Racing in The Street - Themes and Interpretations

Themes and Interpretations

Springsteen has said that this song commemorates the racing in the street that occurred on a little fire road outside his home base of Asbury Park, New Jersey. But the song is one of a number of Springsteen songs from the 1970s, such as "Born to Run" and "Thunder Road", that celebrate American men's desire for freedom from responsibility, as symbolized by the ability to drive to freedom in a fast car. The protagonist of "Racing in the Street" can be contrasted with the protagonist of Tracy Chapman's "Fast Car". The protagonist of "Racing in the Street" using his fast car as a means to escape the city and responsibility, while the protagonist of "Fast Car" is using her fast car to approach the city and responsibility.

In any case, the song plays off the American love of muscle cars during the late 1960s and into the 1970s. Indeed, automotive enthusiasts have debated whether 1969 Chevrolet models could be ordered, customized, or built to the exact specifications given in the song of a 396-cubic-inch Chevrolet big-block engine with fuel injection and Hurst Performance transmission.

Another interpretation of the song is that it is a possible realization of the potential inherent in "Thunder Road". That song is a declaration of what the protagonist and his girlfriend are going to do; "Racing in the Street" is the reality of how they might end up. Most importantly, "Racing in the Street" is the first song in which Springsteen introduces the suffering woman. Rock has always had songs where women are won and lost as trophies in contests, but Springsteen treats that theme with much more compassion than usual in the genre. This perspective is amplified by writer Jeffrey B. Symynkywicz, who sees the romantic attachment formed in the story removing the protagonist from his perfectly constructed world of cars built to personal specification and no external commitments. Springsteen paints "a harrowing portrait of the toll depression takes" on the woman, but the protagonist is at least mature enough to realize he has to augment the challenges he takes on the street with the role of not letting the woman face her demons alone. While romanticization of the ordinary, anonymous Americans found in "Racing in the Street" is common in rock, Springsteen's detailed depiction of them in this song shows real understanding and compassion, perhaps due to his having lived among them.

Writer Greil Marcus sees "Racing in the Street" as picking up the characters of various Beach Boys songs fifteen years later in their lives, never finding anywhere else the freedom they found in their cars and driving forever towards a dead end that they could see but not wish away or reach. Rolling Stone's David Fricke echoes this view, saying it is "Springsteen's grim Darkness portrait of a generation racing to a dead end." Both the album's title track "Darkness on the Edge of Town" and "Racing in the Street", which is similarly set physically and which close the two album sides, are influenced by film noir, which further set the mood of the record. Writer Eric Alterman sees "Racing in the Street" as one of Springsteen's top-flight songs, and one of several on the Darkness album that helped establish its low-on-hype integrity and power, and thus cemented Springsteen's relationship with his fan base.

William Gibson, "noir prophet" of the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction, said in 2010 that "Racing in the Streets" had everything to do with the hacker Bobby Quine from Gibson's 1982 short story "Burning Chrome" and what he did for a living.

Springsteen biographer Dave Marsh has called the song "the line of demarcation separating casual Springsteen fans from the fanatics," with the former considering it yet another sign of Springsteen's car metaphor obsession taken to an extreme, while the latter consider it "maybe the best thing Springsteen has to give." Detractors have also referred to the song as plodding, especially in comparison to the dynamicism of the prior Born to Run album. In any case, the people in "Racing in the Street" are part of the central thematic development of Springsteen's cast of characters from Born to Run to Nebraska and beyond.

Springsteen has called "Racing in the Street" one of his favorite songs. The song has been highly praised by other artists, including Bob Dylan. It was disc jockey Richard Neer's favorite Springsteen song, and when famed New York station WNEW-FM finally gave up on its rock format in 1999, "Racing in the Street" was the last song Neer played.