For Bruce Springsteen, rock and roll meant so much more than a couple of chords and a lot of energy. Records like Chuck Berry and Little Richard spoke to him just as The Bible spoke to Christians across the world, and ‘The Boss’ had found a spiritual calling to make the same style of music when he first assembled the E Street Band. While many of Springsteen’s generation cited The Beatles as the reason for picking up a guitar, he knew that he was being realistic, aiming for a group like The Rolling Stones.
Because looking at the Fab Four, something about them may have seemed a little bit too perfect. Yes, they sang immaculate harmonies and looked like the kind of lads that anyone could hang out with, but it was going to take hard work to even close to matching their guitar hooks or writing material as strong as John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
That’s not to say that what Mick Jagger and Keith Richards came up with in The Stones is easy. The pure attitude and swagger behind most of their material is still the most celebrated classic rock of all time for a reason, and from day one, Richards had perfected the idea of the central guitar riff on ‘Satisfaction’.
But the main thing that stood out about The Stones was how rough around the edges they looked. Whereas Paul McCartney was the doe-eyed pretty boy in some fans’ eyes, Jagger and Richards were presented as the punk kids who had a certain element of danger behind them when they took to the stage.
It’s not like parents didn’t have reason to be scared, either. Before the 1960s were out, Jagger would get busted for drug possession, and tracks like ‘Street Fighting Man’ were advocating for kids to stand up for what they believed in. It was appalling to grown-ups, but Springsteen couldn’t get enough of them when he first laid eyes on them.
When talking to Rolling Stone, Springsteen knew that he had a model for what his group would look like watching The Stones, saying, “Mainly, we planned to be just like the Rolling Stones. They were the band we liked the best at the time. But you grow up, and when you finally put that suit of clothes on, sometimes they don’t fit, or they fit differently, and you’re a different person, and what you’re gonna do is different, I guess.”
While ‘The Boss’ is diplomatic by saying that he completely missed in capturing The Stones’ attitude, the niche he carved out for himself is nothing short of being a rock and roll prophet. He couldn’t make the same massive licks that Richards put out, but his vivid tales about blue-collar working life were bound to resonate with anyone with a beating heart and a head full of dreams on ‘Born to Run’.
Still, Springsteen had the utmost respect for The Stones getting him into music, even later remarking that he learned some of his first Chuck Berry licks secondhand through hearing Richards’s lead playing. ‘The Boss’ had the potential to become the biggest name in music, but he was far more interested in writing about the human side of rock and roll than reckless abandon.