Bruce Springsteen: An Illustrated Biography

Meredith Ochs promises an illustrated biography. And the reader gets really a lot of photos. Especially those from the 70s were new to me, it was fun to see Bruce with lots of hair on his head and in his face. The biography part on the other hand is not very distinct. There are a few facts about Springsteens beginnings, and then his albums function as the red thread in describing Bruce Springsteens career. Why some of the songs were written, which people joined Bruce on his road to success (and mostly stayed for a very long time), how his music style evolved. Most of the times this was too "technical" for me, I was missing some heart in this story, some anecdotes, something to get a better feeling for this outstanding musician - the really interesting stuff. However, one really interesting thing I learned is that he used to write lots and lots of song for an album. And from those 60 or even 90 songs they then picked only a few for release on the album. Which means that there should be a massive amount of material lying around in some drawers that might see the light of day one time. Ochs did a very great job in garnering a lot of information from lots of different sources. And decorated it with many photographs, but mostly from various gigs Springsteen played around the globe. So after a while they just get more of the same. For a more personal view on him I should better read his autobiography.