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For more than 35 years, Bruce Springsteen has set a standard of consistent excellence that few other rock and roll artists could ever hope to match. He has written so many great songs, as both a solo artist and with the E Street Band, that it would seem almost impossible to try and rank those classics one against another. And yet one fan was daring enough, or maybe foolhardy enough, to try. Following up our Beatles and Stones countdowns, JamsBio presents “No Retreat, No Surrender,” a worst-to-first countdown of every album cut in Springsteen history, plus a few choice outtakes, live classics, and soundtrack songs – that’s 200 tunes ranked and defended. Check out JamsBio.com each day as the countdown is gradually revealed, and prepare to hit the message boards to defend your favorites.

200. “Real Man”

From Human Touch

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With snoozer lyrics and a keyboard riff that seems ripped from the musical oeuvre of Dirk Diggler, “Real Man” is one Springsteen song that likely won’t get dragged out for any encores anytime soon. I wouldn’t categorize Bruce’s other rare musical missteps as bad songs; some are generic, some are misguided, and some just fall short of his own lofty standards. But, to paraphrase Ty Webb in Caddyshack, “Real Man” is not…good.

The pity is that Bruce brought back his old buddy David Sancious back for organ work on this Human Touch track, which is a little bit like bringing Tiger Woods in for your bowling league. None of the adventurous spirit that categorizes the pair’s work on Bruce’s first two albums is anywhere in the vicinity of this song.

That squawking riff is just awful, but it’s not like it’s ruining a classic. On the contrary, the basic construct is clunky and overdone, marred by Bruce yelping the vocals in an effort to bring some life to the proceedings. The story of a dude rendered insecure by pop-culture icons (and, by the way, wasn’t Rambo already pretty dated by that point?) is a bit hard to swallow coming from one of the biggest stars on the planet.

And what exactly does it mean to be “feelin’ like a real man”? For a guy who has explored the inner self of the American male better than anybody else, such banalities ring uncharacteristically hollow. Things go awry early and often with “Real Man.” It’s a clunker, Boss fans. You’ll see how much I love the guy as this list progresses. So suck this one up, and I promise it will only get better.

199. “All Or Nothin’ At All”

From Human Touch

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We’re back at Human Touch again, and lest you think that I’m picking on this album, well, maybe I am. There is plenty of blame to go around here, so let’s start assigning it, shall we?

The easy target is “The Other Band,” so named because they replaced the E Street Band around that time. But it’s a bit of a stretch to go after them based on the studio recordings, because Human Touch was essentially recorded with a four-piece band including Springsteen and E Streeter Roy Bittan, along with session men Randy Jackson on bass and Jeff Porcaro on drums.

Yes, it’s that Randy Jackson, the Dawg, judge of talent show/train wreck American Idol. (I have this vague image of Jackson telling Bruce that his vocals are a little “pitchy,” and Bruce responding by rocketing a mike stand at him.) All that aside, the guy is a respected bassist. And they don’t get much more respected than Porcaro, who played with anybody and everybody on the rock scene after his stint with Toto before tragically passing away not long after the release of Human Touch.

But the truth remains that the sound the four created is slick but generic, lacking any personality. Thus, if the song didn’t rise to the occasion, the results were less than memorable. And that’s where Bruce deserves some blame, because songs like “All Or Nothin’ At All” just don’t get off the ground.

What is meant to be swagger sounds more like bluster, both in the flat-lined music and the lyrics, in which Bruce comes off as more bossy than Boss with his in-your-face exhortations to a reticent girl. Blame whoever you want, but the truth is that this song is far closer to nothin’.

198. “Mary’s Place”

From The Rising

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For a man who’s written so many roof-raising, crowd-pleasers that he could build a set list around them and still have more to spare, I’m a little mystified by Bruce’s logic when he wrote “Mary’s Place,” which was clearly intended to be a concert showcase. Whereas all of the other songs came by their live popularity organically, this song feels like it was forced onto The Rising to give people a heads-up that it was coming during a show.

That being the case, it never had a chance as a studio recording. It feels like the “party” that the song wants to start isn’t particularly raucous. Maybe some cheese and crackers and Parcheesi, but nothing that’s going to get anybody in any trouble, like all good parties must.

All of Roy Bittan’s and Clarence Clemons’ efforts to get the song airborne, while admirable, just don’t do the trick, and the brief horn breakdown only serves to remind us of other past glories. If someone created a computer program to approximate the sound of the E Street Band, it might come out sounding like “Mary’s Place.” The details may be familiar, but the soul is missing.

Worse yet, it’s a long song, checking in at over 6 minutes. That’s a whole lot of “let it rains,” probably a score too many for my taste. The song might have made sense as an occasional concert lark, but it’s a black hole on The Rising.

197. “The Long Goodbye”

From Lucky Town

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The easy criticism of Human Touch and Lucky Town is that they failed because Bruce couldn’t write good material while he was happy in his personal life. With a stable marriage and children, how could he produce great music without the inner turmoil that fueled some of his best works?

That’s first-class malarkey on several levels. First of all, I contend that Bruce has written upbeat rock songs better than almost any other artist save The Beatles, and this list will reflect that eventually, but no spoilers yet. Second, there is plenty of more pessimistic material on these albums, proving that Bruce could still clearly step outside his own happiness when need be.

But the sound he created on Lucky Town too often leveled out all emotions, turning the songs into a colorless buzz. Case in point: “The Long Goodbye,” in which Bruce paints a picture of a man whose hopes and dreams have evaporated, but yet his life stubbornly goes on. There is some black humor in the lyrics: “Well I went to leave twenty years ago/Since then I guess I been packin’ kinda slow.” But those touches are drowned out by the murky electric guitars and overall tunelessness.

The angst was there, but “The Long Goodbye” makes the task of seeking it out far too laborious.

196. “Wild Billy’s Circus Story”

From The Wild, The Innocent, & The E Street Shuffle

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This is a tough one, because this song gained sentimental value for me after Bruce used the title character again in “The Last Carnival,” making the tribute to Danny Federici a sequel of sorts. That was undoubtedly a nifty touch, drawing a parallel between the circus life and life on the road.

But that comparison is hard to find on “Wild Billy’s Circus Story,” in which the celebration of circus life is far too literal to be taken as anything but just that. And the wordiness that dogged Bruce a bit in his debut album made a return appearance on this track off The Wild, The Innocent, & The E Street Shuffle. There’s a fine line between impressive and show-offy, and Springsteen is on the wrong side of it here.

While you can sense his admiration of this vagabond way of life in the way he concentrates on the details of the show and its motley crew of players, it also keeps the story a bit earthbound, draining the song of the sense of romance and wonder that it wants to convey. When Billy finally chooses to come aboard at song’s end, you have to wonder why.

Points for Garry Tallent and his fine tuba work (who knew?), and for Bruce working in rhymes with “neck twist” and “human cannonball.” It’s a bit of a wackadoo song and you can’t really get too worked up over it, but “Wild Billy” is far from The Greatest Show On Earth.

The complete list to date.

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