How much do you really know about rock legend Bruce Springsteen? Not nearly as much as you should – but luckily, we’re here to sort that
Bruce Springsteen’s biopic Deliver Me From Nowhere could be set for at least one sequel, as the Daily Star revealed this week. Director Scott Cooper feels the rocker still has a lot of life story to share.
But how much do you know about the legend known as the Boss? Here we relive his Glory Days…
1. Born in New Jersey, US on September 23, 1949, Bruce was the son of Adele and Douglas Springsteen, a legal secretary and a bus driver.
2. Bruce decided he wanted to be a musician aged seven, after watching Elvis Presley on the Ed Sullivan Show. The first song he learned to play on the guitar was Greensleeves.
3. Springsteen never fitted in at school, where a teacher called him “a loner who just wanted to play.” He didn’t even bother attending his 1967 graduation ceremony.
4. He had a strained relationship with his dad, who struggled with mental illness and alcoholism. It would later inspire songs like Adam Raised A Cain and My Father’s House.
5. At 19, Bruce was almost called up to serve in Vietnam – but failed his army physical because of a concussion he’d suffered in a motorbike accident two years earlier.
6. Bruce signed to Columbia Records in 1972. Soon afterwards he formed the E Street Band, named after the New Jersey road where they rehearsed in a garage belonging to the keyboard player’s mum.
7. His new bandmates nicknamed him the Boss – apparently because he would collect and distribute their pay after gigs. But other sources have claimed it’s because he was so good at Monopoly.
8. Their third album Born To Run catapulted Bruce to stardom in 1975. He wasn’t keen on the attention, tearing down his own posters on the band’s first trip to London.
9. A year later, after playing a show in Memphis, Tennessee, a reportedly drunk Bruce decided he wanted to meet Elvis. He jumped over the wall of the King’s Graceland compound, but was intercepted by security guards.
10. In 1984, Born In The U.S.A. became one of the best-selling albums of all time. Bruce was annoyed to see the title track – a bitter critique of the treatment of Vietnam veterans – adopted as a patriotic anthem.
11. A young Courtney Cox danced on stage in the video to Dancing In The Dark, the biggest single from the album, which helped launch her career.
12. There’s been a Springsteen-inspired Muppet since 1988, when Spruce Springsteen popped up in a charity special. Sesame Street later featured Bruce Stringbean and the S Street Band.
13. Bruce has written a host of famous songs for other artists, including Patti Smith’s Because The Night. He planned to give Hungry Heart to The Ramones, until his manager persuaded him to keep it.
14. The star has been married twice – first to actress Julianne Phillips, from 1985 to 1989. He then wed singer-songwriter Patti Schialfa in 1991 and they went on to have three children.
15. Bruce has now released 21 studio albums over six decades, picking up 20 Grammy Awards and an Oscar along the way. A small planet – (23990) Springsteen – was named in his honour in 2001.
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