{"id":8268,"date":"2019-06-06T05:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-06-06T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/estreetshuffle.com\/?p=8268"},"modified":"2020-12-12T06:51:17","modified_gmt":"2020-12-12T14:51:17","slug":"roll-of-the-dice-phantoms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/estreetshuffle.com\/index.php\/2019\/06\/06\/roll-of-the-dice-phantoms\/","title":{"rendered":"Roll of the Dice: Phantoms"},"content":{"rendered":"

You know I always loved a lonely town
\nThose empty streets, no one around
\nYou fall in love with lonely, you end up that way — <\/span>Bruce Springsteen, 2019<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To be free is to be lonely — <\/span>Bruce Springsteen, 1973<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Even almost a half-century ago, Bruce was both enamored of the freedom of the open road and wary of its cost.<\/p>\n

Too often dismissed as a work-in-progress “Zero and Blind Terry,” “Phantoms” is in reality a fully-formed song for which we have a full-band recording. It just so happens to share the exact same music (right down to the oh-oh-OHs) as the better known\u00a0Tracks<\/em> track.<\/p>\n

Surviving records suggest that Bruce worked on and recorded “Phantoms” and “Zero and Blind Terry” simultaneously during the sessions that yielded his second album. Perhaps he intended for the stronger twin to survive; ultimately neither did.<\/p>\n

But whereas “Zero and Blind Terry” foretold the arrival of “Romantic Bruce” (“Incident on 57th Street<\/a>,” and “4th of July Asbury Park (Sandy)<\/a>” lay just ahead in the not-too-distant future), “Phantoms” closed the chapter on… what shall we call him? Western Bruce? Historical Bruce? Hallucinatory Bruce? Regardless, “Phantoms” marked the end of songs like “The Angel<\/a>,” “Santa Ana<\/a>,” and “If I Was the Priest<\/a>.” The tone and imagery of Bruce’s songs would shift from this point forward. (He’d temporarily relapse about 35 years later, but that’s an essay for another day.)<\/p>\n

Let’s take a listen.<\/p>\n