Ten Springsteen Songs That Will Make You Cry

Bruce Springsteen wears many masks and sings in many different voices. He is most widely known as a fire-blazing rock and roll marathon runner; churning out heart-stopping epics filled with guitars, drums, girls and cars. He is Americana personified. Rock and roll dreams come true. He is power and bombast and he oozes an apparent air of charisma and control that has been crafted and honed over five decades of live performance.

Although he may be best known for his fist-pumping anthems (“Born to Run’, “Born in the USA”, “Dancing in the Dark”, “Glory Days”) he also has a storied career as an introspective and sensitive writer, able to tap into the every day dignities of normal life as well as delve into some truly dark and emotional places. Today’s article is concerned with this aspect of his writing. These are the ten Springsteen songs that will make you cry.

The River— The River (1980)

Still one of Springsteen’s best known tracks, “The River” is one of the most personal ballads he’s written. It is narrated by a man who gets his seventeen year old girlfriend pregnant and then traces the unremarkable decline of their lives. It is based on his sister who has thankfully had a much happier outcome than her fictitious counterpart. The song opens with a ghostly harmonica that sets the tone. Because the narrator tells the story so matter-of-factly, there is a sense of a loss of hope and an acceptance of misery on the part of the central characters. It is the final verse that will really floor you. I’ll just place the lyrics here in black and white and you can see for yourself:

“At night on them banks I’d lie awake and pull her close just to feel each breath she’d take/ 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/ That sends me down to the river, though I know the river is dry?”

This is a song laced with an existential dread that is hard to shake off. For an extra dose of emotion check out the version found on the Live 75-85 box set. I won’t give anything away if you haven’t heard it, but I will say that the two words “That’s good” have never been so upsetting.

My Father’s House— Nebraska (1982)

Every song writer has a muse. Leonard Cohen had Marianne Ihlen and Bruce had his father. Douglas Springsteen has been a mythic figure that presides over many of his son’s songs but this track is notable for his absence. Our narrator has a dream that he is being chased through the woods at night and runs towards a light in the distance. When he gets there he falls into the arms of his estranged father. After waking up, he decides to visit his father and makes a vow that “the hard things that pulled [them] apart” would never again “tear [them] from each other’s hearts”. There is a glimmer of hope that, despite being estranged and having been missing from one another’s lives, the two will reconnect and put past demons to bed. The song then delivers a punch to the gut that hurts every time I listen to it:

“A woman I didn’t recognise came and spoke to me through a chain door/ I told her my story, who I’d come for/ She said ‘I’m sorry, son, but no one by that name lives here anymore’.”

The delivery is simple but brimming with emotion, and it is scored sparsely but beautifully only by an acoustic guitar and a lonely harmonica. Watch the version from Springsteen on Broadway if you think you can manage it.

Nothing Man— The Rising (2002)

The Rising was an album that was guaranteed to come packed with difficult songs. It was the album where Springsteen reflected on the tragedy of 9/11 and chose to focus mostly on personal stories and the loss of human life. The album contained no calls for retribution and did not serve to widen the divide between religions or nationalities. “Nothing Man” tells the story of a man suffering from survivor’s guilt. The first lines are graphic and instantly grab you, making you realise that you are in for a powerful and somber experience.

“I don’t remember how I felt; I never thought I’d live/ To read about myself in my hometown paper/ How my brave young life was forever changed/ In a misty cloud of pink vapour.”

The narrator then goes on to explain how everybody around him “acts like nothing’s changed” but that his life will never be the same again. He is plagued by guilt and is likely suffering from PTSD. In a particularly poignant moment he even considers suicide:

“You want courage? I’ll show you courage you can’t understand/ Pearl and silver resting on my night table/ It’s just me, Lord; I pray I’m able.”

The songs ends with the lyric “Darling, with this kiss say you understand/ I am the nothing man.” This leaves it deliberately ambiguous as to the narrator’s fate. It sounds like an apology. It sounds like a suicide note; like a goodbye. A harrowing song and possibly one of Springsteen’s darkest.

