JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD

Album version

One night in a motel room
Eyes cast like steel
I drank the wine that they left on my table
I knew the morning was too far

I smoked my last cigarette
Stay only to defy
The night was dark and the land is cold
I was frozen right to the bone

Just like fire would, I burn
Just like fire would
Just like fire would, I burned up

Five hundred miles I've gone today
And tomorrow's five hundred more
Outside my window the world passes by
It's stranger than a dream

Just like fire would, I burn
Just like fire would
Just like fire would, I burned up

I go to work and I earn my pay load
My sweat falls to the ground
I see you now but we may never meet again, child
The ice is hanging on the door

One night in a motel room
Eyes cast like steel
I drank the wine that they left on my table
I knew the morning was too far

Just like fire would, I burn
Just like fire would
Just like fire would, I burned up

Just like fire would, I burn
Just like fire would
Just like fire would, I burned up

Come on!

Info

JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD is a 1986 song by The Saints. See the original The Saints version for more details.

Bruce Springsteen released JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD on his 2014 album High Hopes. The above lyrics are for Bruce Springsteen's album version of JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD as released on High Hopes.

Studio Recording

In a December 2013 interview for Rolling Stone, Bruce Springsteen told Andy Greene that The Saints' JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD is a song that he had on his radar for 20 years or so and that he always liked.

JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD was recorded in studio in March 2013 during the Australian leg of the Wrecking Ball Tour. Along with HIGH HOPES, the song was cut at Studios 301 in Byron Bay (a town 165 kilometres south of Brisbane) and Sydney in Australia, with the E Street Band and featuring Tom Morello on guitar. Morello, who was in Brisbane, recorded his part at the studio's Byron Bay complex while the rest of the band recorded together at the studio's Sydney complex. This happened in one day, though some parts were added or re-recorded later.

The recording sessions in Australia were spontaneous. The band was there and so was Brendan O'Brien's engineer Nick DiDia who had moved to Australia, "so they just decided to cut a couple songs," Rom Aniello told Andy Greene in a December 2013 interview for Rolling Stone. "I was listening in online. I wasn't part of the tracking session."

The album version of JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD was produced by Ron Aniello with Bruce Springsteen. The performing musicians line-up on the track is:

• Bruce Springsteen (vocal, guitar)
• Roy Bittan (piano)
• Nils Lofgren (guitar)
• Garry Tallent (bass)
• Max Weinberg (drums)
• Steven Van Zandt (backing vocals)
• Patti Scialifa (backing vocals)
• Tom Morello (guitar)
• Charles Giordano (organ)
• Ron Aniello (12-string guitar)
• Everett Bradley (percussion, backing vocals)
• Jake Clemons (horns)
• Barry Danielian (horns)
• Clark Gayton (horns)
• Ed Manion (horns)
• Curt Ramm (horns)
• Jeff Kievit (piccolo trumpet)
• Curtis King (backing vocals)
• Cindy Mizelle (backing vocals)
• Michelle Moore (backing vocals)
• Rob Mathes (New York Chamber Consort — string arrangement and conductor)
• Lisa Kim (New York Chamber Consort — concertmaster, violin)
• Quan Ge (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Hyunju Lee (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Jessica Lee (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Ann Lehman (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Joanna Mauer (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Suzanne Ornstein (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Annaliesa Place (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• David Southorn (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Jeanine Wynton (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Sharon Yamada (New York Chamber Consort — violin)
• Maurycy Banaszek (New York Chamber Consort — viola)
• Desiree Elsevier (New York Chamber Consort — viola)
• Shmuel Katz (New York Chamber Consort — viola)
• Robert Rinehart (New York Chamber Consort — viola)
• Maria Kitsopoulos (New York Chamber Consort — cello)
• Alan Stepansky (New York Chamber Consort — cello)
• Ru Pei Yeh (New York Chamber Consort — cello)

Single Release

JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD was released as a single on 22 Jan 2014. It was issued on CD-R for promotional purposes in Europe.

Bruce Springsteen -- Just Like Fire Would

CD-R single - Columbia (no catalog number) - UK, 2014

1-track promotional CD-R, comes in a clear plastic sleeve with title inlay.

01- JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD

Bruce Springsteen -- Just Like Fire Would

CD-R single - Sony Music (no catalog number) - Holland, 2014

1-track promotional CD-R, comes in a slimline jewel case with picture insert.

01- JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD

High Hopes

High Hopes is Bruce Springsteen's eighteenth studio album. It was officially released on 14 Jan 2014 on Columbia Records. It consists of 12 tracks and clocks at 56:24. Four songs were previously released in different versions (two of which are covers), two more were previously performed live but never released, and the remaining six are new to fans (one of which is a cover). "This is music I always felt needed to be released," Springsteen wrote in the album's liner notes.

In a December 2013 interview for Rolling Stone, Springsteen told Andy Greene that he has always written and recorded significantly more songs than can fit on to whatever album he's creating at the moment. "I have a lot of this music on a computer," he said. "I bring it out on the road to amuse myself. Very often, if I have nothing to do late at night I'll bring it up and look at different bodies of music." The songs that began catching Springsteen's attention were largely recorded after he reunited with the E Street Band in 1999. "The songs were relatively current and had a similar sound picture," he said. "I was interested in putting this material together in some form because it sounded like it all fit together... You have to imagine that when I'm home or done with a tour I go into a studio and I'm surrounded by paintings that I've sorta half-finished. There might be something wrong with this one and I didn't have time to finish this one. When I go into my studio, I'm surrounded by all my music that I haven't released. I wait to see what's going to speak to me." But then they cut a few sessions in 2013 while on tour. "I said, 'Well, these sound good,'" Springsteen told Rolling Stone. "These things blend together. Suddenly, it began to feel very fresh and fit together quite well."

Work on the album started in late 2012 when Springsteen called producer Ron Aniello asking him to work on some demos that he was thinking about releasing. "I remember that Bruce called me on my birthday, so it was December 9th, 2012", Aniello told Andy Greene in a December 2013 interview for Rolling Stone. "He said to me, 'I have some songs. I want to get together.'" According to Aniello, these were old demos that Springsteen had done with Toby Scott and that had been around for a while. Springsteen told him that he wanted to get these songs in shape and see what comes out of that. Aniello was not able to sit with Springsteen to sort it all out because Springsteen was away most of the time touring with the E Street Band. "It all happened in a very unusual manner," Aniello told Rolling Stone. "There was a lot of conversations in Europe and I did some of the recording via iChat when the band was in Australia."

In a January 2014 interview for Rolling Stone, Tom Morello told Andy Greene that he wasn't aware that there was ever talk of a new studio album when they sent him a couple of songs to add guitar on. He did that in his home studio and shortly after he was recording in studio with Max Weinberg and Ron Aniello. "But these studio sessions just kept occurring without any formal notion of what we were doing," Morello recounted. "My assumption was just that 'Bruce is always recording music.' So it was fantastic that I was asked to be a part of it. I was psyched." In March 2013 Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band performed ten shows in Australia as part of the Wrecking Ball Tour. Steven Van Zandt was off filming his television series Lillyhammer and was replaced by Morello for that leg of the tour. Morello suggested to add HIGH HOPES to the live set. They worked it up during the rehearsals prior to the Australian shows and Morello then "proceeded to burn the house down with it," as Springsteen said. They then re-cut the song along with JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD at Studios 301, Australia's largest studio complex. "Tom and his guitar became my muse, pushing the rest of this project to another level," Springsteen said. He told Rolling Stone's David Fricke, "We've never had a recording session during a tour in our lives. We did a couple of things that I wanted to put down. So that was very exciting. And being with Tommy was exciting. The band — Steven, Nils, all those guys — continues to be a source of inspiration for me." Morello told Rolling Stone that he didn't get the notion that this was "coalescing into what was going to be a major release" until they were in Australia.

No less than sixteen recording studios were used in the making of High Hopes: Thrill Hill Recording (Springsteen's home studio in Colts Neck, NJ), Stone Hill Studio (Springsteen's new home studio in Colts Neck, NJ), Very Loud House (in Los Angeles, CA), Renegade Studio (in New York City, NY), Veritas Studio (in Los Angeles, CA), Southern Tracks (Atlanta, GA), East West Studios (in Los Angeles, CA), NRG Studios (in Los Angeles, CA), Village Studios (in Los Angeles, CA), Studios 301 (in Byron Bay and Sydney, Australia), Record Plant (in Los Angeles, CA), Electric Lady Studios (in New York City, NY), Avatar Studios (in New York City, NY), Sear Sound (in New York City, NY), and Berkeley Street Studio (in Santa Monica, CA).

