“In a generation of swine, the one eyed pig is king.” Hunter Thompson

May 18, 2025

Bruce Springsteen has long been a champion of the working class, lower class, underserved, unrepresented, homeless, veterans, voiceless and unseen Americans walking and living in and on the streets. From returning Vietnam vets as far back as 1973 in Lost In The Flood, unemployed construction workers in 1980 on The River, homeless veterans in Brothers Under The Bridge in 1995 and Sinaloa cowboys/pawns in the methamphetamine drug underworld. Album after album, song after song, lyric after lyric, year in and year out, the melodies may change, but the message doesn’t: we are human beings, we are Americans, and we deserve to be seen and respected. Apparently this is news to some of his fans who are “outraged” over his recent comments in the UK during shows on the latest leg of his tour that started in 2023. Some have announced a boycott of his music and concerts despite their false rage at what they see as “cancel culture” on the left.

“In my home, they’re persecuting people for their right to free speech and voicing their dissent. That’s happening now. In America, the richest men are taking satisfaction in abandoning the world’s poorest children to sickness and death. That’s happening now. In my country, they’re taking sadistic pleasure in the pain they inflict on loyal American workers.

They are removing residents off American streets without due process of law and deploying them to foreign detention centers as prisoners. That’s happening now. The majority of our elected representatives have utterly failed to protect the American people from the abuses of an unfit president and a rogue government. They have no concern or idea of what it means to be deeply American.

The America I’ve sung to you about for 50 years is real, and regardless of its many faults, it’s a great country with a great people, and we will survive this moment. Well, I have hope, because I believe in the truth of what the great American writer James Baldwin said. In this world, there isn’t as much humanity as one would like, but there’s enough.”

I’ve gone back and read his comments a few times to make sure I understood what he was saying, none of which is untrue. Human beings here in the states are being rounded up and shipped to El Salvador en masse with no due process. Students and entire universities are being detained and threatened with cuts in funding if they don’t adhere to Trump’s demands on DEI and minorities. The list is endless but the end result is that in a little over 4 months, the Trump administration and his 2025 puppet masters are well on their way in a quest to roll the country and government back to the 19th century, dismantling FDR’s great society and levers of control put in place by Teddy Roosevelt to limit monopolies, worker’s rights, unions and children. Basically, Trump wants to bring back the age of the robber barons, wealthy, white male property owners. If you are a female, LGBTQ, middle or lower class, homeless, suffering with mental health issues, addictions, etc, well, too bad. You should have inherited $250 million from your father like he did.

And for those on the right accusing Springsteen of being a coward for expressing his concerns overseas but not here, that is simply laughable. Springsteen spoke out against Reagan the night after the 1980 election by opening the show at ASU in Tempe, Arizona with, “I don’t how you feel about what happened last night but I am terrified.”, before ripping into a punk speed version of Badlands. He told Reagan to stop using Born In The USA as a campaign song in 1984. He spoke out against both Bush presidents, notably on the Magic album and tour, openly speaking out against extraordinary rendition, black sites and human rights abuses used in the war on terror. He openly spoke out against Trump during the first administration while on tour. This is not a new concept for Bruce Springsteen as artist citizen much in the vein of Woody Guthrie and Pete Seeger. When the election occured in November of 2024, Springsteen was on tour in Canada, a year and a half into a well structured and sometimes scripted concert performance. He opened the next following show with comments and ripped into Long Walk Home which contains the lyrics, ” That flag flying over the court house means certain things are set in stone, who we are, what we’ll do and what we won’t.”

Why anything Springsteen said in Manchester is found to be disagreeable by any of his “fans” is truly mind boggling.

From The Promised Land, a song Springsteen wrote and recorded in 1978 and sings every night on stage:

“I’ve done my best to live the right way
I get up every morning and go to work each day
But your eyes go blind and your blood runs cold
Sometimes I feel so weak I just want to explode
Explode and tear this whole town apart
Take a knife and cut this pain from my heart
Find somebody itching for something to start”

Wow, earth shattering!!!! He’s talking about people who work for a living, not the wealthy, not tech bros, not Elon Musk who inherited money and then invested and didn’t invent anything. People who saw their parents get up and work hard to pay the bills and barely make due. People who now live out those same lives, working everyday to feed their kids, to pay their electricity bill, to go to the doctor. The people who work so hard they forget what living means and lose that part of their inner lives.