Wreck on the Highway— The River (1980)

The River is a strange album. It is filled with hopeful rock songs (“Out in the Street”, “Two Hearts”) as well as plain dopey tunes (“I’m a Rocker”, “Crush On You”, “Ramrod”). Then, as a corollary these, there are several songs seething with existential angst. The title track is one of these, and so is the closing track of the double album.

“Wreck on the Highway” (the title borrowed from a Roy Acuff song) tells the simple story of a man who is driving home one night on an empty and wet road. “As the rain tumbled down hard and cold,” the narrator drones, “I seen a young man lying by the side of the road”. The injured man is surrounded by “blood and glass all over” and weakly pleads for help. After asking for help, the song breaks away for a brief but spooky musical fill which adds a tension to the song— does our narrator help him?

He calls for an ambulance and has a heartbreaking thought as the man is taken to hospital:

“And I thought of a girlfriend or a young wife/ And a state trooper knocking in the middle of the night/ To say your baby died in a wreck on the highway.”

The final verse then ends the song on a note of gratitude, terror and dread:

“Sometimes I sit up in the darkness/ And I watch my baby as she sleeps/ Then I climb into bed and I hold her tight/ I just lay there awake in the middle of the night/ Thinking about the wreck on the highway.”

Long Time Comin’— Devils & Dust (2005)

The ghost of fatherhood once again appears to haunt this list (and not for the last time). “Long Time Comin’” is a song that I ignored for years until I saw Springsteen on Broadway. Bruce’s heartbreaking contextualisation of the song packed it with an emotional dimension I had not previously recognised.

He begins by telling a story of his father coming to visit him just before his first child was born. While they’re both drinking beers his father (who was distant at best and horribly abusive at his worst) turns to Bruce and says “You’ve been very good to us. And I wasn’t very good to you.”

That moment alone was enough to bring me to tears, but that is there merely to inform the song. Now the album version, which is a little poppier than the Broadway version, can cut me deep as well. The tears that this song brings are not necessarily tears of sadness, but of a defiant recognition of oneself. There are, however, sad elements to the song; particularly with reference to the narrator’s father.

“Well my daddy, he was just a stranger, lived in a hotel downtown/ When I was a kid he was just somebody; somebody I’d see around.”

What the song is, in essence, is a man vowing not to make the same mistakes his father made. The sins of the father is a theme which permeates many of Springsteen’s songs from the early days right up until now. “Long Time Comin’” has two stand out lyrics which bring tears to my eyes:

“If I had one wish in this godforsaken world, kids/ It’d be that your mistakes would be your own/ Yeah, your sins will be your own.”

And the second line, so simple and so brief, yet so powerful:

“I ain’t gonna fuck it up this time.”

If I Should Fall Behind— Lucky Town (1992)

A song about the hardships of a long-term relationship. It is both hopeful and filled with struggle; beautiful but also realistic.

“Now everyone dreams of a love lasting and true”, the narrator sings. “But you and I know what this world can do.” It isn’t often that a rock song will make the case that love isn’t enough. You need to actively work on it and have patience. “So let’s make our steps clear so that the other may see/ And I’ll wait for you/ And should I fall behind, wait for me.”

Although Lucky Town is by no means my favourite album of Springsteen’s, this song is one of my absolute favourites. I love the balance of tenderness and honesty. To get a sense of the true emotional power of the song, check out the live version in New York from 2001. The song is sparse enough on the record, but this live version is totally bare bones, letting the lyrics come to the forefront.

Independence Day— The River (1980)

Back to The River and back to the looming presence of fatherhood. In this quiet song, a young man attempts to make peace with his estranged father before leaving the town for good. There is a defeatist attitude towards their relationship which is born out of weariness more than hatred. The narrator laments how “Nothing we can say is gonna change anything now”, and that he’ll be leaving in the morning. The only reason we get for their strained relationship is vague and mildly spectral:

“There’s a darkness in this house that’s got the best of us/ There’s a darkness in this town that’s got us too.”

He knows that their relationship is irreparable and he wants to leave before it gets any worse. In a line which is both sympathetic as well as cutting, he says to his father: “They ain’t gonna do to me what I watched them do to you.” If his father won’t break the cycle, then he will.