Ron Aniello revealed that at least 20 tracks were recorded for the album. Among the tracks that didn't make the album cut were COLD SPOT, HEY BLUE EYES, AMERICAN BEAUTY, and MARY MARY.

The album was produced by Bruce Springsteen, Brendan O'Brien, and Ron Aniello. It features all E Street Band members, including the late Clarence Clemons and the late Danny Federici on several songs of what Springsteen calls "some of our best unreleased material from the past decade." The album also features an ensemble of guest artists, including Tom Morello who's featured prominently on the album, appearing on eight tracks.

Bruce Springsteen -- High Hopes

High Hopes is available in three configurations: standard CD edition, limited edition, and double-disc LP. The limited edition consists of the standard audio CD and includes a bonus live DVD of Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band performing the entire Born In The U.S.A. album on 30 Jun 2013 at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London, England, during the Wrecking Ball Tour. The double-disc LP is pressed on 180-gram vinyl and includes a CD version of the album.

High Hopes track list:

1. HIGH HOPES
2. HARRY'S PLACE
3. AMERICAN SKIN (41 SHOTS)
4. JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD
5. DOWN IN THE HOLE
6. HEAVEN'S WALL
7. FRANKIE FELL IN LOVE
8. THIS IS YOUR SWORD
9. HUNTER OF INVISIBLE GAME
10. THE GHOST OF TOM JOAD
11. THE WALL
12. DREAM BABY DREAM

High Hopes was officially announced on 25 Nov 2013 and the release date was set for 14 Jan 2014, but on 28 Dec 2013 it became available for purchase as individual tracks in MP3 format through Amazon.com's mobile application. Although Amazon quickly removed the files, presumably recognizing its mistake, the album had already made its way onto file-sharing websites.

The album topped the charts in 20 countries, including the United States and the UK. It was Springsteen's eleventh #1 album in the US, placing him third all-time for most #1 albums only behind The Beatles and Jay-Z. It was his tenth #1 in the UK, putting him joint fifth all-time and level with The Rolling Stones and U2.

Music Video

A music video for JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD was posted on 22 Jan 2014, simultaneously with the single release, on both Bruce Springsteen's official website and Bruce Springsteen's VEVO YouTube channel. It was filmed on 13 Jan 2014 at SIR Studios in New York City, NY, during Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's closed rehearsal prior to their appearance on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon the following day. The audio is dubbed from the album version. The video was also included on the Japanese Singles Collection -Greatest Hits- compilation album.

Japanese Singles Collection -Greatest Hits-

Japanese Singles Collection -Greatest Hits- is a Bruce Springsteen compilation album released by Sony Music Japan in 2023. The compilation, which was exclusively released in Japan, consists of previously released 35 audio tracks and 62 video tracks. The collection is part of a 26-title reissue campaign to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Bruce Springsteen's debut album. The series, issued in three waves (25 Oct 2023, 22 Nov 2023, and 20 Dec 2023), includes 25 albums originally released between 1973 and 2014 plus a new compilation album that includes all of Springsteen's singles released in Japan from 1975 to 1999. All audio CD's were manufactured using Sony Japan's Blu-spec CD2 format.

Bruce Springsteen -- Japanese Singles Collection -Greatest Hits-

Live History: on-tour

JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD was performed once during the Wrecking Ball Tour (133 dates, March 2012 to September 2013), on 14 Mar 2013 in Brisbane, Australia. See the live 14 Mar 2013 version.

JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD was performed 16 times during the High Hopes Tour (34 dates, January to May 2014). The song was played in its album arrangement.

Live History: off-tour

JUST LIKE FIRE WOULD was performed off-tour on 14 Jan 2014 at Rockefeller Center in New York City, NY, during a TV appearance on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon. The song was played in its album arrangement, with the E Street Band and Tom Morello. See the live 14 Jan 2014 version for more details.

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Available Versions

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Page last updated: 19 May 2014