I'LL STAND BY YOU ALWAYS^©

Lyrics not available

Page last updated: 02 Sep 2007

Bruce copyrighted this song with the Library Of Congress on 13 Jun 2001. All the other songs Bruce copyrighted at the Library Of Congress in 2001 and 2002 were issued on The Rising album, so there is a very high possibility that this was recorded for that album but was left in the vaults.

According to Billboard, this song was written by Bruce Springsteen for his son, but was given to the Latin star Marc Anthony for his album Mended (2002), because The Boss believed he was the right singer for the song. "I thought it was very, very generous of him," Anthony told Billboard. "And I think it's the ultimate compliment, when someone like that thinks you're worthy of singing a song he wrote for his son". The release date of Mended was pushed back 4 months (Jan 2002 to May 2002) to fine-tune the tracklist, and I'LL STAND BY YOU ALWAYS was then removed from the released version of the album.

The song remains unreleased, and unfortunately, the lyrics were never revealed.

Thanks FFDan for bringing this song to my attention.

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Notes from Brucebase:

A mysterious history. A ballad written by Springsteen sometime between 1998 and 2000 and inspired by Bruce's reading of Harry Potter books to his youngest son Sam. This is not a children's song however. Sometime in early 2001 Bruce made the song available to director Chris Columbus, who at the time was shooting the first of the Potter movies. A Springsteen recording of the song was filed with the US Copyright Office on 13 Jun 2001. However, the Springsteen song was ultimately rejected due to Harry Potter novelist/creator JK Rowling's contractual stipulation that no commercial songs of any type be used in the Potter film series, Warner Bros Music President Gary Lemel, who was involved in the Potter music, was asked by USA Today about this Springsteen song but said he preferred not to comment publicly – but in doing so seemingly verified the basic truth in the story. In September or October 2001 Springsteen donated the song to fellow Sony artist (and Latin/Salsa star) Marc Anthony, who recorded a cover version. In late 2001 both Sony and Anthony issued press releases specifically promoting the Springsteen composition and mentioning it would be one of the tracks on Anthony's forthcoming album Mended (and likely the lead single off the album). Strangely, when the Mended album was finally released in Apr 2002, the song was not on the album, nor was it issued as a single. A later special edition of the Mended album with bonus tracks also didn't include the song. There has been no explanation as to why the Springsteen composition was not issued.