Bruce SpringsteenNebraska

Bleak, hushed, and haunted: just Springsteen, an acoustic guitar, and a harmonica, taped alone on a four-track in his New Jersey bedroom over the winter of 1981. He meant these as demos. The ghostly hiss and tape echo were the record. The title track rides shotgun with Charles Starkweather to the electric chair, flat and chilling; "Atlantic City" turns desperation into one of his most quietly devastating melodies ("everything dies, baby, that's a fact"); and "Highway Patrolman" is a slow novel of two brothers on opposite sides of the law. No E Street Band, no anthems, no escape. The loneliest, most fearless record he ever made. Drop the needle and sit with the dark.