Father's Day (June 16)

John S. Funaro (1923 - June 16, 1999)

     Probably what I love most about Bruce Springsteen's music is the songwriting craft of his lyrics.  Nobody paints a more vivid and detailed picture in your listening mind than Bruce does.  Whether those picture frames form a short one-act play or string themselves into a full feature film, Springsteen packs more intimately visual imagery into one song than most songwriters do on an entire album.  Equally as affecting is how he is also able to let the listener fill in his own blanks to the stories he tells, allowing for an autobiographical, and usually more meaningful experience and reaction to the songs.

     When it comes to music videos, Bruce only rarely (compared to the vast amount of songs in his catalog) makes them.  My guess is that he's keenly aware that most of his songs become personal to his fans in this autobiographical way.  And I'm sure he doesn't want his songs detracting from that interpersonal connection by showing just his interpretations of them.  Aside from the conspicuously forbidden lust video "I'm On Fire", Bruce's videos usually involve him singing with his guitar, and simply a myriad of atmospheric backgrounds.  Instead of visuals he lets his lyrics take care of the cinematography.

     When I made my own video to the song "When I'm Gone", I didn't have the luxury of letting my songwriting do the talking for me.  So instead, I used Brian Vander Ark's beautifully written lyrics and music and made them my own in my mind's eye.  Taking a page out of the same playbook Springsteen follows, Vander Ark allows the listener to extract his own personalized interpretation to the song.  And like so many of Bruce's songs, "Brilliant Disguise", "My Beautiful Reward", "The Promise" to name just a few, "When I'm Gone" became not just the artist's thoughts, but mine as well.