Darkness on the Edge of Town by Bruce Springsteen

Darkness on the Edge of Town, Bruce Springsteen's fourth album, came out on Columbia on June 2, 1978, three long years after Born to Run, and it's leaner, meaner and a whole lot more grown-up than anything he'd done before. It was made after a string of legal disputes with his former manager, Mike Appel, in New York sessions with the E Street Band that ran from June 1977 to March 1978. Springsteen and Jon Landau produced, with Steven Van Zandt lending a hand.

Gone is the Wall of Sound. In its place is a raw, hard-rock roar that puts the whole band in the room, with Springsteen soaking up Steinbeck novels, John Ford films, punk rock and country music along the way. The people in these songs are older, less bound to the Jersey Shore and backed into corners, fighting back against odds that won't budge. "Badlands" is a clenched fist in the air, "Adam Raised a Cain" is scorched earth, "Racing in the Street" is a slow, grieving hymn, and "Candy's Room" rushes by in a fever. Frank Stefanko shot the cover photo in New Jersey.

It didn't sell like Born to Run, but it reached number five in the US, the singles "Prove It All Night", "Badlands" and "The Promised Land" did modest business, and the Darkness Tour was the biggest he'd ever mounted. Critics loved the playing and argued about the words, and in later decades it has been counted among his very best. Outtakes went to other artists, onto The River in 1980 or onto compilations, and a 2010 reissue came with a documentary on the making of the album.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.