- This article is about the album. For the song, see The Ghost of Tom Joad (song).
The Ghost of Tom Joad is the eleventh studio album by
Bruce SpringsteenBruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss", is an American singer-songwriter. He records and tours with the E Street Band...
, released in 1995 (see
1995 in musicThis is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1995.- Events :*January 18 – Jerry Garcia crashes his rented BMW into a guard rail near Mill Valley, California, USA, but is not injured in the accident....
). The album was recorded and mixed at Thrill Hill during the spring and summer of 1995. Musically and lyrically reminiscent of Springsteen's 1982 critically-acclaimed album
Nebraska,
The Ghost of Tom Joad received mostly favorable reviews.
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- This article is about the album. For the song, see The Ghost of Tom Joad (song).
The Ghost of Tom Joad is the eleventh studio album by
Bruce SpringsteenBruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss", is an American singer-songwriter. He records and tours with the E Street Band...
, released in 1995 (see
1995 in musicThis is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1995.- Events :*January 18 – Jerry Garcia crashes his rented BMW into a guard rail near Mill Valley, California, USA, but is not injured in the accident....
). The album was recorded and mixed at Thrill Hill during the spring and summer of 1995. Musically and lyrically reminiscent of Springsteen's 1982 critically-acclaimed album
Nebraska,
The Ghost of Tom Joad received mostly favorable reviews. Mikal Gilmore of Rolling Stone called it "Springsteen's best album in ten years," and considered it "among the bravest work that anyone has given us this decade." However, it reached only #11 on the
Billboard 200The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling new music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...
, breaking a string of eight consecutive Top 5 studio albums in the U.S for Springsteen.
The album is mainly backed by
acoustic guitarThe classical guitar is a plucked string instrument from the family of instruments called chordophones. It traditionally has 3 plain gut bass strings and 3 gut wound silk core treble strings and the modern adaption typically has 6 nylon strings .The basic characteristics of the shape of the...
work and the lyrics on many of the tracks are a somber reflection of life in the mid-1990s in
AmericaThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and
MexicoThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
. Tom Joad is the protagonist of
John SteinbeckJohn Ernst Steinbeck, Jr. was an American writer. He wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Grapes of Wrath and the novella Of Mice and Men . He wrote a total of twenty-seven books, including sixteen novels, six non-fiction books and five collections of short stories...
's
The Grapes of WrathThe Grapes of Wrath is a novel published in 1939 and written by John Steinbeck, who was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1940 and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1962. Set during the Great Depression, the novel focuses on a poor family of sharecroppers, the Joads, driven from their home by drought,...
. Springsteen has commented that he was first inspired by
John FordJohn Ford was an American film director of Irish heritage famous for both his westerns such as Stagecoach and The Searchers and adaptations of such classic 20th-century American novels as The Grapes of Wrath...
's film of the novel.
The album's release was followed by Springsteen's solo acoustic
Ghost of Tom Joad TourThe Ghost of Tom Joad Tour was a lengthy, worldwide concert tour featuring Bruce Springsteen performing alone on stage in small halls and theatres, that ran off and on from late 1995 through the middle of 1997. It followed the release of his 1995 album The Ghost of Tom Joad.-Itinerary:The tour...
.
Track listing
All songs were written by Bruce Springsteen.
- "The Ghost of Tom Joad" – 4:23
- "Straight Time" – 3:25
- "Highway 29" – 3:39
- "Youngstown" – 3:52
- "Sinaloa Cowboys" – 3:51
- "The Line" – 5:14
- "Balboa Park" – 3:19
- "Dry Lightning" – 3:30
- "The New Timer" – 5:45
- "Across the Border" – 5:24
- "Galveston Bay" – 5:04
- "My Best Was Never Good Enough" – 2:00
Personnel
- Bruce Springsteen
Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen , nicknamed "The Boss", is an American singer-songwriter. He records and tours with the E Street Band...
– bass, guitar, keyboards, harmonica, vocals, producer
- Danny Federici
Daniel Paul "Danny" Federici was an American musician, most known as the longtime organ, glockenspiel and accordion player for Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band.- Career :...
– accordion, keyboards
- Gary Mallaber
Gary Mallaber is a Los Angeles session drummer, percussionist and singer. He got his start playing drums in a band from Buffalo, New York, known as Raven....
– drums
- Garry Tallent
Garry Tallent , sometimes billed as Garry W. Tallent, is an American musician and record producer, best known for being the longtime bass player in Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band....
– bass
- Soozie Tyrell
Soozie Tyrell, born May 4 1957, formerly known as Soozie Kirschner, is an American violinist and singer, most known for her work with Bruce Springsteen in the E Street Band....
– violin, background vocals
- Patti Scialfa
Vivienne Patricia "Patti" Scialfa is an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist, best known for being a bandmate and wife of Bruce Springsteen.- Early life :...
– background vocals
- Toby Scott – engineer
- Greg Goldman – recording assistant
- Terry Magovern – research
- Sandra Choron – art direction
- Eric Dinyer – cover art
- Pam Springsteen – interior photographs
External links