Born in the U.S.A. wasn’t the album Bruce Springsteen wanted to make — here’s what he had in mind instead

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The music that most resonates with the audience won’t always be the music that most resonates with the artist, which would explain why Bruce Springsteen has surprising reservations about the most popular album in his discography. Strictly from a sales perspective, the 1984 album was certainly a whopping success.

From Springsteen’s perspective, it was simply an “album that he put out.” Not great, not terrible, but certainly not what he was intending to create when he first entered the studio.

Bruce Springsteen Was Never a Huge Fan Of His 1984 Hit

Becoming a highly successful commercial artist requires a musician to balance the complexities of appreciating what an album did for their career while also leaving space for their own critiques and regrets about the record in question. It’s a fine line to walk, which is something Bruce Springsteen learned in real time as he watched Born in the U.S.A. become increasingly more successful throughout the latter half of the 1980s. It was, for all intents and purposes, his first smash hit. After the album’s release, including seven singles and five music videos, Springsteen wasn’t just a New Jersey rock ‘n’ roller. Indeed, he was a bona fide international superstar with the best-selling album of 1985 under his belt, holding up a pair of faded blue jeans.

But the album’s chart performance didn’t necessarily reflect Springsteen’s feelings about the record. In a 2025 interview with Rolling Stone, Springsteen admitted, “[Born in the U.S.A. became the record I made, not necessarily the record that I was interested in making. I was interested in taking Nebraska and making a full record that had somewhat that same feeling. If you hear “My Hometown” and you hear “Born in the U.S.A.,” they were sort of the bookends I intended. The rest of the stuff was just what I had at the time. Those were the songs I wrote. Those were the songs I recorded.”

“From conception to execution, it was not necessarily the record that, in my mind, I had planned on,” Springsteen continued. “But that’s the way creativity works. You go in the studio. You have an idea. It’s not necessarily what you come out with. So, that was just the situation of that record for me personally.”

The Boss’ Mind Was Still Stuck On An Album From 1982

Bruce Springsteen’s most popular album, Born in the U.S.A., had all the makings for a commercial hit in the mid-1980s. With its synth-heavy production, driving rock beats, and a sense of patriotism (however misinterpreted) that spoke to a country smack dab in the middle of the Reagan presidency, it’s no wonder that the album performed so well. In addition to its title track, the record also featured fantastic singles like “Dancing in the Dark” and “I’m On Fire,” which remain beloved staples of Springsteen’s discography to this day.

But as the Boss explained in his 2025 interview with Rolling Stone, he had a different album in mind when it came time to record his 1984 smash success: Nebraska. This 1982 album was far more experimental and stripped back, which is to be expected, considering he recorded the album on a four-track recorder in his rural home of Colts Neck, New Jersey. The album feels dark, gritty, and personal—far from the clean polish of Born in the U.S.A. That stark contrast is where most of Springsteen’s reservations about the latter album lie.

“I suppose maybe I was looking for something darker,” he told Rolling Stone. “But outside of that, the themes of Nebraska are in there. In “Downbound Train,” they’re in there. They’re disguised somewhat into pop music.”