#8221; which makes the latter song arguably the &#8220;finished&#8221; version of the former (I prefer to think of them as different songs, though)).<\/p>\n<p>Once you get past the &#8220;Nebraskafication&#8221; of the song, pay careful attention to the last verse&#8230;<\/p>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"758\" height=\"427\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/jF4Ju9wu7EI?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><em>Mister, can you tell me what happened to the seeds<\/em><br \/>\n<em>What happened to the seeds I&#8217;ve sown<\/em><br \/>\n<em>Yeah, where they fall from my hand<\/em><br \/>\n<em>And they fell on the ground of this hard land<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Yep&#8230; that&#8217;s right: now we have &#8220;Open All Night,&#8221; &#8220;State Trooper,&#8221; and &#8220;This Hard Land,&#8221; all spinning out of one song: &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>If it wasn&#8217;t for that crazy instrumental track, we&#8217;d probably consider &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World&#8221; just a curious historical artifact, but it&#8217;s just so darn crazily and addictively compelling that it stands on its own.<\/p>\n<p>The bootleg rehearsals above had been circulating for a while with unclear vocals, but Bruce finally released the song &#8220;officially&#8221; on his\u00a0<em>Tracks<\/em> boxset compilation in 1998. The song got a second release in 2015 when it was included with\u00a0<em>The Ties That Bind: The River Collection<\/em> box set that documented the sessions and outtakes that surrounded that classic album.<\/p>\n<p>But &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World&#8221; has only been performed once*&#8211;when Bruce opened with it(!) at MetLife Stadium on the Wrecking Ball Tour. That was a true one-off, head-turning moment (it even throws Bruce and the band toward the end), and you can watch it for yourself below:<\/p>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"758\" height=\"427\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fwmwfjZdrKA?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p>*Technically, Bruce has only performed &#8220;Living on the Edge&#8221; that one time in 2012&#8230; at least that&#8217;s the only time he&#8217;s played it in full with its own melody.<\/p>\n<p>But here&#8217;s a bonus: check out this genuine one-off historical curiosity. It&#8217;s a performance of &#8220;Ramrod&#8221; from a couple of months into the River Tour, on November 28, 1980&#8211;a full year after Bruce recorded the take of &#8220;Living on the Edge of the World&#8221; that&#8217;s included on\u00a0<em>Tracks<\/em> and\u00a0<em>The Ties That Bind.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Listen carefully to the performance, especially around the 3:40 mark, and you&#8217;ll see the Bruce clearly hadn&#8217;t forgotten about his &#8220;lost&#8221; song.<\/p>\n<div class=\"jetpack-video-wrapper\"><span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"758\" height=\"427\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/4HUThNRDG0E?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/div>\n<p><strong>Living on the Edge of the<\/strong> World<br \/>\n<strong>Recorded:\u00a0<\/strong>December 7, 1979<br \/>\n<strong>Released:\u00a0<\/strong><em>Tracks<\/em> (1998),\u00a0<em>The Ties That Bind: The River Collection\u00a0<\/em>(2015)<br \/>\n<strong>First performed:\u00a0<\/strong>September 21, 2012<br \/>\n<strong>Last performed:<\/strong> September 21, 2012<\/p>\n<p>\u00a9 October 18, 2018<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;Living on the Edge&#8221; is a glorious hot mess of a song. An unreleased outtake until 1998, it nevertheless spawned no less than three officially released Springsteen originals along the way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9237,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3623,3],"tags":[1596,1438,1050,571,624,188],"class_list":["post-4788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-river","category-roll-of-the-dice","tag-living-on-the-edge-of-the-world","tag-open-all-night","tag-state-trooper","tag-the-ties-that-bind-the-river-collection","tag-this-hard-land","tag-tracks"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t<!-- 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