Orel Family

Jay-Z, Barrack Obama and Bruce Springsteen. Columbus, November 5, 2012.  A few days ago, I read an article posted on the  Rolling Stone  website. Springsteen producer Ron Aniello was talking about Bruce's latest album,  High Hopes . Talking about how the project began, Aniello said, "I remember that Bruce called me on my birthday, so it was December 9th, 2012. He said to me, 'I have some songs. I want to get together.'" Aniello went on to talk about how Bruce tends to work, and how the process unfolded. I keyed in on the date. On November 4, 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected to his first term as President of the United States. The next evening, Bruce introduced  Badlands  by saying, "I don't know what you guys think about what happened last night but I think it's pretty frightening. You guys are young, there's gonna be a lot of people depending on you coming up so this is for you." The song performance, without the spoken introduction...

Forward, and Away We Go!!! In an interview for the UK paper  The Guardian  in February 2012, Bruce Springsteen said, "I campaigned for Kerry and Obama, and I am glad I did. But normally I would prefer to stay on the sidelines. The artist is supposed to be the canary in the cage."  When he reviewed Obama's performance at that time, his response was measured:  "He kept General Motors alive, he got through healthcare – though not the public system I would have wanted – he killed Osama Bin Laden, and he brought sanity to the top level of government. But big business still has too much say in government and there has not been as many middle- or working-class voices in the administration as I expected. I thought Guantanamo would have been closed but now, but he got us out of Iraq and I guess we will soon be out of Afghanistan." That was then.  That was before Obama had an opponent in the general election, one who opposed the very things that Springsteen praise...