With a love so hard and filled with defeat

I have no idea what a “soft-infested summer” is.

No matter.


Darkness to a Dream
Photograph by Danny Clinch

Whenever I hear the opening lines (or even the devastatingly beautiful keyboard intro, influenced by Dylan but forever married to the Jersey Shore) to “Backstreets,” I am forever back in the summer of the mid-to-late 70s, dreaming and getting lost in the mysteries and promise of the world that existed outside of my sleepy little town.

Yes, the song is about lost love, lies, hurt, anger, memories, regrets and escape.

But I hear so much more; a world that carried that one moment when you lock eyes with the one girl, the one dream, the one instant when it all might come true.

The possibilities. Redemption.



I still hear echoes. And dreamers. And thoughts of tuning the dials of the car radio night after night after night, looking for the great lost note from rock and roll’s past that just might portend your future -- because that one song might understand. Understand the loneliness, understand that time was fleeting but there was still a chance, understand that maybe there was someone else out there that lived inside the same dream that you did. That there was someone who too might understand, and could put their arms around you, take away the hurt, the pain, the confusion, and who knew that maybe things would never be what they should be, but that things could still be all right. Sitting in your room for thousands of hours, dreaming, wondering where and why it all went wrong but knew that all right could still happen. If only, if only, if only. If only you could turn it up a little louder and drown out everything that was real. Hoping that if you listened even harder, maybe you might gather your courage and push yourself to amount to something. Something more, somewhere, somehow. Driving with the windows down and wings open, because there was something out there, and hoping and dreaming that it could be yours. And that you could hold her in your arms all night long.

Of course, you can argue that all of this applies to the entire "Born to Run" album. And you would be correct. But for some reason I hear it all more clearly in "Backstreets:" the sound, the feelings and the emotions it conveys are staggering to me.

I am including a live tour de force of "Backstreets" that is one of his (or anybody else's - talk about a band on a mission) greatest performances, as well as the studio version, which is the one I go home to, time after time.

As for the “soft-infested summer,” I may not be living in one now, but I am fairly sure I am not quite ready to give up looking for it.

Even if I don’t know what it is.