Bruce Springsteen Quotes - Page 9

Work creates an enormous sense of self and I saw that in my mother. She was an enormous, towering figure to me in the best possible way. I picked up a lot of things from her in the way that I work... I also picked up a lot of the failings of when your father doesn't have those things and that results in a house that turns into a minefield.

Pessimism and optimism are slammed up against each other in my records, the tension between them is where it's all at, it's what lights the fire.

In the early years, I found a voice that was my voice and also partly my father's voice. But isn't that what you always do? Why do kids at 5 years old go into the closet and put their daddy's shoes on? Hey, my kids do it.

The Clash were a major influence on my own music. They were the best rock 'n' roll band. Thanks, Joe.

cause down the shore everything's all right

When you have three teenagers, it gives a whole new meaning to "homeland security."

Plus, you know, when I was young, there was a lot of respect for clowning in rock music - look at Little Richard. It was a part of the whole thing, and I always also believed that it released the audience.

I was always concerned with writing to my age at a particular moment. That was the way I would keep faith with the audience that supported me as I went along.

All I try to do is write music that feels meaningful to me, that has commitment and passion behind it.

Think of it this way: performing is like sprinting while screaming for three, four minutes. And then you do it again. And then you do it again. And then you walk a little, shouting the whole time. And so on. Your adrenaline quickly overwhelms your conditioning.

The story I have told throughout my work life I could not have told as well without Clarence.

For the ones who had a notion, A notion deep inside, That it ain't no sin to be glad you're alive I wanna find one face that ain't looking through me I wanna find one place, I wanna spit in the face of these badlands

In the past, some of the songs that were the most fun, and the most entertaining and rocking, fell by the wayside because I was concerned with what I was going to say and how I was going to say it.

I'm interested in what it means to be an American. I'm interested in what it means to live in America. I'm interested in the kind of country that we live in and leave our kids. I'm interested in trying to define what that country is.

Blame it on the lies that killed us. Blame it on the truth that ran us down.

When I was growing up, there were two things that were unpopular in my house. One was me, and the other was my guitar.

If the angels are unkind or the season is dark Or if in the end Love just falls apart Well then here's to our destruction Baby let me be your soul driver.

The wonderful thing about rock music is even if you hate the other person, sometimes you need him more, you know. In other words if he's the guy that made that sound, he's the guy that made that sound, and without that guy making that sound, you don't have a band, you know.

From the beginning, I imagined I would have a long work life.

The highway's jammed with broken heroes on a last chance power drive.

I was in my late 20s, in the process of shaping my musical outlook and what I wanted it to be about, when I first encountered Woody Guthrie.

I wouldn't be windmilling a Fender Telecaster if it weren't for Pete Townshend.

Roy Orbison is singing for the lonely, hey, that's me and I want you only.

So I bought a forty-four magnum, it was solid steel cast, and in the blessed name of Elvis, well I just let it blast 'til my TV lay in pieces.

Madman drummers, bummers, Indians in the summer with a teenage diplomat. In the dumps with the mumps as the adolescent pumps his way into his hat.