Bruce Springsteen: The unstoppable boss of rock’n’roll

At the age of 75, Bruce Springsteen can look back on a music career that has now spanned 60 years. It began in 1964 when he watched the Beatles’ legendary first appearance on American soil on the “Ed Sullivan Show” in his parents’ living room and decided at that moment to become a musician himself. After he had organized a little money with small jobs such as painting houses and tarring roofs, he started his music career without further ado that same year.

First guitar cost $18

In an interview with the Associated Press a few years ago, he described this first step as follows: “I saved up $18 and went to the Western Auto Store in Freehold. There was a junk guitar in the window and I said, ‘Give me that one.’ It was the cheapest one they had. I took it home. That was my first guitar.”

His decision to become a musician was met with little enthusiasm by his parents at the time. “When I was growing up, there were two things that were unpopular in my house,” he once revealed to his audience at one of his later concerts. “One was me, and the other was my guitar.” His father, who brought home modest earnings as a taxi driver and prison guard, imagined his son becoming a lawyer, while his mother, who worked as a secretary, suggested that he use his creative talents as a writer.

The fact that he finally got his own way is something he has today thanks to a huge worldwide fan base whose lives he accompanied and decisively influenced with his music. On his 75th birthday today, he is still considered the undisputed boss of the US rock scene and one of the most commercially successful rock musicians of all time.

Jump into the billionaires club

He has sold around 140 million albums worldwide and has won 20 Grammys and an Oscar (for the song “Streets of Philadelphia” in the soundtrack of the 1993 AIDS drama “Philadelphia”). In July 2024, Forbes magazine reported that Springsteen had made the leap into the billionaires’ club after selling his song rights to Sony Music in 2021 for an estimated $500 million. He will therefore probably no longer have to save up for his next guitar.

But the legendary status that the “Boss” has cannot be measured in money anyway. Which musician can claim that there are radio stations that play almost exclusively his music, like “E Street Radio” launched by the Sirius Satellite Group in 2005?

Even Barack Obama would like to be Springsteen

Even former US President Barack Obama (63) looks back on the musician’s legendary career with awe. At a fundraising gala as part of his presidential candidacy, where Springsteen and his colleague Billy Joel (75) created a lively atmosphere with a few songs, Joel announced, according to a report in “Rolling Stone”: “I just told Michelle backstage that the reason I’m running for president is because I can’t be Bruce Springsteen.”

“What a fucking ride!”

Shortly before his 75th birthday, “The Boss” was also very impressed by his musical life’s work. At the world premiere of the documentary “Road Diary: Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band”, which provides unique impressions of his 2023-2024 world tour, at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 8, Springsteen said: “If I left tomorrow, that would be fine.” And added with a grin: “What a fucking ride!”