[Springsteen and the E Street Band] are doing for the seventies what Liverpool's Beatles did to the sixties: bringing rock and roll music back from the edge of oblivion, making it the leader again. (p. 74)

[The] music he makes and the adolescent world he evokes somehow belong to the '50's and the '60's and the present all at once, which may explain why Springsteen's popularity cuts across age barriers. He offers a totally mature, conscious adolescent energy (and humor, and sexuality) which appeals to the eternal rock 'n' roller in all of us. (pp. 74-5)

Bruce Springsteen the lyricist is a storyteller with a great comic gift and a unique sensibility: what he's into is life on the fringes of urban civilization, under the flashing Exxon sign, as lived by people like Big Balls Billy, and the Magic Rat…. Who else writes stuff like this these...