E street shuffle guitar lesson4/25/2023 Hey ho rock ‘n roll deliver me from nowhere Hey mister deejay won’t you hear my last prayer Lost souls calling long distance salvation Sun’s just a red ball rising over them refinery towers I got three more hours but I’m covering ground Sit tight, little mama, I’m a-coming around Let her know that her daddy’s coming on home I make a pit stop, wipe the windshield, check the gas (Three hours? Wherever Wanda lives, it’s obviously not in New Jersey.) With them big brown eyes that make your heart stand stillīut in short order, our narrator’s mind returns to the road and the present as he focuses on staying awake for the long drive still ahead. We’re wiping our fingers on a Texaco road map On the front seat, she’s sitting in my lap We do get a single verse devoted to Wanda, a flashback that tells us little about the attraction other than her eyes:īehind the counter at Route 60 Bob’s Big Boy Fried Chicken Good night good luck, one two power shift Underneath the overpass, trooper hits his party light switch Radio relay towers, won’t you lead me to my baby It takes me two hours to get back to where my baby lives Now the boss don’t dig me, so he put me on the night shift He certainly seems to take pride in his car’s ability to outrun the state police: This New Jersey in the morning like a lunar landscape Gotta hit the gas, baby, I’m running late This turnpike sure is spooky at night when you’re all alone Gotta find a gas station, gotta find a payphone I’m an all-set cobra jet creeping through the night time Well I’m going out tonight, I’m gonna rock that joint Took her down to the car wash, checked the plugs and points Propped her up in the backyard on concrete blocksįor a new clutch plate and a new set of shocks With her line blown out she’s humming like a turbojet Well I had the carburetor baby cleaned and checked Both songs are very much about a working-class guy getting off his night shift and hurtling the length of the New Jersey Turnpike towards his girl.īruce described “Open All Night” in a letter to Jon Landau as a song about a hero braving “snow, sleet, rain, and the highway patrol for a kiss from his baby’s lips.” But if anything, the additions to “Open All Night” only serve to add depth and character to the narrator’s car rather than Wanda, which raises a question as to which one is the true love interest. Honestly, I’m hard-pressed to say whether there’s any real substantive difference between “Living on the Edge of the World” and “Open All Night” despite the lyrical additions and changes. He gave his girl a name (“Wanda”) and a new employer (Bob’s Big Boy, an arguably lateral step from Howard Johnson’s), he plugged in his trusty Telecaster, and pressed Record. Both melodically and lyrically, “Wanda” is obviously an attempt by Bruce to rework “Living on the Edge of the World,” and we can also hear the early seeds of “This Hard Land” and “ State Trooper.” (I told you the lineage of “Open All Night” is complicated.)īruce eventually found a new melody for his errant lyrics and wrote a few new verses to keep them company.
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