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Part two picks up in the clubs and dives where Bruce and the band are trying to outrun obscurity. We walk with them through the struggle to get the first records heard, the critics who saw the spark, and the brutal work of making Born to Run: months of second-guessing, endless mixes, and the very real possibility that it might all collapse under its own ambition. We hear about Jon Landau’s famous “I saw rock and roll future” review, the Bottom Line breakthrough, the U.K. trip that almost derailed him, and the strange, exhausting new life of a band suddenly under the lights. This chapter closes with one of the great stories in the Springsteen mythos: the bomb scare in Milwaukee, the evacuated club, and a night that turns from chaos into a legendary, delayed show—a perfect snapshot of how fragile and how powerful this whole thing really was.

Music in this Episode: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band

• Born to Run
• Thunder Road
• Jungleland
• Tenth Avenue Freeze Out
• Kitty's Back
• Mountain of Love
• I Fought the Law

Archival Interviews

Mark Maron Interview

Rick Rubin/ Malcolm Gladwell Interview

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