Springsteen September 15

Designed as a companion to Bruce Springsteen's 2016 memoir Born to Run, Chapter & Verse provides something of an aural autobiography, tracing Springsteen's development from a Jersey garage rocker into one of the great American songwriters. Springsteen compiled the 18-track disc himself, intending his selection to mirror the themes in his book, so he balances epics with intimate miniatures since both kinds of songs can capture his quests for deliverance and escape. He alternates his well-known anthems ("Born to Run," "Badlands," "Born in the USA"), with a few other popular singles ("Brilliant Disguise," "The Rising") and a host of deep cuts, all of which tend to downplay both his romantic and hard-rocking sides.

The Tunnel of Love tour again? That’s surely a sentiment some are expressing with this month’s release of New York 5/16/88, the outstanding opening night performance from the final, five-show stand on the US leg of the 1988 tour.

The Legendary 1979 No Nukes Concerts from Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band were recorded at the September 1979 MUSE (Musicians United for Safe Energy) benefit concerts at Madison Square Garden in New York City. This set features 13 songs performed over two nights, that are newly remixed and remastered.

Letter to You comes quickly on the heels of Western Stars, a long-gestating 2019 immersion into the lush, progressive country vistas of the early 1970s, but in a sense, it's a true sequel to Bruce Springsteen's 2016 memoir Born to Run and its 2017 stage companion Springsteen on Broadway. It's an album where Springsteen reckons with the weight of the past, how its ghosts are still readily apparent in the present, an album where the veteran singer/songwriter is keenly aware he has more road in his rearview mirror than he does on the highway ahead of him. Springsteen does find himself drawn to the good old days, reviving three unrecorded songs from the days separating the split of his first band the Castiles and his contract with CBS, adding them to a clutch of new songs where Bruce ponders what it means to be the "Last Man Standing," surrounded by the spirits of old friends who may no longer be alive but are still a palpable psychic presence.