Album Review: Human Touch and Lucky Town

Today marks the 25th anniversary of one of Springsteen's most dubious career moves to date: the release of both Human Touch and Lucky Town.  These albums were Bruce's first away from the E Street Band, and missed out on the top spot on the billboard charts to the Wayne's World soundtrack.  Widely considered the nadir of Springsteen's popularity, Bruce didn't even mention these albums in his autobiography.  But, a generation later, it's time to look back and ask the question: was it really that bad?

Human Touch is a beast to review.  It's hard to say anything complimentary about any song without noting how much the music is a product of the time.  In the late 80s and early 90s, the "white dude rock world" (for obvious lack of a better term) was dominated by the ballad:



On Human Touch, Bruce was working too hard to find that type of sound.  While there's definitely some solid songs on here, they are buried under a 90s gloss.  "Soul Driver" has the new jack swing drum splash (think a slower Bell Biv Devoe).  "Cross My Heart" is the epitome of 90s country, seeming to draw from the then-uber popular Garth Brooks.  While songs like "Roll of the Dice" and "All or Nothin' At All" are energetic rockers, could you imagine them being done in a jazzier, looser E Street style?  They'd be instant classics!  The album is a long listen, and gets bogged down by numerous generic songs that just bleed into each other.



However, time has been much kinder to Lucky Town.  While Human Touch was a scattered attempt to find the "ballad", Lucky Town is a much more focused, personal, and catchier.  The album starts incredibly strong with the joyous "Better Days", the angry "Lucky Town", and the wedding classic "If I Should Fall Behind".  Unfortunately, the back half of the album sounds like remixes of the first: "Living Proof" is another "Better Days", "Book of Dreams" is another "If I Should Fall Behind", "Souls of the Departed" is another "Lucky Town".  However, the sound is definitely less dated than Human Touch - if this is what Bruce's long-rumored country album sounds like, I'll be very pleased.

Ultimately, I'd give Human Touch 2 out of 5 stars, and Lucky Town 3 out of 5 stars.  Human Touch is only for the Bruce completists, but the casual rock fan should be able to find a couple songs on Lucky Town that they'd enjoy.  Either way, I think we can all agree that the Wayne's World soundtrack definitely deserved the number 1 spot that week.

As for the question of Bruce's worst album of all-time - I'd still give that to Working On A Dream.  While I gave them both 2/5 scores, I can imagine a Human Touch E Street "remix" that could save a lot of the songs.  And, finally, the last thought exercise for this album: how would you make it one album?  Here's my Lucky Touch (Human Town?) playlist:

1. Better Days
2. Roll of the Dice
3. Real World
4. All Or Nothin' At All
5. Lucky Town
6. Man's Job
7. I Wish I Were Blind
8. If I Should Fall Behind
9. Leap of Faith
10. Human Touch

So, what are your thoughts on these two albums?  What would be your Lucky Touch? Let us know in the comments!

Cover Spotlight - "Human Touch" by Joe Cocker

File this under "Covers I Had No Idea Existed".  This cut comes from Cocker's 1996 mostly-cover album Organic, which also features covers of Van Morrison, Bob Dylan, George Harrison, and Stevie Wonder.  While it gives Springsteen's original a more country flare, it still has a 90s-style sound (which also hampers the original, too).  The music sounds a little too clean and polished for my taste, as I'm more used to a grittier sound, like in Cocker's famous "With A Little Help From My Friends".

However, it is an interesting, unusual, and unexpected cover - if you told me Joe Cocker covered a Springsteen song, this would not have been on my shortlist of guesses.  And, personally, this was a new discovery for me, and, even if you've known about this cover for a while, I'm sure you can relate to the feeling of being a fan of something for so long, thinking you've seen it all, and then finding something new.  Hopefully, someone else reading this today will get that same feeling.

Lyrics Spotlight - Soul Driver & Sad Eyes

"Well if something in the air feels a little unkind,
Don't worry darling, it'll slip your mind"
- Soul Driver, Human Touch & Sad Eyes, Tracks

With any kind of artist as prolific as Bruce Springsteen, you're bound to see some overlap between their artistic output. Bruce is particularly interesting for his willingness to release unfinished songs or alternate versions over the years, kindly digging into his treasure trove of abandoned work to the delight of his adoring fans. We've written about Bruce's "first drafts" several times in the past and while I'm not sure "Soul Driver" and "Sad Eyes" quite qualify for that type of comparison, they do share an identical pair of lyrics. As noted in the liner notes of Tracks, "Sad Eyes" is a cast off from the Human Touch album. Aside from the shared lyric, the songs tell the story of pursuit from two different approaches. In "Soul Driver" Bruce sings from the position of an active pursuer whereas in "Sad Eyes" he plays the more passive role, attracting his object of desire by playing hard to get. In both songs, the quoted lyric serves to convince the object of desire not to dwell on the negatives and be open to a love that supersedes life's problems.

Lyrics Spotlight: "Human Touch"

"Oh girl that feeling of safety that you prize
Well it comes at a hard hard price
You can't shut off the risk and the pain
Without losing the love that remains" - "Human Touch", Human Touch

A few weeks back I reviewed Mick Foley's debut into the literary world Tietam Brown.  Coincidentally later that day he guest was the guest DJ on E Street Radio.  His theme for that episode were the lyrics I chose this week's analysis.  He really analyzed the song and broke it down.  I've never been a big fan of "Human Touch" (the song and the album, I don't hate it but it just cant compare to E Street material or his incredible folk albums).  But after hearing Foley delve deep into the lyrics, and reading them over, and listening to the song on repeat, I've gained a new appreciation.

This might be Springsteen's best work lyrically.  I've written in the past about Springsteen's lyrics struggles with doubt and mistrust, but I don't think any song displays it so much as "Human Touch" in particular these lyrics.  This just a sample of the lyrics, but really I could have gone with just about any from this under-appreciated song.  Gone is the Springsteen of old with his wild youth filled lyrics like "Tonight we'll be free, all the promises will be broken."  He can't write a song like that anymore, because his view of the world has changed.  But, as Foley said in his show, Bruce couldn't write a song like "Human Touch" when he first debuted either, because he hadn't experienced the pain and sacrifice of losing love yet.