There is also a begrudging admission of kinship and a sense of an ill temperament passed down though their fatalistic bond. He even concedes that “we were just too much of the same kind”. The song then ends with an empathetic understanding coupled with a guilty confession. Springsteen himself was fawned over by his paternal grandmother when he was a young boy and in his autobiography even describes his father as a king usurped by his first-born. That information makes the closing verse even sadder:

“Papa, I know the things you wanted that you could not say/ But won’t you just say goodbye it’s Independence Day/ I swear I never meant to take those things away.”

He feels guilty and responsible for his father’s ruin and thinks the best thing is to run away. The song is used to a bitterly upsetting scene in the Springsteen-inspired movie “Blinded by the Light”; which I would highly recommend.

Highway Patrolman— Nebraska (1982)

The fact that Sean Penn wrote and directed “The Indian Runner”, a movie based entirely from this song, speaks volumes for its cinematic quality. It tells the story of Joe Roberts, an honest cop who struggles to keep his trouble-making brother Frankie in check. The heart of this story is the battle between the obligation to the law, and the obligation to one’s family. Roberts, who narrates the tale, repeatedly affirms that a man who “turns his back on his family, well he just ain’t no good”.

He turns a blind eye to Frankie’s smaller misdemeanours, reasoning that “when it’s your brother sometimes you look the other way”. But when Frankie murders somebody in a barroom fight, Joe is the first on the scene. His inner conflict is palpable: does he protect his brother and cheat justice, or does he bring Frankie in and betray his fraternal obligations?

“I chased him through them county roads until a sign said Canadian border five miles from here/ I pulled over to the side of the highway and watched his taillights disappear.”

The song is presented, like the entire Nebraska album, with an eerie emptiness to its arrangement. Springsteen’s vocals are subdued and echoey and ghostly, and the pattern that the acoustic guitar is picking is unobtrusive and purely there to underscore.

Chasin’ Wild Horses— Western Stars (2019)

First of all, as I do anytime Western Stars is mentioned, I have to make clear my absolute love for this album. I think it is one of the finest records Springsteen has ever released, and it is filled with such majesty and beauty; from its gorgeous cover art to its sweeping orchestration.

The story of “Chasin’ Wild Horses” is a pretty straightforward one, and an almost archetypical country song. It’s about a man who works hard all days in an attempt to forget a lost love. The lyrics are well crafted and thoughtfully presented, but it is the music to this song which makes it so emotional. It builds momentum and explodes into an orchestral flare which never fails to elicit an overwhelming emotion in me that brings a lump to my throat.

Every time.

Without fail.

This also happens with the title track from the album but I think that “Chasin’ Wild Horses” has a far bleaker story.

Downbound Train— Born in the USA (1984)

In amongst the jingle-jangle pop-rock of this titanic album, there are a few songs which are more subdued and reflective. The Top 40-friendly “Darlington County” and “Working on the Highway” are nullified by “I’m on Fire” and “My Hometown”, ensuring that the album doesn’t lose its substance and reduce itself to another 80s pop record. This nullification actually has a galvanising effect, making the record stand out as one of the highest selling (and best regarded) albums to come out of that decade.

“Downbound Train” is something of an anomaly then. While “My Hometown” and “I’m on Fire” are certainly more serious that many other tracks, “Downbound Train” is an almost nihilistic examination of a life broken by a love lost.

The narrator’s partner leaves him with a matter-of-fact statement and a virtual shrug of her shoulders. “We had it once, we ain’t got it anymore.” This then leads to, what I maintain to be, Springsteen’s bleakest lyrics to date:

“Now I work down at the car wash where all it ever does is rain.”

The real heartbreak of the song comes with the false hope and the eventual gut-punch of the last verse. The narrator hears his lover’s voice calling to him, leading him to their marital home.

“I rushed through the yard, I burst through the front door/ My head pounding hard/ Up the stairs I climbed…”

We can feel the tension and the anticipation building as this desperate man sprints his way to the bedroom. But…

“The room was dark, our bed was empty/And I heard that long whistle whine/ And I dropped to my knees, hung my head and cried.”

It ends with him waking from this dream-turned-nightmare and he painfully tells us that “Now I swing a sledgehammer on a railroad gang” and it ends with the simple question: “Don’t it feel like you’re a rider on a downbound train?”