Springsteen dives into his psyche with ‘Western Stars’ film | The Business Standard
Skip to main content
  • Latest
  • Economy
    • Banking
    • Stocks
    • Industry
    • Analysis
    • Bazaar
    • RMG
    • Corporates
    • Aviation
  • Videos
    • TBS Today
    • TBS Stories
    • TBS World
    • News of the day
    • TBS Programs
    • Podcast
    • Editor's Pick
  • World+Biz
  • Features
    • Panorama
    • The Big Picture
    • Pursuit
    • Habitat
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Mode
    • Tech
    • Explorer
    • Brands
    • In Focus
    • Book Review
    • Earth
    • Food
    • Luxury
    • Wheels
  • More
    • Sports
    • TBS Graduates
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • Gallery
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Magazine
    • Climate Change
    • Health
    • Cartoons
  • বাংলা
The Business Standard

Friday
June 13, 2025

Sign In
Subscribe
  • Latest
  • Economy
    • Banking
    • Stocks
    • Industry
    • Analysis
    • Bazaar
    • RMG
    • Corporates
    • Aviation
  • Videos
    • TBS Today
    • TBS Stories
    • TBS World
    • News of the day
    • TBS Programs
    • Podcast
    • Editor's Pick
  • World+Biz
  • Features
    • Panorama
    • The Big Picture
    • Pursuit
    • Habitat
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Mode
    • Tech
    • Explorer
    • Brands
    • In Focus
    • Book Review
    • Earth
    • Food
    • Luxury
    • Wheels
  • More
    • Sports
    • TBS Graduates
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • Gallery
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Magazine
    • Climate Change
    • Health
    • Cartoons
  • বাংলা
FRIDAY, JUNE 13, 2025
Springsteen dives into his psyche with ‘Western Stars’ film

Glitz

BSS/ AFP
24 October, 2019, 05:55 pm
Last modified: 24 October, 2019, 05:58 pm

Related News

  • New York's 'homecoming' concert called off as hurricane nears
  • Bruce Springsteen plans June return to Broadway for vaccinated audience
  • Drunken driving charge dropped against Springsteen; $500 fine for drinking at beach
  • Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen team up for new Spotify podcast
  • Rocker Bruce Springsteen faces drunk driving charge after 2020 arrest

Springsteen dives into his psyche with ‘Western Stars’ film

Springsteen plays his full “Western Stars” 13-track album in the film

BSS/ AFP
24 October, 2019, 05:55 pm
Last modified: 24 October, 2019, 05:58 pm
Springsteen dives into his psyche with ‘Western Stars’ film

Though Bruce Springsteen's songs are a vibrant part of the contemporary American songbook, he regularly uses his lyrics to express his deep misgivings about the proverbial "American dream."

With "Western Stars," a full-length feature film out Friday that marks the Boss's directorial debut, New Jersey's favorite son is once again looking at a question he's grappled with for decades: the struggle between transient freedom and communal life.

The meditative concert film features sweeping pans over California's wide expanses — think wild horses, a muscle car on the open road and cacti bathed in a rose sunrise — interspersed with Springsteen's family home movie footage.

The Business Standard Google News Keep updated, follow The Business Standard's Google news channel

It is effectively the 70-year-old icon's replacement for a tour to promote his latest solo effort.

Springsteen plays his full "Western Stars" 13-track album in the film — it hearkens back to the 1970s-era golden age of the Laurel Canyon music scene — with backing from band members including his wife Patti Scialfa as well as a 30-piece orchestra.

The recorded live performance, filmed in a barn on Springsteen's property in New Jersey, features sweeping crescendos of strings that project a luxurious warmth — the aural equivalent of slipping into a hot tub in the middle of the desert at dusk.

But the music's hazy glow contrasts with the edge of the artist's piercing inner reflections, as Springsteen considers the demons he's repressed and the aches he's caused after nearly half a century in show business.

"It's easy to lose yourself — or never find yourself," his voiceover says in the film. "The older you get, the heavier the baggage becomes that you haven't sorted."

Considering the "destructive parts" of his character, Springsteen says that in his younger life, "if I loved you, I would try to hurt you."

"You run until you've left everything that you've loved and that loves you behind," he says.

"I've done a lot of that kind of running."

– 'Living in good faith' –

Though his fame is rooted firmly in his skills as a musician, Springsteen as auteur is not necessarily a stretch: the performer has long imbued his lyrics with a cinematic quality.

The brawny superstar burst onto the international stage in 1975 with "Born to Run," taking his audiences into bleak small American towns that contained youthful desires for adventure.

"Western Stars," his 19th album, marks a sharp turn from his signature hard-driving rock that recounted the mundanities of everyday life and blue-collar struggles, making him a working class hero.

But Springsteen maintains the character-driven storytelling element that has long shaped his work, centering on the tale of a lone, washed-up Western movie star adrift and in search of roots.

