Track Listing

1. Blinded By the Light
2. Growin' Up
3. Mary Queen of Arkansas
4. Does This Bus Stop at 82nd Street?
5. Lost in the Flood
6. Angel
7. For You
8. Spirit in the Night
9. It's Hard to Be a Saint in the City

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #985 in Music
• Brand: Sony
• Released on: 1990-10-25
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .23 pounds

Customer Reviews

Bruce's Debut
Greetings From Asbury Park served notice that there was a new musical force on the scene. On his debut, Bruce showed he was the best songwriter to come along since Bob Dylan. The album kicks off with the musical tounge twister "Blinded By The Light" that showed Bruce wasn't a typical singer-songwriter. The song has a funky riff and is replete with horns. "Spirit In The Night" introduced the E Street sound and is a precursor to the character oriented songs that would appear later on Born To Run & Wild. "Does This Bus Stop at 82nd St?" is fun and "For You" is a rare rock song about suicide. "Growin' Up" & It's So Hard To Be A Saint In The City" show early signs of Bruce's "Tramp" persona. "Lost In The Flood" is the great forgotten Bruce song and is as good a song as he has ever recorded. While Greetings is uneven at points ("Mary, Queen of Arkansas' & "The Angel"), it shows an artist who had a very original sound and huge potential. It is great to throw it in the cd player and hear a young, raw and hungry Bruce Springsteen and listen to where it all started.

What is everyone talking about?
I am a brand new, 19-year-old Bruce fan. I have just finished reading the rest of the reviews and I am confused. A good friend of mine gave me two of Bruce's cd's to start off with: "Greetings..." and "The Wild..." I'd never heard Bruce before, and I was completely astonished when I heard it. Bruce Springsteen is absolutely incredible. I listened to it nonstop for a month, and easily picked out what I considered to be the best. On "Greetings", two of my favorites were "Mary, Queen of Arkansas" and "The Angel", second only to "Lost in the Flood." I don't understand why all the reviews seem to cast those as the weakest points of the album. What struck me about Bruce was his compassion, intensity, and the forcefulness of his poetic, melancholic yet youthful sincerity. I find those qualities most in the songs that everyone else finds lacking. I am now at the complete mercy of Bruce's romantic, expressive genius and I will faithfully stick by that side of him. I hope I'm not the only one who appreciates these masterpieces.

Great, young Bruce
This CD presents a young and interesting Bruce Springsteen, performing songs with an early version of the E Street Band. Despite the fact that The Wild, The Innocent...would be released later that year, this album is very different than that album. This album has more Dylan-esque tendencies than that release, revealed on songs like "Does This Bus Stop At 82nd Street?," "Mary, Queen of Arkansas," and "Growin' Up." These songs, more acoustic in nature than later Springsteen (except Nebraska and Tom Joad), are a welcome change of pace from later, rock oriented Springsteen. Along with those two tunes, this album also includes the fabulous(to say the least) rocker "For You" and the moody "Spirit In The Night," a radio favorite. Although many casual fans consider "Spirit In The Night" to be the pinnacle of early Springsteen, it is not even the best song on the album, as it is easily rivaled by "It's Hard To Be A Saint In the City," "Lost In The Flood," and "For You." "Blinded By The Light," the opening number, has a great funky feel to it, with some interesting, stream-of-conciousness-lyrics. Even the oft-forgotten "Mary..." has some great, sensitive lyrics. While not as good as his next release, this album is a definite buy for any Springsteen fan or even a Dylan fan looking for some new tunes.