The Beatles Song Bruce Springsteen Said Was ‘a Rip-Off’
The Beatles’ steady rise to the top in England stood in contrast to their explosion of popularity in the United States. They went from unknown to the country’s most popular band virtually overnight. Their records flew off shelves. Young fans like Bruce Springsteen bought whatever Fab Four merchandise they could get their hands on. That included one Beatles song that Springsteen said was a rip-off that he listened to constantly anyway.
Bruce Springsteen said ‘My Bonnie’ was a ‘rip-off’ and ‘not great,’ but he listened to it anyway
The Boss was one of the millions of young music fans bowled over by The Beatles when they arrived in the U.S. in 1964. Those scores of fans helped the band place 64 songs in the Billboard top 100 between 1964 and 1970. Even the Fab Four’s self-professed lousy songs performed well in the U.S.
Springsteen fell hard for The Beatles when he first heard “I Want to Hold Your Hand” on the radio. As Craig Brown writes in 150 Glimpses of The Beatles, The Boss immediately scoured his local record store for a copy of the single.
He had to settle for “My Bonnie.” The tune was only tangentially a Fab Four record. They backed singer Tony Sheridan on the first single they played on in 1961. Springsteen said that particular Beatles song was a rip-off and not very good at all. Still, he preferred leaving the record store with some Fab Four music instead of none at all (per Brown).
“It was a rip-off. The Beatles backing some singer I’d never heard of. I bought it. And listened to it. It wasn’t great, but it was as close as I could get.”
Bruce Springsteen
Though buying “My Bonnie,” a traditional folk song spruced up to be a vaguely surf-rock sounding early rock ‘n’ roll tune, proved to be a rip-off, it didn’t sour The Beatles for Springsteen. He popped into the record store every day until he got his hands on a proper Fab Four album. He painted his aunt’s house to make enough money to buy a guitar.
“I searched the newsstands for every magazine with a photo I hadn’t seen, and I dreamed, dreamed, dreamed, that it was me,” Springsteen said (per Brown). “I didn’t want to meet the Beatles. I wanted to be the Beatles.”
Soon enough, he was on his way, and The Beatles helped him get there.
Springsteen developed his guitar playing by listening to The Beatles
Hearing “I Want to Hold Your Hand” ignited Springsteen’s passion for music. Hearing The Beatles back Sheridan on “My Bonnie” might not have been anything special, but it was enough to keep Springsteen’s dream of becoming a musician alive.
Soon enough, The Beatles were helping The Boss chart his course to stardom. The first rock song he learned to play was the Fab Four’s version of “Twist and Shout.”
“My Bonnie” proved to be a rip-off for Springsteen, but his first Beatles album, Meet The Beatles, showed him a glimpse of his own future. The four faces staring back, each one half hidden in shadow, seemed to beckon him to join them in the spotlight. The Boss didn’t see his own face on an album cover until nearly a decade later on 1973’s The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle. Still, continued inspiration from The Beatles, rip-off song and all, helped Springsteen stay on course long enough to become a star in his own right.
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