40-Year-Old Songs: Working on the Highway

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One thing is for certain: when you get to 1984, you simply CANNOT ignore this album. It’s one of those albums that “everybody” owned back then. And what do you know, it’s now forty years old this year!! Wow. Let’s get rockin’. Working on the Highway - Bruce Springsteen There was no avoiding Born in the U.S.A. in 1984. Poor cloistered nuns probably had it piped in to their convents! It turned out to be the ninth biggest-selling album of the 1980s. (Somehow, I managed to see Bruce twice — without exorbitant scalpers — on the tour in 1985.) This is the Chuck Berry song! You see, ol’ Chuck got arrested once for transporting an underage girl across the state line (under the Mann Act). And that’s what our protagonist is doing here: despite the warning that “she’s just a little girl, she don’t know nothin’ about this cruel, cruel world,” off they go to Florida. Now, before you think ol’ Brucie is a pervert, do consider the fact that, throughout most of rock and roll up to that point (and probably to this day), “groupies” were considered “old” at 16. And it was a prevailing theme in songs (“sweet things from Boston so young and willing” from Steely Dan’s “Hey 19”) and movies (“Are you really 19?” in Fast Times At Ridgemont High). It’s also not a case of kidnapping, but consensual (“we got along all right”…and if it had been kidnapping, “her brothers” would have probably killed him instead of leaving him for the cops ). Wow, I just ruined a great song for you, didn’t I? Tune in next week, when I destroy “I’m on Fire.” Until then, rock out with Bruce. Working on the Highway Written by Bruce Springsteen Recorded by Bruce Springsteen From Born in the U.S.A., 1984 The judge got mad and they put me straight away: