Springsteen: Point Blank [Paperback]

Chris Sandford (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 15, 1999

Bruce Springsteen turned fifty in 1999—the same year he was inducted into both the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame. He remains one of the last true rock stars and nothing less than a cultural icon, with album sales of fifteen million annually and concerts that are instant sellouts worldwide—now more than ever with the revival tour of the E Street Band. In Springsteen, Christopher Sandford takes us back to the Boss’s early days in New Jersey and through the sensational hits and rock-god lifestyle of the mid-seventies ... bringing the Springsteen story right up to the present for a second generation of fans. By interviewing virtually all the major figures in Springsteen’s life, past and present, and combining that with his own celebrated skill as a writer and critic, Sandford has created a compelling—and often surprising—portrait, one that gives new insight into Springsteen’s music and influence and illuminates the many contradictions in his complex makeup.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"a loving yet unflinching portrait... a deft account based on exhaustive research and interviews....The book is most compelling, in its description of how Springsteen's social conscience grew as he matured... a worthy analysis of rock's most generous soul... This book makes one realize Springsteen deserves any peace he has found." -- Boston Globe, 11/19/99

About the Author

Christopher Sandford, the biographer of Mick Jagger, Kurt Cobain, and Sting, is also the author of Bowie: Loving the Alien and Clapton: Edge of Darkness. He has reviewed and written about rock music for more than twenty years, for theTimes of London and other publications, and his books have been published in more than a dozen countries.

Product Details

• Paperback: 480 pages
• Publisher: Da Capo Press; 2nd edition (October 15, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0306809214
• ISBN-13: 978-0306809217
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,013,649 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Blunder Road, December 1, 1999

By 

Patrick R. Curren "Vinyl Lover" (New Jersey) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Springsteen: Point Blank (Paperback)

It's always good to read a Springsteen bio that counterbalances the worshipful works by Dave Marsh, whose objectivity is tainted by his family's long personal relationship with Bruce.

On the up side, this is a warts and all portrait that offers information I haven't read elsewhere. It paints a fuller, more life-like picture than previous books.

On the down side, the author is guilty of gross overwriting and sweeping generalizations. Where one word would do, he uses four or five. I suspect many readers will also have trouble decoding the "Britishisms" that litter every page.

Another negative is the failure to grasp the culture of Asbury Park and Freehold in the 1950s and 1960s. I grew up in this area, a few years behind Bruce, knew this culture firsthand, and saw all his early bands (except the Castilles). The author alternates between being clueless and plain wrong. There were enough factual errors (e.g., Ocean County College is not on Hwy 9, the Stone Pony was not in existence during Bruce's scuffling club days) to make me question the accuracy of the balance of the book.

In short, while this is an interesting addition to my rock-n-roll library, I'm still waiting for the definitive Springsteen biography.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Point Blank, September 12, 2002

By 

Anthony Souza - See all my reviews

This review is from: Springsteen: Point Blank (Paperback)

This is a well-written, if over-analyzed, portrait of Springsteen. Sandford, who's clearly a fan, writes about Springsteen's childhood and his rise as a rock star that turns into rock icon -- but he tries to do so with the objective of portraying Springsteen in more human terms instead of just feeding the myth-making machine as so many other authors have done. This means that at times Springsteen does not come off as squeaky-clean or saintly as some of the more hard-core fanatics want so desperately to believe. Sandford balances the musical (reviewing and analyzing Springsteen's albums and songs, Springsteen's coping with the problems and pressures and eventually coming to terms with being a star, etc.) with the personal (his relationships with women, his marriage with Phillips, his sometimes contradictory nature, his selfless giving to various charities and so on). Sandford also shows how Springsteen evolved from somebody who never read a book and didn't know anything about politics to somebody who now reads the classics and is much more politically aware. Sandford is also not afraid to criticize, or at least point out certain contradictions concerning Springsteen's behavior -- one example being that early in his career, Sprinsteen vowed to never play stadiums and had imposed a ban on T-shirt or merchandising in his name. By the time of the Born in the U.S.A. tour, however, he was playing huge stadiums and selling plenty of merchandise, courtesy of Jon Landau. However, this book is no sordid tell-all, nor is it a hatchet job to try to bring Springsteen down -- Sandford usually goes on to defend Springsteen, or at least to explain the reasons for why Springsteen did what he did.

One thing should be pointed out: Sandford is British, not American, and British sentence structure and grammar is a little different in style than American writing. He also has a dry sense of humor that is sprinkled throughout the book and he writes about Springsteen from an English perspective, not an American one.

This book does have it's flaws though, with the major flaw being that he uses too many anonymous sources for his quotes, causing a dip in the credibility department. He also tends to be a bit long-winded, which causes him to repeat himself quite a bit.

In the end, though this book shows Springsteen as more than a one-dimensional "Rambo with a guitar". Sandford succeeds in portraying Springsteen as a human being, with human flaws, and not as some guitar-toting cartoon character. If you're looking for a more objective look at Springsteen, then this is the book.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Pass This One By, January 11, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Springsteen: Point Blank (Paperback)

Having read just about every Springsteen book I've come across in the last 10 years or so, I've got to say that Sanford's Point Blank is hands down the least redeeming of the bunch. Rather than ramble on endlessly (as Sanford tends to do) let me just sum it up this way: first, this book offers no information that even the most fair-weather Springsteen fan wouldn't already know. Second, Sanford's prose is, at best, ill-developed, sloppy and over-written, as if he's trying to squeeze every fancy adjective he's ever heard into the very same sentence. At worst, it bounces around and runs on and on to the point of being unreadable. (And given that Bruce has made a career out of writing for "every man", as it were, with both economy and accessibility, Sanford's style seems in direct contradiction to the man he's writing about and the fans who will likely buy this book.) In short, even if Bruce were a raving ego-maniac (which I sincerely doubt he is) HE would find it nearly impossible to make his way through this book. On that note, the Dave Marsh volumes "Glory Days" and "Thunder Road" manage to reveal more of Springsteen's myth, legend, and reality in the first couple pages than Sanford does in an entire book. Spend your money on those, if you want, but take a pass on Point Blank.