Rock legend Bruce Springsteen feared his career was doomed after struggling to write new music for the E Street Band for seven years.
Bruce recently announced plans to release Western Stars, his first studio album in five years, next month (Jun19), but he admits a battle with writer’s block made it really hard to come up with new tunes to perform with his longtime backing band – and he thought it would spell the end of their decades-old partnership.
“I’ve spent about seven years not writing anything for the band. I couldn’t write anything for the band,” the star confessed during a special interview with director Martin Scorsese at Hollywood’s Raleigh Studios on Sunday night (05May19).
“And then about a month or so ago, I wrote almost an album’s worth of material for the band and it came out of just… I mean I know where it came from, but at the same time, it just came out of almost nowhere.
“I had almost two weeks of those daily visitations and it was so nice. It makes you so happy. You go, ‘Fine, I’m not fucked.’ There’ll be another tour.”
During the chat, organised to promote his Netflix concert special, Springsteen on Broadway, among Emmy Awards voters, the singer detailed how he continues to draw on his Catholic faith for inspiration.
“All my work was informed from my years at Catholic school and I was never able to outrun it,” he explained. “As I got older I stopped fighting against it. Now I draw on it and enjoy it.
“First of all, there’s no greater well to draw from than the myths in Catholicism: Redemption, damnation, death, sexual torture…”
He also shared how he takes regular trips back to his New Jersey hometown to remind him of his roots, and even crashed a funeral during a recent visit.
“I get drawn back to my (hometown) church,” he said. “I attended some stranger’s funeral a month ago.
“I was driving by it and saw the door was open and I said, ‘I gotta go in. I gotta go back.’ I went in and there was some nice man’s funeral going on and I sat in the back and it was completely bizarre.”
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