1980-10-17
The River
Bruce Springsteen
By Maeve C.
“The Ties That Bind” opens The River, and for a while it was meant to name a single album. Bruce Springsteen shelved that version and kept recording at the Power Station in New York until August 1980, co-producing with Jon Landau and Steven Van Zandt.
The finished record stretched to twenty songs across four sides. “Hungry Heart”, first written for the Ramones, became his first US Top 10 single, and the album became his first to top the Billboard chart. His own site describes a balance of party songs and darker storytelling, a range the sequence covers between “Sherry Darling” and the closing “Wreck on the Highway”.
Sources
Artist's official discography: released 17 October 1980 (Columbia); double album; US Billboard 200 No. 1, UK No. 2; balance of party songs and darker storytelling.Corroborates release through Columbia on October 17, 1980; Power Station sessions March 1979 to August 1980; scrapped single LP The Ties That Bind; producers Springsteen, Landau, Van Zandt; "Hungry Heart" written for the Ramones, first Top 10 (US No. 5); first US No. 1 album. A lone MusicBrainz US entry dated 10 October 1980 is unsourced and contradicted by the artist's site.