Erratic Bruce

THREE YEARS BACK, or was it four, Bruce Springsteen was seen in Boston by rock critic Jon Landau, who pronounced the now-famous judgment on him: I have seen the future of rock and roll and its name is Bruce Springsteen." That was a pretty tall order for a raggedy-looking dude from Asbury Park, N. J. to fill. That and Time Magazine's talk of him as the new Bob Dylan put a great deal of pressure on Springsteen to produce a suitable follow-up for his smash 1975 album, Born to Run.

So now, three years and a million delays (because of legal problems) later, Springsteen's fourth album is here. Unfortunatley, the boy from Asbury Park seems to have lost something during those years, because Darkness on the Edge of Town is not really the album everyone has been wating to hear for so long.

It took several listening and a retreat to earlier albums to understand why Darkness on the Edge of Town is not the great Springsteen album. Much of the new album fails to swing, bounce, rock or ring as true as Springsteen's earlier stuff. It gets right down to a comparison of the different drummers on the albums. Max Weinberg, who handles drums on this album, plods unimaginatively compared to Vini "Mad Dog" Lopez, who lays down the beat on The Wild, the Innocent, and The E Street Shuffle. Moreover, Springsteen has given this album a very dense texture, creating a wall of sound effect on many of the cuts. Springsteen has used this approach befire, but on this record he lays certain things too thickly, specifically the less-than-sprightly rhythm section and his own vocals. "Badlands," basically a good cut--as energetic and rambling as the best Springsteen can be--suffers, as you will, from Springsteen's triple-tracked harmony on the chorus, which is all too reminiscent of bloodhounds baying at a treed raccoon. In fact, Springsteen does this on several of the cuts on this album, including the title track, with the same failure.

Another problem that hampers Springsteen involves his lyrical themes. It usually rings hollow for rock stars to sing in the first person about the drudgery of the working man, but Springsteen does it here on several cuts, including "This Promised Land" and "Factory." In other songs, Springsteen returns to the well of the road, fast cars and the outsider-looking-in that has supplied him form the start. But now the release and freedom that he used to find there has vanished, to be replaced by desperation and bitterness. On the title track, he sings that he has lost his money and his wife and doesn't care about much anymore. Sometimes this desperation is effective, especially what is perhaps the most moving song on the album, "Racing in the Streets." In this simple melody, he explores the ultimate loneliness and failure of someone who, like himslelf, has sought freedom in the fast lane. Springsteen sings over an echoing piano and in the chorus--"Summer's here and the time is right, for racing in the streets"--does a twist on the innocence of an earlier time in rock. But this sight of the traps awaiting the outlaw man of the road, who always thought he was free, seems to sound the bottom of Springsteen's cars and speed theme. Where else he can go, having once exposed it as a delusion?

But the power of this song is offset by two awful turkeys, "Adam Raised a Cain" and "Streets of Fire." Almost identical, they throb like a migraine with leaden, new-wave-inspired beats while Springsteen growls incoherently and lays down overamplified guitar riffs. These songs seem to be his answer to the anger of punk rock, but they sound more like annoying filler material.

CANDY'S ROOM," which serves as a transition from the dulling attack of "Something in the Night" to the haunting "Racing in the Streets," stands out after a couple of listenings as one of the better musical cuts. A tinkling bell and Springsteen's razor-sharp guitar follow the beat of the vocals while drummer Weinberg turns in his best performance on a restless cymbal. Thesong is colored by skillfully manipulated dynamics as fast and slow, soft and loud roll back and forth with Springsteen's vocals. But unfortunately, this winner has an insipid and trite song like "Factory" sharing album space with it.

The trouble is, simply, that Springsteen has ignored his limitations on this album. He shines when he explores the problems that confront an outsider trying to wrest women from sheltered lives with the lures of speed, passion and freedom. Springsteen is in fact one of the most attractive and believable outsider person as in rock. But when he tries to assume the stance of someone caught inside, in the work-a-day world, it's hard either to accept or be interested in it. Springsteen is a wonderful painter of the social landscape, but as a social critic he is standing at the wrong easel.

This album does have a tendency to grow on you, and if you like Springsteen you may like this. But you probably won't be crazy about it. Its shortcomings and its excesses are hindrances that cannot be overlooked. It could be that because of the three years off, Springsteen has lost an essential edge and been too compulsive about his album; we hope that is all it is. But when I look into the vacant eyes of the man on his album cover, and remember how many talents have burned out and gone maundering off into self-indulgence and pretentiousness, I start to think that there may be all too much more. But only the next album will tell if the "future of rock and roll" has become a part of the past.