Bruce Springsteen "Born In The U.S.A. (Single & Video)"

"Born in the U.S.A." is a 1984 song written and performed by Bruce Springsteen, and released on the album of the same name. One of Springsteen's best-known singles, Rolling Stone ranked the song 275th on their list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time", and in 2001, the RIAA's Songs of the Century placed the song 59th (out of 365). The song addresses the harmful effects of the Vietnam War on Americans and the treatment of Vietnam veterans upon their return home. It is an ironic retort to the indifference and hostility with which Vietnam veterans were met.

This song was written in 1981 as the title song for a film that Paul Schrader was contemplating making and that Springsteen was considering starring in (Light of Day starring Michael J. Fox).  Springsteen thanks Schrader in the liner notes of the album "Born in the U.S.A.".

Casual home demos were made later that year, following the completion of The River Tour. A more formal solo acoustic guitar demo was made on January 3, 1982 at Springsteen's home in Colts Neck, New Jersey during the long session that constituted most of the Nebraska album released later that year. Acoustic versions of several other songs that eventually appeared on the Born in the U.S.A. album were also on this demo, including "Working on the Highway" and "Downbound Train". However, Springsteen manager/producer Jon Landau and others felt that the song did not have the right melody or music to match the lyrics, and also did not fit in well with the rest of the nascent Nebraska material. As a result, the song was shelved. (This version surfaced in the late 1990s on the Tracks and 18 Tracks outtake collections.)

In March 1982, Springsteen revived the song with a different melody line and musical structure. A full E Street Band version was recorded, with much of the arrangement made up on the spot, including Roy Bittan's opening synthesizer riff and what producer Chuck Plotkin nicknamed Max Weinberg's "exploding drums". The famous snare drum sound on this record, notable for its gated reverb, was obtained by engineer Toby Scott running the top snare microphone through a broken reverb plate with a fixed four-second decay and into a Kepex noise gate. This is the version that appeared on the Born in the U.S.A. album, a full two years later. The studio recording also originally ended with a lengthy jam session, which was later edited for the song's commercial release.


In a 1986 speaking engagement at the University of Georgia, Max Weinberg (drummer for the E Street Band) stated that "Born in the U.S.A." was his all-time favorite song that the band had recorded. Later, in a separate question and answer session, Weinberg explained that it was his favorite because the song was not written in advance for the various instrumental parts. After a grueling studio session while members of the band were in the booth at the sound board, one member of the band at a time returned to the recording area joining in to make up their own new parts to the song that had been intended as an acoustic guitar-only song. Even Springsteen came out and started singing vocals. It sounded so good that they did it again and recorded it. Without reviewing the recording, Springsteen said, let's do that one more time. So they recorded the second take (or the third time the unwritten version had ever been played). That second studio take was the CD release on the Born in the U.S.A. album.

The music video for "Born in the U.S.A." was directed by noted filmmaker John Sayles. It consisted of video concert footage of Springsteen and the E Street Band performing the song, poorly synchronized with audio from the studio recording. Released on November 28, 1984, there supposedly had not been enough time to mix the audio from the concert.


This footage was intermixed with compelling mid-1980s scenes of working-class America, emphasizing images that had some connection with the song, including Vietnam veterans, Amerasian children, assembly lines, oil refineries, cemeteries, and the like, finishing with a recreation of the album's cover, with a grizzled Springsteen posing in front of an American flag.