Today we went to the fashionable hotel Clarion to interview journalist H\u00e5kan Lahger. We had a very interesting conversation about the period 1975-1985, when Bruce was at his peak, according to H\u00e5kan.<\/p>\n
“A lot has been said about Springsteen’s performance at Konserthuset in 1975, and all is true. It feels almost embarrassing to use a word such as ‘spectacular’ but it really was. In a time when most rock ‘n’ roll bands were either too drunk, too stoned, played too loud, used too many effects, Bruce was totally different. He came on stage, happy as a kid who had gotten all the Christmas presents he wanted and he never wanted to stop playing, he could go on forever”, H\u00e5kan said.<\/p>\n
During the eighties the E Steet Band machine reached it’s highest moments, according to H\u00e5kan. The musicians knew eachother so well, they were playing extremely tight and they had learn to master the great outdoor arenas.<\/p>\n
But around 1985 H\u00e5kan started to lose interest. “I noticed that I started to wait for certain moments or for him to do certain things on stage, and that made it all predictable. But one thing that also put me off was that the journalists had started to cover everything Bruce did when he came here. And that part of journalism that is concerned about what an artist eat, where they go on a day off, is so far away from what really matters, namely their music. That bored me so I slowly drifted away from it all.”<\/p>\n
One of the things that H\u00e5kan thinks makes Bruce such an interesting artist is his ability to write about urban life. “Springsteen carrys on the tradition of Woody Guthrie. Guthrie was a singer songwriter who told stories about life on the countryside. In his early albums Bruce told the stories of a young man from New Jersey, who was discovering the big city and all it’s adventures and setbacks. It wasn’t the perfect world of popular songs, he portrayed a darker picture, where unhappiness and failure wasn’t uncommon. But even if Springsteen’s songs are very dark, there’s always a glimpse of hope in them”, he said.<\/p>\n
We thank H\u00e5kan for a great interview and prepare for our last one this session, with journalist Mats Br\u00e5stedt on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Today we went to the fashionable hotel Clarion to interview journalist H\u00e5kan Lahger. We had a very interesting conversation about the period 1975-1985, when Bruce was at his peak, according to H\u00e5kan. “A lot has been said about Springsteen’s performance … Continue reading