Mark Powell
11/17/14
Graphic Essay
The Only Good Thing to Come Out of New Jersey
“Youz guys ready to go to joyzey?” It was the tenth hour of a thirteen hour car ride and
by my count this was the eighteenth time my grandpa had attempted to tune his south Jersey
accent to sound like Tony Soprano.
I don’t remember feeling anything. Sometimes things happen in such a small period of
time that all the emotions get mixed together in a kennel of memory. Within six months I’d lost
my father and was now leaving my entire childhood behind to move to freakin New Jersey.
I’d heard all the jokes: New Jersey, Manhattan’s toilet.
New Jersey, America’s trash heap. And this was before MTV’s
Jersey Shore.
When we crossed the Maryland border into New Jersey,
we stopped for gas. My first steps in the state I would spend the
next eight years in was a 1-95 rest stop. Rest stops are casual,
yet inexplicably some of the dirtiest places in the U.S, so it felt
like I was walking in a classic Jersey stereotype. While my mom
got gas, the three of us went to the gift shop to flock with the other seagulls.
The gift shop, like Jersey itself, lacked its own identity. It was filled with New York
Yankee memorabilia, along with “I <3 Jersey” shirts and books about Philadelphia. One corner
caught my eye, with a white cue card above it which read “Springsteen.” The t-shirts were all
laced with a portrait of a man with what could only be described as white-man jerry curls. I saw
my grandpa come over from behind my right shoulder.
“The only good thing to ever come out of New Jersey,” he said. “Hell of a musician.”
My Father’s House
My father’s house shines hard and bright it stands like a beacon calling me in the night.
Calling and calling so cold and alone
Shining across this dark highway where our sins lie un-atoned.
Bruce Springsteen was born at the Jersey shore in Long Branch—about an hour and
fifteen minutes from where I lived. Many of his songs make mention of the shore, and his days
before becoming a hit rock and roll singer.
Growing up in Freehold, he had an estranged relationship with his father, whom he
mentions in several of his songs and in several of his biographies, including Dave Marsh’s book
Born to Run.
“When I was growin up, there were two things that were unpopular in my house. One was me,
and the other was my guitar…Every time he’d knock on my door, that was all I’d hear—‘Turn
down that God-damned guitar. He musta thought everything in my room was the same Goddamned brand—God-damned guitar, God-damned radio, God-damned stereo.’”
When Bruce was ready for elementary school, his mother sent him to St. Rose of Lima in
Freehold. Springsteen’s experience at the Catholic Church conflicted with the adult he would
become. Bruce doesn’t deny that his Catholic upbringing influenced his religious beliefs—or
lack thereof—as an adult. Springsteen was seen as an outcast as a child, spending most of his
time with his guitar, which he learned to play at an early age.
Bruce eventually learned to get along with his father, expressing that they were just
“too much of the same kind.” As he gained experiences in adulthood, he also gained respect for
the man who had caused him so much stress as a child.
After his funeral in 1998, Springsteen’s opinion of his father had finally come full circle.
“I feel so lucky to have been so close to my dad as I became a man and a father myself,” he
said.
****
My relationship with my father was far different than Bruce’s. He was everything to me.
And when he passed away, I didn’t know where to turn. I thought I’d have to raise myself, and
nobody told me anything different. It wasn’t until years later that I’d learn how wrong I was.
The first few months we lived in New Jersey were filled with confusion. We weren’t able
to move into our house until the fall, which meant we had to spend the summer living with my
aunt and uncle, as well as their three kids. In short time, they’d become my best friends. What I
didn’t know was the sense of family that had been missing since that fateful November day had
already been decided during a conversation between my mom and uncle just a few months
earlier.
When my mom made the decision to uproot her life, friends, and support system, it
took a hell of a lot of planning. As a newly rediscovered single parent, she needed to job and
house hunt from afar, all while dealing with the emotional rollercoaster that she self-admittedly
had trouble dealing with.
I’ve heard the story a few times. Mom pulls Uncle Jim aside. Tells uncle the kids need a
father figure. Uncle obliges. I could draw it out into a conversation about ethics and morale
responsibility, but that wasn’t the nature of the decision. The simplicity and eager action my
uncle took in accepting two new kids arriving at his doorstep is best appreciated in brevity.
Finally, six months after they’d been brighter than ever before, the lights at dad’s house began
to fade, ever so slowly.
