Blindsided By The Bruce

It is July 6, 1992 and I'm getting psyched up for my Springsteen interview. The meeting is scheduled for Wembley Stadium, London and the understanding is that myself, a guy from Melody Maker and a broadsheet writer will meet the Boss at the soundcheck and we'll shoot the breeze in an informal setting.

This is an exciting prospect. I've been a Springsteen fan since 'Born To Run in 1975, when I first became aware of an artist being hyped and primed for major success by the music industry. This led me to 'Greetings From Asbury Park' and some of the other treasures back there. I'd seen his 'Born In The USA' tour at Wembley also, so I have taken the gig seriously, staying up all night, reading the books and thinking up useful questions.

But on the morning of the meet, I get a call from his London press office. Apparently Springsteen's media people have realised that I'd reviewed his two recent albums, 'Lucky Town' and 'Human Touch'. These records told the listener of Bruce's creative block and his eventual escape from this. Neither record was great, but I felt like I had given them a fair hearing. Unfortunately, his people weren't so tolerant and so I had been vetted and deemed unsuitable. And then the lady at Sony Records asks me to find another NME writer to make the journey to the venue and to get the necessary quotes.

It's a bit of a sore point in my Springsteen relationship, and one that comes back to me when some other critic raves about the guy's status as a man of the people. Still, I will not hold grudges and on tonight's show I'll be digging into his new retrospective set, 'The Promise', an archive of the sessions that finally birthed his 1978 album 'Darkness On The Edge Of Town'. Y'know, I still believe in the promised land.