586 - Bruce Springsteen Incident On 57th Street 1973

"Incident on 57th Street," is a virtual mini-opera about Johnny, a "romantic young boy" torn between Jane and the bright knives out on the street. Springsteen never resolves the conflict (if he ever does his music will probably become less interesting). Instead he milks it for all it's worth, wrapping up all the song's movements and juxtapositions with his unabashedly melodramatic and loonily sotted Sloppy Joe voice.

Spanish Johnny drove in from the underworld last night
With bruised arms and broken rhythm in a beat-up old BuickBut
dressed just like dynamite
He tried sellin' his heart to the hard girls over on Easy Street
But they sighed

"Johnny it falls apart so easy and
you know hearts these days are cheap"