Bruce Springsteen - Songs To Orphans (1973)

Bruce Springsteen's musical career began as far back as 1964, after he saw the Beatles' appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show, and inspired by them he bought his first guitar and started playing for audiences with a band called the Rogues at local venues in Freehold. The following year he went to the house of Tex and Marion Vinyard, who sponsored young bands in town, and they helped him become the lead guitarist and subsequently one of the lead singers of The Castiles, who recorded two original songs at a public recording studio in Brick Township. In the late 1960's he performed briefly in a power trio known as Earth, and from 1969 to early 1971 he was a member of Steel Mill, which included Danny Federici, Vini Lopez, Vinnie Roslin, and later Steve Van Zandt and Robbin Thompson, recording three original Springsteen songs at Pacific Recording in San Mateo. Over the next two years, as Springsteen sought to shape a unique and genuine musical and lyrical style, he performed with Dr. Zoom & the Sonic Boom (early- to mid-1971), the Sundance Blues Band (mid-1971), and the Bruce Springsteen Band (mid-1971 to mid-1972). He came to the attention of Mike Appel and Jim Crecetos, managers of Sir Lord Baltimore, and in April and May 1972 they had him record his entire songbook for them, acoustically. He also recorded some sessions for John Hammond in May and June 1972, which led to his being signed to Columbia Records, where he went straight back into the studio to record his debut album 'Greetings From Asbury Park, N.J.' between June and October 1972. Sessions for the follow-up 'The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle' took place between May and September 1973, and there were a number of out-takes left over, including the superb 'Evacuation Of The West'. Many of these recordings have appeared on various bootlegs over the years, and so I've picked the very best of the songs from these sessions which never made it to an official album, and added in a couple of edited live recordings from 1973 of otherwise unrecorded songs, to piece together a record which just confirms what a prolific talent Springsteen was at the start of his long and illustrious career. 

Track listing

01 Seaside Bar Song    
02 The Lady And The Doctor 
03 Bishop Dance     
04 War Nurse
05 Visitation At Fort Horn
06 Hey Santa Ana
07 Songs To Orphans
08 Jazz Musician
09 Thundercack
10 Family Song
11 Saga Of The Architect Angel   
12 No More Kings In Texas (Evacuation Of The West)  

Tracks 2, 4, 5, 7, 8, 10 Media and 914 Sound Studios, Blauvelt, New York City 06-07/72
Tracks 1, 6, 12 'The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Shuffle' studio sessions 07-08/73
Track 11 Media and 914 Sound Studios, Blauvelt, New York City 20/02/1973
Tracks 3, 9  Berkeley Community Theater, Berkeley 02/03/73