From Badlands:

“Workin’ in the field
You get your back burned
Workin’ ‘neath the wheels
You get your facts learned
Baby, I got my facts
Learned real good right now
You better get it straight, darlin’

Poor man wanna be rich
Rich man wanna be king
And a king ain’t satisfied
‘Til he rules everything
I wanna go out tonight
I wanna find out what I got”

Holy shit!!!! People working in fields, people working in mechanic shops, people installing wire and nailing two by fours. People who work so hard they feel it slipping away but they know it ain’t no sin to be glad you’re alive. The people who want to keep pushing til it’s understood and these badland start treating them good.

From Brothers Under The Bridge written in 1995 and included on Tracks boxset:

“Campsite’s an hour’s walk from the nearest road to town
Up here there’s too much brush and canyon
For the CHP choppers to touch down
Ain’t lookin’ for nothin’, just wanna live
Me and the brothers under the bridge”

Yes, veterans of the Vietnam conflict. The same one Springsteen avoided through certain methods at the board office, the same one Donald Trump avoided because of his bone spurs note paid for by his daddy’s doctor. The same one’s who were turned away from their employers looking for their old jobs back, the same ones who didn’t receive the treatment they needed for PTSD, drug and alcohol addictions. The same one’s who now face even less funding for important programs because of this administration and Elon Musk’s delete button.

Song after song, album after album, lyric after lyric, it’s all there for anyone who has ears to hear and eyes to read the lyric sheets his “fans” have claimed to buy and read over the last 50 years. His message, his thoughts, his political ideals, his concern for America and Americans has been there from day one. How anyone can be shocked at this point in time is beyond comprehension. If this is the case, you are being disingenuous and just don’t want to hear it, or you haven’t listened to a damned word the man has sung every night for the majority of his life.

Artists of every medium make their art and send it out into the world. Some are much more visible and get print ink and screen time to broadcast that message. But they all have the right to express themselves in any way they choose. And as the viewer or listener, you have the right to like it or not and make decisions based on that whether that be not attending concerts, not listening to their music, not buying their output, etc. The old adage “shut up and sing” is perverse at best and tired at the worst. Bruce Springsteen has been singing the truth of the American way of life for decades, at least you can give him the courtesy of actually hearing his words and understanding them. Bruce Springsteen has a work ethic unmatched in the pop music field, good or bad, whether you like it or not, he has integrity in buckets and spades.

Donald Trump and his minions have a very narrow idea of what America should look like. They take joy and pride in being cruel for cruelties sake. Their train only carries the wealthy, the con men, the grifters, the whites and mostly males. In 1998, Springsteen was trying to write a song that would declare his intention of putting the band back together after a long break and hitting the road. He had the idea of a train carrying everyone to a promised land, a land where sunlight streams, a land of hope and dreams. He took the basis of the old folk song “This Train” sung by Sonny Brown and Terry McGee, the song sung by Woody, the song popularized by Big Bill Broonzy. But in their version, this train don’t carry saints and sinners, their train doesn’t carry whores and gamblers. It only carries the righteous and the holy. Springsteen wanted a train big enough for everyone: lost souls, sweet souls departed, saints and sinners, the weak, the strong, the poor, those of color, LGBTQ, women, Latinos, immigrants and those left to suffer by those who could have helped. That’s the kind of train Springsteen has been singing about since he picked up a guitar in 1964 and learned to play Twist and Shout. And for that, I am proud to call myself a fan of Bruce Springsteen. If you don’t like his vision of our country and the world, that’s OK, our train is big enough for everyone.

Thank you Bruce. Thank you for using the power of your voice and audience to speak for the unseen and unheard. Thank you for being a good companion for this part of the ride. Thank you for building a train where you don’t need a ticket, you just get on board.