https://rollingstone.com.br/cinema/jeremy-strong-nao-acho-que-o-algoritmo-seja-amigo-do-artista/

We are on a sunny autumn afternoon in The Stone Ponyin Asbury Park, New Jersey. In the bar’s parking lot there was still the structure that housed the Summer Stage 2025the festival that takes place during the summer and that amplifies the voice of this temple that has been, for 51 years, a safe territory for independent music and that has the reputation of being the mailing address of Bruce Springsteen — where he played surprise gigs. This mystery of his appearance haunts the environment. The t-shirt with the words “I Heard Bruce Must Show Up” (“I heard that the bruce must appear”) is a mandatory item in the surrounding area and illustrates the fame of the most famous working class superhero in the region.

We arrived in the fall for interviews about the film Springsteen: Save Me From the Unknownfrom Scott Cooperbased on the book Deliver Me From Nowherefrom Warren Zanes — published in 2023 and now reissued with a final chapter on the details that transformed this writing into a screenplay. The concert hall is one of the locations and today is only open to the press, it houses foreign journalists who will be introduced to the details of the feature film that investigates the creation of Nebraska1982 album by The Boss — which brings a minimalist and raw sound produced in his room — which gives vent to ghosts from his life — and the observation of others — which he transformed into poetic prose, lyrics and melodies so cinematographically possible that they could only result in a manifesto to read or see — exactly as it happened.

The known fact is that, at the time, the artist isolated himself in Colts Neck, near his hometown of Freehold, to record demos for his upcoming work with the E Street Band and, instead, recorded an intimate tracklist of 10 songs anchored in his compositions and voice, and recorded on a four-channel cassette recorder. What was later learned about this work is that, post-tour The Riverfound himself a few steps away from superstardom that culminated in high expectations from his record company, Columbia Recordswaiting for more and more hits. Isolated, crossed by familiar marks and dealing with the effects of depression — which he later admitted — he produced a portrait of torment based on references such as the film No Man’s Land (1973), from Terrence Malickthe band’s eponymous debut album suicide (1977), the savage odyssey of murders caused by serial killers Charles Starkweather and Curry Ann Fugate — young people who lost their innocence to delinquency and true crime between 1957 and 58 — and the stories of Flannery O’Connor, master of literature and author of the maxim “a serious writer always uses a flaw in human nature as his starting point”.

It is known that the musician began to read O’Connor almost 30 years old and this influenced his musicality; in the review of Darkness on the Edge of Town, Paul Nelson explained this approach in the article “Springsteen Fever” for the Rolling Stone (July 1978) when he writes: “Many of the characters in his songs seem to be trapped in a state of despair so intense that they must either break through to something better—or at least ambiguous—or succumb to madness, murder, or something even worse.”

Four years later we have Nebraskapost-The River and pre-Born in the USA. Initially it would be called Starkweatheras we understand from his biographer — “a forensically researched story about this record of Bruce Springsteen what Zanes calls it ‘the biggest comeback ever made by someone who was at the top of the charts’”, according to a report in the British newspaper The Guardian — and his filmmaker — “wanted a profound portrait, but epic in its emotional range”, he confessed Cooper who is also the screenwriter of the work. The actor Jeremy Allen Whitewho lives the The Boss on the big screen, I was also a fan and saw in the song “Reason to Believe” a ray of hope. “Then he told me that she was the most hopeless of all. I think this record is about loneliness and darkness. Something I’m familiar with,” he said.

The city without the hustle and bustle and heat of the beach is a mix of spaces (that seem) empty and wooden houses inhabited as if straight out of decorating realities. In the streets, a parked hearse announces the Ghost Tours of Paranormal Museum while we also came across collections of healing stones and crystals for sale as souvenirs. This not so esoteric environment also breathes the coast with a sharp wind that even the seagulls lose their balance. We left the The Asburya building that was a home for the elderly belonging to the Salvation Army in 1956, it ended up abandoned in the mid-2000s and, since 2016, it has been converted into a boutique hotel reimagined by the architectural firm Stonehill Taylor. There, the industrial appearance of the exposed brick building brings an air of encounter with its collective environments with a pool table and sofas that encourage reading — with table books like “Rolling Stone – 50 Years” or “500 Greatest Albums of All Time” (Nebraska occupies position 150), as well as a wall-shelf of vinyls and cassettes that invite you to listen — a sign calls for a “date with a record” as part of the experience. Attached to the hotel is Transparent Galleryfrom Danny Clinchwhere Tina Kerekes reminds us of part of the career of bruce framed in a photo gallery. “See how happy he is”, she comments when showing recordings of the star during live performances among his followers.

We got into a car to head to the The Robinson Ale Housewhere we will find Jeremy Strongthe Kendall Roy from the series Successionwho now personifies the manager Jon Landau. The conversation takes place on the balcony — he overlooks the sea, I faces the facade of the Convention Hall, a beacon of entertainment, a mix of a gallery and local restaurants — where the pop up is located Springsteen Archives — and concert hall. THE Kiss played there in 1975 during the “Dressed to Kill Tour” (the poster still appears on the walls five decades later) and bruce I also used it for rehearsals. The interview took place on September 30th, exactly the same day that, 43 years earlier, The Boss launched Nebraska. He tells me that he was in college when he was impacted by the work. “It’s one of those albums that chills you to the bone”, he recalls. I question a line in which his character comments on fans’ preference for artistic “moments” — a premonitory sentence from the 1980s that is now the music industry’s current rule for creating singles, virals, dance breaks, visuals and lyric videos from single releases made available faster than understanding and almost as fast as the acceleration of our hyper-stimulated waiting.

“In this case, this album couldn’t be more analog — he recorded it with shitty equipment, in his own bed, but what mattered there was the level of honesty. I like that this film is being released in a world that has become increasingly synthetic and artificial. It’s like bringing real sound [o longa em si] surrounded by a lot of noise. Much of technological progress is, in some ways, unethical and even hostile if we think about what it takes to make art. I don’t think the algorithm is the artist’s friend”, comments a shy Jeremy Strong, known for his deep dive into the texts and subtexts of his characters and discreet in a dark green look and white t-shirt that contrasts with the blue of the Jersey Shore.

Not far from there is the Unwind Records and Comicsdividing the Asbury Park Boardwalk with ice cream, clothes and the medium Madam Marieand also full of relics more definitive than the instant (such as the book of Daniel Johnstonthe disk Buckingham Nicksfrom 1973, and stills from the scene Eraserheadfrom David Lynch1977). The owner, the collector Aaron Hochmantells us that the city breathes punk, but that Springsteen is a kind of bait for tourists, while commenting on his predilection for Tropicália – he takes the vinyl off the shelf fuckfrom Caetano Velosoand remembers that he learned about the Brazilian movement from the single of the same name by Beck (from disk Mutations1998). I turn again to Strongwhich he transferred to the screen Jon Landaustaunch music critic with texts already present in edition number 01 of Rolling Stone Magazinefrom November 1967, when he analyzed Are You Experiencedfrom Jimi Hendrixstating that “his lyrics were banal and his compositional ability was very bad”. He also wrote the 1974 review that said “I saw the past of rock before my eyes. I saw the future of rock and roll and its name is Bruce Springsteen”, published in the newspaper The Real Paper. We return to Stone Pony and receive the new edition of the book by Zanes. Out of nowhere, a black car arrives at the yard and leaves. bruce.

He really showed up.

See this photo on Instagram

A post shared by Rolling Stone Brasil (@rollingstonebrasil)

• interview

• jeremy strong

• Springsteen: Save Me From the Unknown