Chimes of Freedom [EP]

Bruce Springsteen

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 22, 1999)
• Original Release Date: 1988
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: EP
• Label: Sony
• ASIN: B00000JBEI
• Also Available in: Audio Cassette
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #396,136 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Essential Bruce, but unforgivable omissions, October 5, 1999

By A Customer

This is essential Bruuuce, unquestionably. The first three tracks are great. The fourth, a stripped down acoustic version of "Born to Run" is more a novelty than anything else, and although it sounds interesting on paper, Born to Run doesn't really work that well in this arrangement.

The problem with this EP is that it is an exact reproduction of the original US CD issue of this EP. That EP was released in 1988, in the long-dead 3"-CD format. Space limitations of the CD3 format mandated that a couple of the tracks on this EP be edited to fit in the ~22 minutes available on a CD3. For that reason, a guitar solo in "Tougher than the Rest", as well as a long rambling introduction to "Chimes of Freedom" were jettisoned. There were not criminal edits--in fact many (yours truly included) were relieved to not have to sit through Bruce's introduction of "Chimes" over and over. But since this material is not otherwise available in the US on CD, this reissue should have been definitive and included the original versions that were available on vinyl and cassette.

Aside from that, this release would rate a strong 4 1/2 stars.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars 3-star AVERAGE / 5 for cassette, 1 for CD, January 2, 2000

By	A Springsteen fan (Kalamazoo, MI) - See all my reviews

My girlfriend originally gave me the cassette of this recording when it first came out, and I absolutely went nuts over it. However, when the CD-3 came out, I got it and was disappointed by the editing done to Tougher Than The Rest and to Chimes of Freedom. Now that the CD was reissued, I had hoped that Columbia would have the good sense with the conventional CD format to restore Tougher and Chimes to original length. They still stuck with the old CD-3 edits! Now, I grant that the intro to Chimes is rather dated, since it was done to promote the Amnesty International tour in progress at that time. However, they could have at least restored Tougher, guitar solo and all. While I love this collection of songs, and it is great that Sony brought back this disc from the grave, I still have to give the CD reissue a ONE star rating for the unforgivable non-remastering done to it. If you don't want to shell out for the import version, stick with the cassette version---it contains the full tracks from the LP/tape original masters, and the sound for a cassette is a Bruce fan's dream come true. FIVE stars for the cassette version---in fact, buy TWO of the tape, because you will want to play that first copy until it is run to the ground!

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A great collection of songs with a poor attention to detail., August 3, 1999

By A Customer

A remastered version of this import was enticing. I own the Canadian import but disliked the inferior sound and mix. When I purchased the reissue I was disappointed to find the guitar solo missing from "Tougher Than The Rest" and the preamble missing from "Chimes Of Freedom". However, the versions of "Be True" and "Born To Run" are excellent. I wish Columbia had chosen to release the full length version. Stick with the import.