Bruce Springsteen – Twilight Hours Review

Picking through Tracks II: The Lost Albums has shown Bruce Springsteen to be a prolific creative force. To have seven albums’ worth of work as strong as this, and yet think it is not worthy of release, is fascinating. Listeners have plenty to choose from with Tracks II: The Lost Albums. LA Garage Sessions ‘83 stands tall as one of the best would-be hits for The Boss. Twilight Hours has the same effect. A noir album with orchestra stylings, softer flourishes we know Springsteen can handle when a tender moment is needed. A whole album of songs in the style of American pop tradition. A precursor to Only the Strong Survive, dumped in favour of Western Stars. Those lounge pop leanings on lead single Sunday Love call for what its title suggests. Flowers, champagne, the crooner-adjacent charm works well on Springsteen. 

From the album cover featuring a sorrowful-looking Springsteen, the same pain on his face as a man who has forgotten to put the washing machine on, to the titles of each song, you can get a feeling of those lounge pop charms. Truly fantastic moments where Springsteen adapts his voice to a genre he has never explored. The same occurred on Streets of Philadelphia. But The Boss trades off those loop machines for the soppy equivalent, a string section backing his musings on love and life. He has enough to pull from, and the openness of Twilight Hours is what makes it such a satisfying listen. Without honesty in music concerned with love, new and old, there is not much point to an orchestra-backed album. Springsteen pushes the listener and orchestra to their limit, figuring out just how far, just how loud, he can make these moments. Two of Us sounds borderline cliche, but is pulled back by a resounding Springsteen vocal performance. That is the constant on Twilight Hours.  

Just when you think a song is taking itself too far, falling for the typical crooner orchestral moment, a little flicker of The Boss breaks through and reinterprets the classic sound. Macroscopic details usually overlooked by the average person are what Springsteen finds beauty in. The mind drifts to the cracked sidewalk, a winding road, and from there, we interpret what we can. It is either vain hope or sincere happiness where beauty shines in everything. As much is heard on Lonely Town, a longing piece from The Boss, which is backed by that swelling orchestral touch. There are moments on Twilight Hours which begin to fall for the soppy crooner tone but, ultimately, it is refreshing to hear Springsteen pursue such a wildly different sound. Part of the charm is hearing what Springsteen can bring from his past to this genre. 

He offers a few links to his past, to the songs which have and will always define his career. Sierra-based memories on High Sierra are warm occasions which match the orchestral backing. That longing to stay in one perfect spot is an absolute, pure understanding of the lighter pop style he is aiming for here. The very best of baroque and piano pop offers a listener the chance to bask in the beauty and love of an occasion they never experienced. A convincing storyteller can take us there and make us wish we could stay. High Sierra does that, and it makes the rest of the songs look that much weaker as a result. Twilight Hours is a delightful listen not just because it offers a new range for The Boss, but because it provides those satisfying glimpses of the past, which, as ever, inform the future. Love of the everyday moments, the little bits of life, is what Springsteen offers here, and earnestly so.