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A memory of public awkwardness that always comes back to me when people talk about Bruce Soringsteen: I went to a presentation in undergrad by a prof on music and philosophy. We were supposed to bring a CD we liked to share with the group. I was STOKED. This seemed so up my alley
I wanted to seem cool, so I picked Daydream Nation and off I went. It turned he started the presentation by asking to play some of the CDs we'd picked for the group. I was sitting next to him, so he grabbed my CD and put it in the player, asking me to say the title and the band.
I said it. Dead silence. No "cool choice, man," no acknowledgement whatsoever. I was rattled. The prof asked me what song to play and I hesitated and he just started playing the first track, "Teenage Riot."
The intro felt like it went on forever. The prof actually asked "does the song do anything else?" I wanted to die. No one was digging it. Seven minutes later, the song was over. It was silent again. No one else got a turn. The prof just started his presentation.
All of his examples were about Bruce Springsteen songs. I didn't know any of them. At one point he played an excerpt from a Bruce Springsteen song, one of his hits, and asked "what do we associate with this song?" No one spoke. He looked at me and I panicked.
Normally I love being called on because I'm a kiss ass little nerd, but I was begging him in my mind not to call on me. He did. I said "I don't know. I've never heard that song before."
This was too much. He was incredulous. He was furious. I'd already fucked up his presentation with my stupid Sonic Youth CD and now THIS? I didn't even know a goddamn Bruce Springsteen song? A song everyone knows?
He didn't say any of this, but it was implied by the very pregnant pause before he called on someone else. I don't know that I stopped blushing until I made it back to my dorm room and could die of embarrassment in peace. So that's what I think of when people mention Bruce.