My Hometown
Now Main Street’s whitewashed windows and vacant stores
Seems like there’s nobody that wants to come down here no more
They’re closing down the textile mill across the railroad tracks
Foreman says these jobs are going boys and they ain’t coming back
Bruce was never shy when singing about growing up in Freehold. Growing up in a small
community close to the shore, Springsteen experienced both sides of a thriving beach
community. On one hand, small businesses and restaurants in Freehold and Asbury Park were
very successful in drawing tourists. However, Bruce was relatively poor as a child and into his
early adulthood.
In his song My Hometown Springsteen talks about the racial struggles of his community
as a child in the 1960’s, as well as economic problems in the area. Bruce never shied away from
speaking to racial issues in his childhood, even going as far as to proclaim he would have moved
his family out of his hometown at the end of the song. Modern day Freehold hasn’t changed
much since Bruce left. Most of us see it as a stop on the way to Asbury Park or Ocean Grove.
My uncle grew up just outside of Freehold in Monmouth. Every summer we’d pass it on
the way to the Monmouth Racetrack on the way to the Haskell Invitation, a $1 million horse
race known as “The Shore’s Greatest Stretch.” He’d tell us stories of growing up by the shore
and working at the track. It wasn’t until I did some research into Bruce’s hometown that I
realized the parallels between the two. To my uncle and other New Jersyans (yes, they prefer
that spelling); Bruce symbolizes some semblance of their young adulthood, working hard for
every dime. And for that reason, they’re damn proud of their hometown, and their home state.
Bruce Springsteen: One of many misunderstood people from New Jersey.
****
My uncle always pointed out that
Danny Federici played keyboard for the
East Street Band when we drove
downtown. Federici played until his late
50’s, when he took a leave of absence
from the band and eventually passed away
from melanoma. He met Springsteen in
the 60’s when he and fellow East Street
Band member Vini Lopez found Bruce
somewhere in the swamps of Jersey and chose him as their lead singer.
Federici was born in my hometown of Flemington, New Jersey. He also went to my high
school. Hunterdon Central doesn’t list him in their plaque of famous alumni. I was never really
sure why.
Flemington is a small town about an hour from Manhattan in the center of the state,
and is most commonly known for being the site of the Lindbergh Trial, having a large set of
store outlets, or being home to a museum of model trains.
Growing up, Main Street was host to a number of events, including live concerts. More
recently, the events committee has hosted Salsa Night due to the rapidly increasing number of
Latin American immigrants living downtown, which is surprising considering Flemington had
previously been a fortress with its own moat that kept out minorities. The area has the
potential to be a bustling small town, especially around the holiday season.
The problem I have with my hometown was that it never fulfilled that potential. We had
a movie theatre for awhile, but it was replaced by a drug store when I was teenager—even
though it was across the street from a Rite Aid. The historical Union Hotel was open for years as
a restaurant, and actually housed several Presidents as they passed through the Northeast in
the previous centuries. After being closed for a few years, the scheduled re-opening has been
pushed back several times, leaving only the ghosts who are rumored to haunt the upstairs
offices and bedrooms.
Even with its shortcomings, my mom decided not to leave town when we moved two
years ago. I think it’s because she feels safe. Flemington is rarely a town with much controversy.
I can recall one Sunday morning when the local paper headline read “Boy Taunts Deer.”
There’s a scent of content with every breath taken in Flemington. But frankly, it’s exactly
what my family needed.
Born to Run
Beyond the Palace hemi-powered drones scream down the boulevard.
Girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors
And the boys try to look so hard.
Springsteen found escape playing at various bars around the shore. If you found yourself
at the Stone Pony in Asbury Park in the late 1960’s, you probably saw Bruce, playing a cover of
Bob Dylan or Elvis Presley. He still stops in at the 913 Ocean Ave spot from time to time. Some
things don’t change.
The Jersey Shore is a magical place. Lately, it’s gotten some bad press from the Jersey
Shore crew and Hurricane Sandy, which destroyed much of the Wildwood and Seaside
boardwalks most shore residents grew up with.
Springsteen’s song My City of Ruins provided a gospel for shore residents grieving the
piles of plywood and sheet metal that used to symbolize their early childhood.
I wasn’t home for the storm, but I still remember the panic and restlessness I felt being unable
to talk to my friends and family from all over the state.
