Personnel: Bruce Springsteen (vocals, guitar); Steve Van Zandt (guitar); Clarence Clemons (tenor saxophone); Roy Bittan (piano); Danny Federici (organ); Garry Tallent (bass); Max Weinberg (drums); Mark Volman, Howard Kaylan (background vocals).

Producers: Bruce Springsteen, Jon Landau, Steve Van Zandt.

All tracks have been digitally remastered.

Recorded at The Power Station, New York, New York.

Personnel: Bruce Springsteen (vocals, guitar, electric 12-string guitar, harmonica, piano); Steven Van Zandt (vocals, guitar); Clarence Clemons (vocals, saxophone, percussion, background vocals); Danny Federici (vocals, organ); Howard Kaylan, Mark Volman (vocals, background vocals); Steve VanZandt (guitar); Garry Tallent (horns); Roy Bittan (piano, organ, keyboards, background vocals); Max Weinberg (drums).

Audio Mixers: Chuck Plotkin; Toby Scott; Bob Clearmountain.

Recording information: The Power Station, New York, NY.

Photographers: Amanda Flick; Frank Stefanko; David Gahr; Jimmy Wachtel; Barry Goldenberg; Joel Bernstein.

Imbedded within the double-disc running time of The River is a single-disc album that follows up on the themes and sound of Darkness on the Edge of Town -- wide-screen, midtempo rock and stories of the disillusionment of working-class life and the conflicts within families. In these songs, which include the title track, "Independence Day," and "Point Blank," Bruce Springsteen's world-view is just as dire as it had become on Darkness, but less judgmental. "Independence Day," for example, is a father-and-son ballad that has little of the anger of its hard rock counterpart on Darkness, "Adam Raised a Cain." Springsteen's heroes again seek to overcome their crushing troubles through defiance and by driving around, and though "The River" repeats the soured love theme of "Racing in the Street," he also posits romance as a possible escape, sometimes combining it with one of the other solutions, as on the eight-plus-minute "Drive All Night." But there is also another album lurking within The River, and it is a more lighthearted pop/rock collection of short, sometimes humorous songs like "Sherry Darling" and "I'm a Rocker." At times Springsteen combines elements of the two, as on "Out in the Street," perhaps the album's quintessential song, a catchy, uptempo number that sounds like something from the early '60s and echoes the theme of the Vogues' 1966 hit "Five O'Clock World." "Hungry Heart," which became Springsteen's first Top Ten hit, combines a rollicking musical track with a more sober lyrical theme that emphasizes longing over disappointment. But a better guide to Springsteen's development are the songs "Stolen Car" and the album-closing "Wreck on the Highway," gentle, moody ballads imbued with a sense of hopelessness that anticipate his next record, Nebraska. ~ William Ruhlmann

Only Springsteen could have got away with releasing a double album with 19 tracks of what was basically the same song. Such was his standing that he did, and it worked like a dream. Almost all the tracks hit you in the stomach, with burning saxophone from Clarence Clemons and piercing wurlitzer organ. Bruce, meanwhile, sings of cars and girls and girls and cars, but at no stage does he forget that this is rock 'n' roll. With this release Springsteen completed a rite of passage. Described as the "new Dylan" early in his career, the singer proved this tag a fallacy, drawing on Dansette pop - Phil Spector, Gary US Bonds, Mitch Ryder - rather than the folk tradition. The singer articulated the dilemmas of America's blue-collar workforce, encapsulating a generation trapped in a post-60s malaise. He does so with sumptuous melodies which draw in, rather than confront, the listener and show Springsteen not just as a magnetic showman, but as a pensive, literate songwriter.

Rolling Stone - Ranked #86 in Rolling Stone's "100 Greatest Albums Of The Eighties" survey (November 1989).

Q (12/94, p.170) - 3 Stars - Good - "...may yet prove to be the greatest evocation of Springsteen's vision, laden as equally with childhood memories and first sex as with life's current disillusions and stale sex....[the title track is] impossibly beautiful..."

CMJ (11/15/99, p.24) - "...THE RIVER's got cars, girls, sex, unemployment and alcohol; when you've got a hot band behind you, making all that stuff resonate, well, brother, that's called rock'n'roll."