Working on a Dream is the 16th studio album by Bruce Springsteen, released on January 27, 2009 through Columbia Records. It has sold more than 3 million copies worldwide, with over 585,000 in the United States as of September 2010.
The album was officially announced, along with a track listing, on November 17, 2008. The album first began selling in Germany and Ireland, on January 23.
The album came out of songwriting and recording that Springsteen continued with towards the close of his previous work, 2007's Magic, as the band worked on a video for one of that album's songs. "What Love Can Do" was written, in Springsteen's words, as a "love in the time of Bush" meditation, but felt like the start of something new rather than a candidate for Magic. Encouraged by his 2000s producer Brendan O'Brien, Springsteen decided to start work on a new album and wrote "This Life," "My Lucky Day," "Life Itself," "Good Eye," and "Tomorrow Never Knows" during the next week. They were then recorded with the E Street Band members during breaks on their 2007–2008 Magic Tour, with most being finished in just a few takes. This all reflected a faster pace of producing new music than Springsteen had been known for in the past; Springsteen said, "I hope Working on a Dream has caught the energy of the band fresh off the road from some of the most exciting shows we've ever done." As with Magic, most of the tracks were first recorded with a core rhythm section band comprising Springsteen, drummer Max Weinberg, bassist Garry Tallent, and pianist Roy Bittan; other members' contributions were then added subsequently.
The album is the last to feature new work of founding E Street Band member Danny Federici, who died in April 2008. Federici's son Jason also plays on the album.
Title number "Working on a Dream" was first performed during Springsteen's November 2, 2008 appearance in Cleveland for Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign (accompanied by Patti Scialfa), and then a chopped-up airing of the recorded version first appeared during the November 16 NBC Sunday Night Football broadcast at halftime. The intact "Working on a Dream" began airing on radio stations and their websites on November 21; it was made available for free download via iTunes and the Sony BMG website on November 24. The track entered the UK Singles Chart at position 195 the following week. A music video appeared on some foreign sites showing the recording of the song. "My Lucky Day" was made available in the United States on amazon.com on December 1, accompanied by a longer music video that showed Springsteen and the band arranging and recording the song. "Life Itself" was released as a free download from amazon.com on December 28, with a music video that featured studio footage interspersed with vague scene snippets that may illuminate the moody song.
On January 12, 2009, the album leaked onto the internet. On January 19, NPR.org scheduled a streaming of it free for a week, in advance of the actual release. Sony BMG's Irish website also began streaming it. An extensive and carefully planned promotional push for Springsteen and the album was put together, incorporating appearances at the Golden Globe Awards, the Barack Obama presidential inauguration, a new greatest hits album, the half-time show of Super Bowl XLIII and an anticipated appearance at the 81st Academy Awards. The last of these went awry when, in what Rolling Stone termed "shocking news," "The Wrestler" was snubbed by the Academy and failed to gain a nomination. Nevertheless, all the activity led Springsteen to say, "This has probably been the busiest month of my life."
An abbreviated version of "Working on a Dream" was included in Springsteen's February 1 performance during the Super Bowl. VH1 Classic aired the documentary Bruce Springsteen: The Making Of 'Working On A Dream' in early February 2009. The Working on a Dream Tour began on April 1, 2009, in the wake of the album's release.Working on a Dream is the 16th studio album by Bruce Springsteen, released on January 27, 2009 through Columbia Records. It has sold more than 3 million copies worldwide, with over 585,000 in the United States as of September 2010.
The album was officially announced, along with a track listing, on November 17, 2008. The album first began selling in Germany and Ireland, on January 23.
The album came out of songwriting and recording that Springsteen continued with towards the close of his previous work, 2007's Magic, as the band worked on a video for one of that album's songs. "What Love Can Do" was written, in Springsteen's words, as a "love in the time of Bush" meditation, but felt like the start of something new rather than a candidate for Magic. Encouraged by his 2000s producer Brendan O'Brien, Springsteen decided to start work on a new album and wrote "This Life," "My Lucky Day," "Life Itself," "Good Eye," and "Tomorrow Never Knows" during the next week. They were then recorded with the E Street Band members during breaks on their 2007–2008 Magic Tour, with most being finished in just a few takes. This all reflected a faster pace of producing new music than Springsteen had been known for in the past; Springsteen said, "I hope Working on a Dream has caught the energy of the band fresh off the road from some of the most exciting shows we've ever done." As with Magic, most of the tracks were first recorded with a core rhythm section band comprising Springsteen, drummer Max Weinberg, bassist Garry Tallent, and pianist Roy Bittan; other members' contributions were then added subsequently.
The album is the last to feature new work of founding E Street Band member Danny Federici, who died in April 2008. Federici's son Jason also plays on the album.
