The idea for this book was born when I got stranded in Philadelphia after Bruce Springsteen had to cancel two shows in March 2023 because of illness. I had traveled to the United States to finally see him again after the long touring hiatus caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, and instead of celebrating at concerts with fellow fans, I suddenly found myself sitting alone in cafés, writing about why all of this actually mattered so much to me.

Once the tour resumed and I continued following it through North America and Europe, I kept taking notes about what I experienced at the shows and in conversations with other longtime fans. Gradually, a structure began to emerge that helped me better understand both the nature of fandom and the elements of Springsteen's art that make it such a lasting experience. When you follow an artist over decades, something very special happens. You feel part of a community. But you also become aware of time passing by. And in Springsteen's case, there's also the sense that he himself experiences these things. And that reinforces the feeling of being accompanied and understood through so many songs and through the voice that carries them.

Popular music can bring people together in a very powerful way, and Bruce Springsteen remains an artist whose work continues to explore both the importance of that cohesion and its possible limits and pitfalls. That experience also shaped the way the book itself came into being. During the 2023–2025 tour, at almost every concert I attended, I met fans who shared their own stories and experiences with me. And at panel discussions in Germany, I received an incredible amount of support for the ideas and arguments I was developing in the book. In a way, it reminded me of the 2013 documentary Springsteen and I, which brings together testimonies from Bruce fans and captures just how much this music — and this person — can mean to people.

So the book also became a document of my own journey as a fan. On the larger scale, it looks back across more than forty years to the moment when I first heard "No Surrender" and realized that I really could learn more from a three-minute record than I would ever learn in school. But it also tells the smaller story — from the first idea for the book to the collaboration with Bloomsbury, the many inspirations I drew from the great books by Peter Ames Carlin, Stephen Hyden, or Warren Zanes and podcasts such as Hal Schwarz and Flyn McLean's None but the Brave, the support I received from the Bruce Springsteen Archive & Center for American Music in Long Branch, New Jersey, and the bookstores that invited me to present my work, like Wolfe & Kron in Asbury Park, NJ or PowerHouse Books in Brooklyn, NY.

It's been a wonderful journey, and I hope that readers will be able to feel at least some part of that experience in the book itself. And I hope the book resonates not only with Springsteen fans but with anyone who has ever fallen in love with a piece of art or music, or really any passion that becomes part of their life and continues speaking to them.

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Ongoing thread. More from Nicolas Pethes to follow.

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