The Gaslight Anthem on first meeting with Bruce Springsteen: “I freaked out”
The Gaslight Anthem‘s frontman Brian Fallon has opened up about the first time he met Bruce Springsteen back in 2009.
Back in July, the band announced their first record in nine years, ‘History Books’ and shared the title track, which is a duet with Springsteen himself. In a new NME interview, Fallon recalled his reaction to Springsteen joining the band at Glastonbury to perform ‘The ’59 Sound’.
“We were playing in 10 minutes, so when he showed up, I couldn’t think,” said Fallon. “My musical professional brain took over because my regular brain freaked out, and I said to him: ‘Do you know the song? Then let’s go!’ It was a small tent and felt pretty epic afterwards. I freaked out.”
He continued: “I had to go straight back to the bus and lie on the floor thinking: ‘What the hell just happened? Am I in a club now? Do I get a card or a badge now?’ I should at least get a Nando’s Black Card after playing with Bruce Springsteen at Glastonbury!”
It was also revealed Springsteen helped the band reunite in 2021. After meeting with The Boss, Fallon challenged himself to write four new songs for The Gaslight Anthem.
“I wanted to make that deal with myself because I felt like if I call the guys and say: ‘Do you want to do this?’ you have to have something to show them,” Fallon explained. “I wanted four demos that I felt good about, which is practically half an album. When I finished the first song ‘Positive Charge’, it felt like a Gaslight Anthem song that would belong up there next to ’45’ or ‘The Sound of ‘59’, and knew I was onto something special.”
Fallon and Springsteen have since become close, something he expanded upon with NME. “Bruce is a friend, and it’s not lost on me how crazy it is that I can say: ‘Oh, I can text my friend Bruce Springsteen and see if he wants to catch a little TV tonight!’” he said.
“Him coming on the record now felt like a full-circle moment of owning our own story and accepting that we’re a band from New Jersey. ‘Cause there’s other bands from New Jersey, but there’s not other bands who hold that position with him. My Chemical Romance are a much bigger band than ours worldwide, but Uncle Bruce doesn’t hang out with them!”
Bruce Springsteen recently announced he was postponing his September shows due to “symptoms of peptic ulcer disease”.
In a series of tweets on X (formerly Twitter), he wrote: “Over here on E Street, we’re heartbroken to have to postpone these shows. First, apologies to our fabulous Philly fans who we missed a few weeks ago. We’ll be back to pick these shows up and then some. Thank you for your understanding and support.”
The Gaslight Anthem’s new album ‘History Books’ is released on October 27.
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Alex Rigotti
NME
