You can hide beneath the covers and study your pain, make crosses from your lovers, throw roses in the rain. Waste your summer praying in vain, for a savior to rise from these streets.
Bruce SpringsteenA time comes when you need to stop waiting for the man you want to become and start being the man you want to be.
Bruce SpringsteenYou may not be able to hit all the notes. That's OK. You may not have the clearest tone. You may not have the greatest range. But if you can inhabit your song, you can communicate.
Bruce SpringsteenMusic doesn't tell you where to go. It says, go find your own place. That's what it told me.
Bruce Springsteen[The Catholic religion] was something I carried with me, never forgot, brought into my music. And it's been in my music ever since.
Bruce SpringsteenDon't run back inside, darlin', you know just what I'm here for. So you're scared and you're thinkin' we ain't that young any more...Show a little faith! There's magic in the night. You ain't a beauty, but hey, you're all right.
Bruce SpringsteenThe book was just something that came along after we played the Super Bowl and I wrote a little essay that went online. Then I had two or three weeks and I said, wow, that essay was pretty good. Maybe I'll try and write some other stuff. Writing about the depression, I just felt - you know, when you write a book like this, you have to open up your life. You have to be willing to do so to a certain degree.
Bruce SpringsteenYeah, I had gay friends. The first thing I realized was that everybody's different, and it becomes obvious that all of the gay stereotypes are ridiculous.
Bruce SpringsteenPoor man wanna be rich, rich man wanna be king, and a king ain't satisfied until he rules everything.
Bruce SpringsteenI always look terrible before the show. That's when I feel worst. And after the show it's like a million bucks. Simple as that. You feel a little tired but you never feel better. Nothing makes me feel as good as those hours between when you walk offstage, until I go to bed. That's the hours that I live for.
Bruce SpringsteenWhen I was very, very young, I decided that I was gonna catalogue my times because that's what other people who I admired did. That's what Bob Dylan did, that's what Frank Sinatra did, Hank Williams did, in very different ways.
Bruce SpringsteenI was a guitar player on the streets of Asbury Park and already a member in good standing amongst those who lie in service of the truth - artists with a small A. But I held four clean aces. I had youth, almost a decade of hardcore bar band experience, a good group of homegrown musicians who were attuned to my performance style, and a story to tell.
Bruce SpringsteenMadman 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.
Bruce SpringsteenI 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.
Bruce SpringsteenMost artists I know consider themselves to be phonies, along with the feeling that there's something that you're doing is essential, essential to communicate, and deeply, deeply real.
Bruce SpringsteenThat's what being a front man is all about - the idea of having something supple underneath you, that machine that roars and can turn on a dime.
Bruce SpringsteenI'm the kind of person, I think a lot about everything. Nothin' I can do about it. It's like, I'm a thinkin' fool. That's a big part of me.
Bruce SpringsteenI cut my bow from the wood of this tree of evil. Of this tree of good, I want a kiss from your lips.
Bruce SpringsteenAdult life is dealing with an enormous amount of questions that don't have answers.
Bruce SpringsteenI've always loved the fact that Bob's [Dylan] been able to sustain his mystery over 50 or 60 years.
Bruce SpringsteenWork 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.
Bruce SpringsteenI tend to be a subscriber to the idea that you have everything you need by the time you're 12 years old to do interesting writing for most of the rest of your life - certainly by the time you're 18.
Bruce SpringsteenDancing in the dark. Does fortune wait or just the black hand of fate, It'll take your God filled soul. Fill it with devils.
Bruce SpringsteenMental illness and creativity are - it's a thin line in between the two. I tend to believe that.
Bruce SpringsteenI can get onstage and cut that off and be superinstinctive. To be a good live performer, you have to be instinctive. It's like, to walk in the jungle, or to do anything where there's a certain tightrope wire aspect you need to be instinctive. And you have to be comfortable at it also.
Bruce SpringsteenSo 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.
Bruce SpringsteenYou need two things to remain very, very present. You need to continue to write well and engage yourself in the issues of the day. And you have to continue to make good, relevant records.
Bruce SpringsteenIf they had told me I was the janitor and would have to mop up and clean the toilets after the show in order to play, I probably would have done it.
Bruce SpringsteenSometimes I do an automatic songs, songs that you don't really think about, or work on. You just look back and it sorta surprises you.
Bruce SpringsteenThe great challenge of adulthood is holding on to your idealism after you lose your innocence.
Bruce SpringsteenI have been on stage on a few occasions where I felt I couldn't escape the interior of my - my interior thoughts. But Peter Wolf once said, what's the strangest thing you can do on stage? Think about what you're doing.
Bruce SpringsteenI don't know if I know anyone, with the exception of the early inventors of rock music [who wasn't influenced by something].
Bruce SpringsteenOutside the street's on fire in a real death waltz between what's flesh and what's fantasy.
Bruce SpringsteenThey put a rifle in my hand, sent me off to a foreign land to go and kill the Yellow man.
Bruce SpringsteenYou can't start a fire Worrying 'bout your little world falling apart This gun's for hire Even if we're just dancing in the dark
Bruce SpringsteenMy dad had a very difficult life, a hard struggle all the time at work. I've always felt like I'm seeking his revenge.
Bruce Springsteen