In the aftermath of Sandy, President Obama visited the Jersey Shore to reassure citizens and
assess the damage. Unlike his predecessor before him, Obama sent humanitarian relief to the
shore as soon as possible, as over seven million residents in the Northeast were without power.
****
My Uncle Jim was the first to introduce me to Bruce. Our family trips down to the shore
with my brother and cousins often took us to the strangest of places and the best of times. But
the car rides were my favorite part. There was something about driving with the windows
down, listening to Born to Run and feeling the salty air gently tickle your nostrils that feels
better than any high or fix I’ve ever had.
The Wildwood boardwalk is the last place on earth you’d want to wear shoes. In a sea of
sandals and flip flops all slapping against the soft plywood, I was the only one wearing all white
Nike sneakers.
We stepped into Flipper’s Fascination, initially, I thought, to take off my shoes and
socks. Before I knew it we were all sitting down, playing what can best be described as a singleplayer connect four using a ball. The host, and owner, was this guy, who would later be
featured on the television show
“hoarders” for the sheer amount of old
arcade games he keeps in a closed down
shop in Wildwood known as
“Randyland.”
“This game will blow your socks off,
don’t worry,” Randy insisted.
Oh, how right he was.
Blinded by the Light
Yeah, he was blinded by the light.
Cut loose like a deuce, another runner in the night
Blinded by the light
He got down but he never got tight, but he’s gonna make it tonight.
Springsteen signed his first major record deal
in 1972 with Columbia Records, but would struggle
early on in his career. His first release, Greetings From
Asbury Park, N.J., failed to gain much traction despite tracks such as “Blinded By the Light,” and
a cover that included excellent album artwork.
Bruce brought his music-playing friends along for his second album, forming what would
later be known as the East Street Band. The band added more flare to Springsteen’s lyrics, and
by 1974 music critics were taking notice.
“I saw Rock & Roll future, and its name is Bruce
Springsteen. And on a night when I needed to
feel young, he made me feel like I was hearing
music for the very first time,” Jon Landeau,
Boston music critic.
****
I was a strange kid in middle school. I had
a few friends, mostly made up of video game
addicts and underdeveloped outcasts. I towered
over them in height, but rarely acted like it. In many ways, I felt like I couldn’t relate to anyone,
probably because I wore oversized cargo shorts, a sweatshirt, and transition glasses to school
every day. My best friend was my dark blue walkman, which awkwardly hung halfway out of
pocket as I rode my bike to school.
One day at lunch a girl came up and asked what I was listening to. She was a grade
younger than me, but I wasn’t exactly one to be picky. After a few stutters, I stared directly into
her chest and opened up the walkman. It was Born to Run, a simple yet brilliant eight track CD
which effectively put Bruce Springsteen on the map. It was the only CD I ever carried with me.
“My dad listens to him,” she said. “He said it’s all he listened to when he was my age.”
It’s a response I’d heard before. And it would surely be followed by…
“I like Fall Out Boy,” she smiled.
I walked away.
Dancing in the Dark
I check my look in the mirror
I wanna change my look, my hair, my face.
Man I ain’t getting nowhere
Springsteen is known as one of the best in concert performers of his generation. In his
younger days he’d pull girls on stage, ask for their name, and insert their name into a song. His
energy not only kept the crowd going, but pumped up his own band. Similar to how a coach
would give his team a pregame speech, Bruce will announce the names of members of the East
Street Band, tell a story about the two (usually involving drinking or a previous concert on tour)
and split the overwhelming support of the onlookers between himself and his longtime friends.
****
When I was sixteen I finally got to see my first Bruce Springsteen concert-in Hershey,
Pennsylvania of all places. We listened to Bruce’s famous Born to Run almbum the entire way to
the amusement park. Hershey is in the middle of nowhere Pennsylvania, surrounded by farms,
mountains and Amish
people. My uncle, who
wasn’t with us at the
concert, had shown me
Springsteen concerts from
the 80’s. I found it hard it
hard to believe that he
performed with the same
ferocity and intensity as he did decades ago.
Yet, when he came on stage, the man had an incredible swagger, as if he were a twenty
year old guitarist performing his first concert. One of the most astonishing facts about a
Springsteen concert is that the front row is filled with girls half his age, if not younger. The
audience, like Bruce, never seems to age. He begins with his newer songs, which the crowd
enjoys. But that’s not the reason they came. They came for the classics.