Title number "Working on a Dream" was first performed during Springsteen's November 2, 2008 appearance in Cleveland for Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign (accompanied by Patti Scialfa), and then a chopped-up airing of the recorded version first appeared during the November 16 NBC Sunday Night Football broadcast at halftime. The intact "Working on a Dream" began airing on radio stations and their websites on November 21; it was made available for free download via iTunes and the Sony BMG website on November 24. The track entered the UK Singles Chart at position 195 the following week. A music video appeared on some foreign sites showing the recording of the song. "My Lucky Day" was made available in the United States on amazon.com on December 1, accompanied by a longer music video that showed Springsteen and the band arranging and recording the song. "Life Itself" was released as a free download from amazon.com on December 28, with a music video that featured studio footage interspersed with vague scene snippets that may illuminate the moody song.
On January 12, 2009, the album leaked onto the internet. On January 19, NPR.org scheduled a streaming of it free for a week, in advance of the actual release. Sony BMG's Irish website also began streaming it. An extensive and carefully planned promotional push for Springsteen and the album was put together, incorporating appearances at the Golden Globe Awards, the Barack Obama presidential inauguration, a new greatest hits album, the half-time show of Super Bowl XLIII and an anticipated appearance at the 81st Academy Awards. The last of these went awry when, in what Rolling Stone termed "shocking news," "The Wrestler" was snubbed by the Academy and failed to gain a nomination. Nevertheless, all the activity led Springsteen to say, "This has probably been the busiest month of my life."
An abbreviated version of "Working on a Dream" was included in Springsteen's February 1 performance during the Super Bowl. VH1 Classic aired the documentary Bruce Springsteen: The Making Of 'Working On A Dream' in early February 2009. The Working on a Dream Tour began on April 1, 2009, in the wake of the album's release.false2025-11-08 06:10:33Working on a Dream20092009-01-012009-01-0152Rock1112772110215a0b9fc40-a651-4289-bca5-7affff3171c970248960-cb53-4ea4-943a-edb18f7d336f9cec178a-f785-33c5-8888-63ba27efca4c/media/data/media5/Music/Bruce Springsteen/Working on a Dream/folder.jpgBruce SpringsteenBruce SpringsteenBruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen (born September 23, 1949) is an American singer and songwriter. He has released 21 studio albums during a career spanning six decades, most of which feature his backing band, the E Street Band. He is an originator of heartland rock, a genre combining mainstream rock music with poetic and socially conscious lyrics that tell a narrative about working-class American life. Nicknamed "The Boss", he is known for his descriptive lyrics and energetic concerts, with performances that can last more than four hours.Springsteen released his first two albums, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. and The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle, in 1973; neither earned him a large audience. He then changed his style and achieved worldwide popularity with Born to Run (1975). This was followed by Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978) and The River (1980), which topped the Billboard 200 chart. After the solo album Nebraska (1982), he reunited with his E Street Band for Born in the U.S.A. (1984), which became his most commercially successful album and one of the best-selling albums of all time. All seven of its singles reached the top 10 of the Billboard Hot 100, including the title track. Springsteen mostly hired session musicians for the recording of his next three albums, Tunnel of Love (1987), Human Touch (1992), and Lucky Town (1992). He reassembled the E Street Band for Greatest Hits (1995), then recorded the acoustic album The Ghost of Tom Joad (1995) and the EP Blood Brothers (1996).
Seven years after releasing The Ghost of Tom Joad—the longest gap between any of his studio albums—Springsteen released The Rising (2002), which he dedicated to the victims of the 9/11 attacks. He released two more folk albums, Devils & Dust (2005) and We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions (2006), followed by two more albums with the E Street Band: Magic (2007) and Working on a Dream (2009). The next two albums, Wrecking Ball (2012) and High Hopes (2014), topped album charts worldwide. From 2017 to 2018, and again in 2021, Springsteen performed the critically acclaimed one-man show Springsteen on Broadway which saw him perform some of his songs and tell stories from his 2016 autobiography; the album version was released in 2018. He then released the solo album Western Stars (2019), the album Letter to You (2020) with the E Street Band, and a solo cover album Only the Strong Survive (2022). Letter to You reached No. 2 in the U.S. and made Springsteen the first artist to score a top five album across six consecutive decades.Listed among the album era's most prominent acts, Springsteen has sold more than 71 million albums in the U.S. and over 140 million worldwide, making him one of the best-selling music artists of all time. He has earned numerous awards, including 20 Grammy Awards, two Golden Globes, an Academy Award, and a Special Tony Award. He was inducted into both the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1999, received the Kennedy Center Honors in 2009, named MusiCares person of the year in 2013, awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama in 2016, and awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Joe Biden in 2023. He ranked 23rd on Rolling Stone's list of the Greatest Artists of All Time, which described him as being "the embodiment of rock & roll".