Tramps Like Us

Monday, September 16, 2024 Entry #114

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band have played Springsteen’s classic hit song “Born To Run” at each of the 12 concerts I have seen on their 2023-24 tour. And, though I didn’t crunch the numbers, I am nearly 100% certain that not a show has gone by these past two years without it.

“Born To Run” is a Springsteen setlist staple for a very good reason-it is simply an incredible song. Every time I hear it, I am reminded once again of the cathartic power of the song’s melody and the brilliance of the songwriting. To me, “Born To Run” is of a piece with other epic American narrative poems like T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land” and Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl.”

The opening verse of “Born To Run” sets its sweeping tone of grandeur:

“In the day we sweat it out on the streets/Of a runaway American dream
At night we ride through the mansions of glory/In suicide machines
Sprung from cages on Highway 9/Chrome wheeled, fuel injected, and steppin' out over the line
Oh, baby this town rips the bones from your back/It's a death trap, it's a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we're young/'Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run!”

In spite of the fact that I have been hearing the song over and over, or perhaps because of that, my main takeaway from “Born To Run” has changed of late. Yes, the song will forever be associated with escape, independence, and freedom: “Baby, we were born to run!” It is the ultimate road trip song, the best tune to crank up loud when you are saying, “I’m outta here!” whether in reality or fantasy. And, for a long time, that emphasis was more than enough for me.

However, the many nights of witnessing the house lights turned all the way up so the audience and musicians alike can clearly see who we’re ecstatically and without abandon shouting that “Born To Run” chorus along with has made an impact. What really packs the biggest emotional wallop for me now is actually the penultimate phrase, “Tramps like us!”

While the word “tramp” feels quite anachronistic (perhaps purposely so), a throwback to a bygone Woody Guthrie, dust bowl, hobo, and freighthopping era, I feel like I deeply understand and resonate with the term. A “tramp” to me suggests an outsider, a misfit, a rebel, a non-confomist. And, the truth is, almost everyone has taken their turns, willingly or not, feeling this way. Even if most of us are hardly tramps anymore in our daily lives, at a Springsteen show it all comes back. Feeling wild, vibrant, liberated, and special, we wear that tramp designation as a badge of honor. Not only that, but at the concert we are surrounded by tens of thousands of our fellow tramps! Together we form a joyful and liberating community of iconoclasts.

I believe it was very purposeful that Springsteen wrote, “Tramps like us,” as opposed to “a tramp like me,” or “tramps like me and Wendy” (the girl he is singing about in the song). Springsteen knew that his experiences and emotions were much like ours, and his songwriting allows us to reflect our “trampiness” back to The Boss, and share it with one another.

You can sense some of that “Tramps Like Us” vibe in the video at the top of this post that I recorded in Asbury Park during the performance of “Born To Run” itself. I took some time in that moment to look around in wonder, feeling a mighty kinship with the tramps all around me. Of course, this communal, dare I say counter-culturally spiritual, sense of unison pervades Springsteen’s shows, throughout many of the songs he has written and performs.

“Because The Night.”

“Badlands.”

Here’s a great “Tramps Like Us” kind of cheer, from the song “Rosalita”: “We’re gonna play some pool, skip some school, act really cool, stay out all night, it’s gonna feel alright!” What a great moment to sing that out and totally feel the times (including right now!) you were such a tramp!

“Tramps like us, baby we were born to run!”