Springsteen considers "Western Stars" — which he co-directed with Thom Zimny — the third installment in a trilogy that began with his acclaimed 2016 memoir and his wildly successful intimate show on Broadway.

The rock star has been open about his battles with depression and self-loathing, saying publicly he's been in therapy for decades and continues to aspire towards, as he puts it in the film, "living in good faith."

"Lost is something I'm good at writing," he says. "Gravitating towards pain feels more like home."

"You don't know how to hold onto love but you know how to hold onto hurt."

Scialfa, his wife of nearly 30 years and member of his famed E Street Band, plays guitar and sings in the film, but also is charming in home movie from the pair's honeymoon.

Springsteen reminisces about the early days of their romance spent on a park bench in front of New York's Empire Diner, where he eventually proposed.

"When you're young, it's all about going where I want to go, doing what I want to do, I'm going to be who I want to be, and that's okay for your twenties," he told late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel this week.

"But somewhere in your thirties, it starts to catch up with you and your definition of freedom has to expand to include family, your civic life, you know, community that you're involved in," he continued.

"If it doesn't… you get stuck out in the cold, you know? Really out in the cold."

Bruce Springsteen / Western Stars

Comments

While most comments will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive, moderation decisions are subjective. Published comments are readers’ own views and The Business Standard does not endorse any of the readers’ comments.

Top Stories

  • Yunus-Tarique meeting: Jamaat says outcome positive for democracy, IAB says dispelled uncertainty from politics
    Yunus-Tarique meeting: Jamaat says outcome positive for democracy, IAB says dispelled uncertainty from politics
  • Taskeen Ahmed, DCCI president. Illustration: TBS
    'Will boost business confidence': DCCI welcomes agreement between Yunus-Tarique on election
  • Sketches: TBS
    How an escalating Iran-Israel conflict could impact Bangladesh

MOST VIEWED

  • Wreckage of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner showing part of its registration "VT-ANB" in Ahmedabad, India, June 12, 2025. REUTERS/Amit Dave
    Air India Dreamliner crashes into Ahmedabad college hostel, kills over 290
  • File Photo of Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus: UNB
    Prof Yunus to receive Harmony Award from King Charles today
  • Energy adviser Fouzul Kabir Khan with other government officials during a visit to Sylhet gas field on 13 June 2025. Photo: TBS
    I would disconnect gas supply to every home in Dhaka if I could: Energy adviser
  • Bangladesh Bank Governor Ahsan H Mansur. TBS Sketch
    Bangladesh mulls settlements with tycoons over offshore wealth: BB governor tells FT
  • UCB declares no dividend for 2024 to comply with regulatory requirement
    UCB declares no dividend for 2024 to comply with regulatory requirement
  • UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus
    Disclosure of unconfirmed Yunus-Starmer meeting shows ‘diplomatic imprudence’: Analysts

Related News

  • New York's 'homecoming' concert called off as hurricane nears
  • Bruce Springsteen plans June return to Broadway for vaccinated audience
  • Drunken driving charge dropped against Springsteen; $500 fine for drinking at beach
  • Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen team up for new Spotify podcast
  • Rocker Bruce Springsteen faces drunk driving charge after 2020 arrest

Features

Photos: Collected

Kurtis that make a great office wear

5h | Mode
Among pet birds in the country, lovebirds are the most common, and they are also the most numerous in the haat. Photo: Junayet Rashel

Where feathers meet fortune: How a small pigeon stall became Dhaka’s premiere bird market

2d | Panorama
Illustration: Duniya Jahan/ TBS

Forget Katy Perry, here’s Bangladesh’s Ruthba Yasmin shooting for the moon

3d | Features
File photo of Eid holidaymakers returning to the capital from their country homes/Rajib Dhar

Dhaka: The city we never want to return to, but always do

4d | Features

More Videos from TBS

Iran-Israel military power; who is ahead?

Iran-Israel military power; who is ahead?

1h | TBS World
Did the possibility of an Iran nuclear deal set back after the attack?

Did the possibility of an Iran nuclear deal set back after the attack?

2h | TBS World
IRGC chief Major General Hossein Salami killed in Israeli strike

IRGC chief Major General Hossein Salami killed in Israeli strike

4h | TBS World
'Historic' meeting between Yunus and Tarique underway in London

'Historic' meeting between Yunus and Tarique underway in London

6h | TBS Today
EMAIL US
contact@tbsnews.net
FOLLOW US
WHATSAPP
+880 1847416158
The Business Standard
  • About Us
  • Contact us
  • Sitemap
  • Advertisement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Comment Policy
Copyright © 2025
The Business Standard All rights reserved
Technical Partner: RSI Lab

Contact Us

The Business Standard

Main Office -4/A, Eskaton Garden, Dhaka- 1000

Phone: +8801847 416158 - 59

Send Opinion articles to - oped.tbs@gmail.com

For advertisement- sales@tbsnews.net