The Wrestler by Bruce Springsteen

“The Wrestler” music video
“The Wrestler” live performance clip

The stage lights suddenly shut off and I heard a wash of synthesized strings, slowly moving through a four-chords pattern drifting over the audience. Standing up on the third level of the United Center, I looked out over the audience and felt a sense of relaxation fill the arena.

The synthesized strings surrounded me like a summer breeze, comforting in its warmth but fleeting in its presence. Slowly a spot light slowly opened up to reveal Bruce Springsteen standing behind a microphone, head down in contemplation. He rose his head up slowly looking out at the audience with as if he was looking into a mirror deep into his own eyes. He approached the microphone and slowly counted, “1, 2, 3, 4.”

Springsteen’s voice cut through the wash of sound like reality pushing its way into a dream. As he counted to four, a single acoustic guitar entered strumming solemnly bringing us into ourselves, changing our glances from the heavens above to the earth below.

Up until this point in the concert, Springsteen was throwing a party. The most optimistic of the five times I’ve seen Springsteen live, this concert was a celebration of hope, optimism and the American dream. Springsteen and The E Street Band started the concert with “Badlands,” a tribute to resilience. He worked his way through songs that spanned his entire career, it was after “The Promised Land,” one of my favorite Springsteen songs that the lights shut off, and the introduction to “The Wrestler” began.

Springsteen has spent his career composing and performing songs about people who have difficult lives. However, there is something different about “The Wrestler.” It’s not a song like “Promised Land” which describes a person in bad situation but is resilient in facing challenges. Describing “The Wrestler” as a song about a man who is depressed isn’t really what this song is about either.

Springsteen wrote “The Wrestler,” for the critically acclaimed film of the same title, which was touted as the “resurrection of Mickey Rourke.” The Wrestler is as good as everyone says it is. I have only seen a couple films in which the actors become their characters so convincingly and so completely. The plot of the film follows Randy “The Ram” Robinson, a washed out professional wrestler. The character of Randy has fallen on hard times and because of injuries has to stop wrestling. Randy feels drawn to go back to wrestling as his only human connection. It’s a place where he feels alive in a world that seems to keep pushing him.

Springsteen utilizes questions to expresses the feeling of the narrator. Like Bob Dylan’s use of questions in “Blowing in the Wind,” Springsteen asks us if we’ve seen things that most of us can only imagine. This draws us deeper within ourselves as our own imagination takes us into the depths of our hearts.

The opening line “have you ever seen a one trick pony in a field so happy and free?” takes the phrase “one trick pony” which is used to describe a person who can only do one thing well and combines it with the literal meaning of a pony. Within this line, we understand the sadness but also the feeling of bliss that animals get when they are free.

The chorus enforces the response in the verses stating that if you’ve seen that, then we have seen the narrator. Each line “then you’ve seen me” is followed by a declaration. He is a man who stands at every door, always leaves with less and can make you smile, but only through his pain. When he wonders, “can you ask for anything more?” he asking us if there is anything more in life that is important. In a way, it is these consistencies that bring him solace with is true in all of our lives.

He takes full responsibility his life in the bridge. He pushes away what he the comforts, the people, in his life, which he accepts That is what is so poignant about these statements. His words touches us as we all struggle to accept ourselves throughout our lives.

Faith is something that we have in things that are beyond understanding, inspired by intangibles that touch our souls. The wrestler’s faith in his body which reflects a darkness.

Springsteen invites us to questions the choices in our lives, the constants that bring us comfort and the faith that brings us hope. To call “The Wrestler” depressing would oversimplify what is meaningful about this song. This song is is indescribably, spiritual and personal.

As Springsteen sang through “The Wrestler,” last night and reached the climax of the bridge, I was overcome by a sense of belief. And for a moment, my soul was overcome by truth, faith, hope and love.

Tell me, friend can you ask for anything more?