You don’t listen to Bruce the same once you’ve seen him in concert. It sounds like a
cliché, but it was almost as if my blue walkman had come to life. We took pictures at one point,
but they’re long gone, and they wouldn’t have given the experience justice anyway. My most
vivid memory was when the lights went out, except for a small spotlight on Bruce. We all
waited in anticipation. Of course, it was Dancing in the Dark.
The River
Now those memories come back to haunt me
they haunt me like a curse
Is a dream a lie if it don’t come true
Or is it something worse
Bruce’s initial rise to stardom led to his first marriage with Julianne Phillips, who was
much younger than he and frankly had
very little in common with him. After
several years together, Springsteen
wrote the Tunnel of Love album which,
like most of his albums, is not what
you think it’s about. Many of Bruce’s
songs spoke of his displeasure with his
marriage, and the fallout of falling in
love with the wrong person.
Springsteen and Phillips, from
all accounts, had an up and down relationship. Phillips would travel on tour with Bruce, and
rekindle their romance in the dressing room after concerts. But as soon as they were apart,
frustration would build to a boiling point, even causing Springsteen to make daring comments
in concert, before performing a song inspired by their frequent quarrels.
“(First) you’re makin love to em all the time, three or four times a day. Then you come back a
little bit later, and uh-oh…it’s like ‘Are ya gonna make love to me tonight, or are we gonna wait
for the full moon again,’ y’know?” he said at a concert in Los Angeles in 1984.
Bruce’s open talks with the audience weren’t fictional, as many had previously thought, and
the couple got a divorce shortly after.
****
I wasn’t much for relationships in high school. I saw my friends taking bathroom breaks
in class to calm down their girlfriends after they had seen them waving to another girl in the
hallway. I didn’t think buying a thirty dollar necklace from Marshall’s to get to second base with
a girl I couldn’t stand was worth it.
My first girlfriend created more drama than the sinking of the Titanic. Most
conversations would end with “I hate you,” a comment that would surely be taken back an hour
later.
In that time of silence, I’d sit in my room and listen to The River, not because it had
much real-life meaning to me, but because I was thankful not to be in that situation. The story
of this man who Bruce claimed to be was tragic, in which he got “Mary” pregnant, was forced
into marriage, and had to get a job in hard labor. Bruce sent me a warning, and I listened. We
broke up several months later when she went off to college, in another drama-filled escapade
that would surely make the Boss wince.
Glory Days
My old man worked twenty years on the line and they let him go
Now everywhere he goes out looking for work
They just tell him that he’s too old
In Springsteen’s later albums he focused less on the working class and stories of women
who got away, and more on inspiration. Albums like The Rising and High Hopes were far
different from the original masterpieces like Born to Run and The River. There was even a brief
period of time when he tried to transition into folk music, a move which my uncle and I criticize
to this day. Still, Bruce’s transition is far from uncommon in old, aging rock stars. The spirit of
their old albums doesn’t sell like it used to, and in hopes of making more of a profit, the artist
changes tones. I haven’t listened to a single track off of Bruce’s new album, and I’d like to keep
it that way.
It’s not that the album doesn’t have value. I’m sure many Bruce die-hards will buy it, but
it’s just not the Bruce I knew. The Bruce who would sing about the hardships of lives he had no
part of. The Bruce who fought for his identity as the voice of the working class. The Bruce who
always made me nostalgic for times I wouldn’t have even been alive to see.
But maybe I’m just stuck in the glory days.
****
Last summer we made our way down to the shore on Mother’s Day. Ocean grove is an
upscale, upper class neighborhood on one of the cleanest beaches in the Northeast, right
outside of Asbury Park. I find it hard to believe that Springsteen ever came to this part of town,
although “Born to Run” was a constant as we sat for brunch and ice cream. The song didn’t
seem to suit the white collar crowd gathered around the pavilion on Main Street.
I had made the drive separately, so when we left I decided to take a detour to Asbury
Park, which was just a short ride from Ocean Grove. The Stone Pony sits at the corner of Ocean
Avenue, just about a block from the Atlantic. From the outside, it looks old and run-down, like
any other creepy shore shack that probably doesn’t take credit cards. As curious as I was, I
didn’t go in. I stayed in the car, turned up the stereo, closed my eyes, and let Bruce and the East
Street Band soak my eardrums.
Salvation.