Much to my wife's chagrin, I'm into Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band and have read and watched everything about him over the years.

and “Shut Out the Light,” hosted homeless drives next to T-shirt concessions, and volunteered anonymously at food bank fundraisers. It’s a measure of our cultural progress that we now hear this as material from a suffering patient, and not just a voice trapped by fate.If we had made it “right,” as technology allows us to do to a greater and greater degree now, the music would have moved further away from where we live.

Whatever else he did, or is yet to do, he can always play the ultimate get-out-of-jail card: he’s the guy who made Nebraska. captures the dark essence of the American dream, shedding light on a hidden world we’d rather not face but live in all the same, and does so in a way that will forever stand the test of time. But I always remembered that Springsteen passed on the first of those questions, which surprised me. It’s very interesting to see the self doubt Bruce had and the many ways these songs may have been ruined if they kept with the plan to record them with the E Street band. Finance is provided by PayPal Credit (a trading name of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH).In this monthly series, Scott Timberg interviews musicians on the literary work that has inspired and informed their music. My brother and I bought a copy of this for our Dad for his birthday and, as with most things Springsteen related, I couldn’t get him one without getting myself one! But almost forty years later, Nebraska is arguably Springsteen's most important record--the lasting clue if you're looking to understand not just the artist's career and the vision behind it but the man himself. Nebraska expressed a turmoil that was reflective of the mood of the country, but it was also a symptom of trouble in the artist’s life, the beginnings of a mental breakdown that Springsteen would only talk about openly decades after the album’s release. Last year, Springsteen released Only the Strong Survive, a two-man hat trick, and it disappoints most where it aims highest.