{"id":783626,"date":"2026-05-09T05:52:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-09T05:52:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/783626\/"},"modified":"2026-05-09T05:52:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-09T05:52:18","slug":"21-years-ago-today-bruce-springsteen-took-what-might-be-his-most-audacious-and-controversial-record-to-no-1-with-one-of-his-darkest-songs-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/783626\/","title":{"rendered":"21 Years Ago Today, Bruce Springsteen Took What Might Be His Most Audacious (And Controversial) Record to No. 1 With One of His Darkest Songs Ever"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ever since dropping his landmark 1975 album<\/a> Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen has been a singular force in rock and roll. With 20 Grammy Awards and over 140 million albums sold, Springsteen is constantly reinventing himself, keeping his work fresh without ever straying from the blue-collar sensibilities that first won over fans. On this day (May 8) in 2005, \u201cthe Boss\u201d was back on top of the albums chart with Devils & Dust, his third acoustic album and 13th overall of his career.<\/p>\n

Why This Global Corporation Refused to Sell The Album<\/p>\n

Bruce Springsteen pared it way back for Devils & Dust, ditching his E Street Band in favor of playing most instruments himself.<\/p>\n

\u201cI like writing pop songs, and I like the band playing loud, and I enjoy playing big places,\u201d he told the New York Times<\/a>. \u201cBut there\u2019s something about when an audience comes in, and it\u2019s just them, and it\u2019s just you.\u201d<\/p>\n

The album\u2019s 12 tracks\u2014many of which Springsteen had penned a decade earlier\u2014revolve around familiar themes: inner studies of characters battling with \u201cthe worst of themselves and the best of themselves.\u201d Rolling Stone<\/a>\u00a0lauded the project, calling it Springsteen\u2019s most audacious record since the home-demo American Gothic of 1982\u2019s\u00a0Nebraska.\u201d <\/p>\n

However, one particular song, \u201cReno\u201d, caused quite a stir. The album\u2019s third track sees a man recounting a lukewarm hotel room encounter with a sex worker. In the second verse, she informs her client of the prices she charges for certain acts.<\/p>\n

One line in particular was too much for Starbucks, who backed out of a deal with Columbia Records to stock the album on its shelves. At the time, Starbucks was an emerging force in the music industry, having accounted for a quarter of the sales for Ray Charles\u2019 final album, Genius Loves Company.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were a number of factors involved. It [the lyrics] was one of the factors, but not the only reason,\u201d Ken Lombard, then the president of Starbucks Entertainment, told Billboard<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Springsteen shrugged off <\/a>the controversy, insisting that the lyric was \u201cjust what felt right.\u201d<\/p>\n

[RELATED: This Story From Bruce Springsteen\u2019s Childhood Is Infuriating, and It\u2019s Easy To See How It Affected His Music]<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

The Record Marked a First For Bruce Springsteen<\/p>\n

Devils & Dust gave Bruce Springsteen the seventh No. 1 album of his career. Additionally, it was the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer\u2019s first-ever chart-topper that didn\u2019t feature the E Street Band.<\/p>\n

Devils & Dust nabbed five Grammy nominations. Springsteen took home the Best Solo Rock Vocal trophy for the title track, which he performed live during the ceremony\u2019s telecast. One of the darkest tracks in Springsteen\u2019s catalog, Springsteen tells the story of a troubled soldier. <\/p>\n

In true Bruce Springsteen fashion, he wrapped up his performance with \u201cBring \u2019em home,\u201d referencing U.S. troops fighting the Iraq War overseas. He immediately left the stage, never once glancing back at the partial standing ovation he received.<\/p>\n

Featured image by Jo Hale\/Getty Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ever since dropping his landmark 1975 album Born to Run, Bruce Springsteen has been a singular force in…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":783627,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[29],"tags":[75409,4580,171,975,4185,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-783626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-2000s","tag-bruce-springsteen","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-rock-music","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116543065488597246","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=783626"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/783626\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/783627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=783626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=783626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=783626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}