The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle (1973)

The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle is the second studio album by the American rock singer-songwriter Bruce Springsteen. It was recorded by Springsteen with the E Street Band at 914 Sound Studios in Blauvelt, New York, and released on November 5, 1973, through Columbia Records. It includes the song "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)", the band's most-used set-closing song through 1985.

As with Springsteen's debut album released earlier in the year, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle was well-received critically but had little commercial success at the time. Locally, though, the album sold well, was played regularly on Northeast album-oriented rock stations and made Springsteen a local phenomenon. Once Springsteen achieved nationwide popularity with his subsequent album Born to Run (1975), several selections from this album became popular FM radio airplay and concert favorites. On November 7, 2009, Springsteen and the E Street Band played the album in its entirety for the first time during a concert at Madison Square Garden. In Rolling Stone's 2020 edition of its "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time" list, the album was ranked at number 345.

Recording

Recording began on May 14, 1973, with the day spent on "Circus Song", which would be finished on June 28, and re-titled "Wild Billy's Circus Story". Two days later, "The Fever" was recorded in one take, then discarded and not included on the album. Sessions did not resume until June 22, but all backing tracks and most of the album would be recorded by the end of the week. September 23, 1973, was the final day of sessions, with final touches applied to "Kitty's Back", the last verse of "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)" overdubbed with new lyrics, "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" and a brand new song, "Incident on 57th Street", both recorded from scratch and completed. Along with these tracks, the album would be composed of "New York City Serenade", completed August 7, and "The E Street Shuffle", recorded on June 28 in one session.

Musical style

According to biographer Peter Ames Carlin, Springsteen had developed a "renewed passion for full-band rock 'n' roll" with The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle. Sputnikmusic critic Adam Thomas later wrote that the album departed from the folk influences of Springsteen's 1973 debut album Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. and was instead characterized by "a grand fusion of nostalgic rock 'n' roll and soulful R&B".

Artwork and name

The back photo for the album featured six members of Springsteen's backing E Street Band standing in a doorway of an antique store on Sairs Ave in the West End section of Long Branch, New Jersey. The building was across the street from West End Elementary School, and for years was Tommy Reed's bicycle repair shop and penny candy store; it has since been demolished and its former location is occupied by a parking lot.

The album was named in part after the 1959 Audie Murphy--Sandra Dee film, The Wild and the Innocent.

Release

There is disagreement on The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle's release date between official sources and third-party sources, including various Springsteen biographies covering the era. Springsteen's official website provides a release date of September 11, 1973; however, it is known that Springsteen was still in the studio recording for the album past this date. Indeed, September 23 was the final recording date, and after mixing and sequencing tweaks, the album was released on November 5, 1973. However, there was very little press, no advertisements in the trade papers and no release party, possibly because of Springsteen's deteriorating relationship with Columbia Records, and the departures of John Hammond and Clive Davis, the men who had signed him as a Columbia artist. This situation would continue, and would almost result in the termination of Springsteen's contract in 1974.

Reception

The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle sold poorly when it was first released in 1973 but received acclaim from critics. Rolling Stone magazine's Ken Emerson said that its lengthy, vividly written songs make for a more challenging and romantic album than Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., but still retain that album's ebullient music because of Springsteen and the E Street Band's masterful playing. In a less enthusiastic review for Creem, Robert Christgau wrote that it does not cohere as a whole, although its livelier songs make it "the kind of album that will be fun to go back to" if Springsteen improves upon it. According to him in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981), Springsteen eschewed the limiting folk conventions of his first album for a vibrant, quirky style of rock and roll that balances his celebrations of wild youth with a mature embrace of city life: "This guy may not be God yet, but he has his sleeveless undershirt in the ring."