At 7 albums and 83 songs, the massive ‘Tracks II’ box set says a lot about Bruce Springsteen as an artist. It shows a true artist on a compelling quest.
“Two faces have I
One that laughs, one that cries
One says hello, one says goodbye”
Bruce Springsteen, “Two Faces,” 1987
Taken off Springsteen’s brilliant 1987 Tunnel of Love album, this gem is ostensibly written about a troubled relationship. But as someone who has interviewed so many of the greatest songwriters ever – Mike Stoller, Paul Simon, Willie Nelson, Jackson Browne, Stevie Wonder, Dolly Parton, Stevie Nicks, Tom Petty – the list goes on and on, I can tell you most songwriters will tell you that songs often have multiple meanings and hidden subtext even the writers don’t know about. I have had countless songwriters tell me they often don’t know what a song is about until years later.
So, it is very interesting to revisit this particular track nearly 40 years later with two facts in mind. One, it was on the album that directly preceded Springsteen disbanding the legendary E Street Band for a dozen years. Two, looking at the song in the wake of the massive seven album, 83-song Tracks II: The Lost Albums set coming out Friday (June 27), it could easily be an artistic confession.
Because, although unlike Tracks, these are seven complete individual albums, when you look at them as a whole, they very much reveal the duality of Springsteen, the musician.
Almost all great artists have multiple artistic sides to them. Tom Waits, Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Prince, John Lennon – if you go through their whole bodies of work, you see great detours along what is considered their artistic path. And some, like Waits, their whole career is exploration. So, to say Springsteen has multiple artistic personalities is not unusual.
