A massive release in June is happening for Bruce Springsteen. Kicking out seven unreleased albums, titled "Tracks II: The Lost Albums," features 83 songs recorded from 1983 to 2018 — 74 of which have never been given an official release.
"I've played this music to myself and often close friends for years now," Springsteen said in a statement, per Rolling Stone. "I'm glad you'll get a chance to finally hear them. I hope you enjoy them."
It will be a seven-CD box set or a nine-LP vinyl release. It acts as the long overdue follow-up to "Tracks," Springsteen's 1998 box collecting the b-sides and rarities of his first 25 years in the music industry.
"Tracks II's" songs include everything from working tapes from the "Born in the USA" sessions to alternate versions to long-missing pieces of material returned from the underground to the shelf as bootlegs.
Speaking in a trailer for the release, Springsteen acknowledged talk of a lull in his career, "I often read about myself in the '90s as having some lost period or something. And I really, really was working the whole time."
Other records in the collection, like the country-tinged "Somewhere North of Nashville" — from May 1995 — and the pop-influenced "Twilight Hour," which encompasses work done around the same time as 2019's "Western Stars," reveal the range of Springsteen's musical exploration.
The last disc of the set, "Perfect World," is made up of songs that longtime collaborator Joe Grushecky co-wrote during the 1990s and early 2000s. "It's the one thing on this that wasn't initially conceived as an album."
The 74-year-old Springsteen attributed the COVID-19 lockdown as a driving force in getting the long-in-the-making project done. During the pandemic, he reportedly told friends to "Finished everything I had in my vault."
During a 2017 chat with Variety, he looked back on the reason behind why so many of these songs never made it past the cutting room floor.
"We've made many more records than we released. Why didn't we release those records? I didn't think they were essential. I might have thought they were good... but over my entire work life, I felt like I released what was essential at a certain moment."
Still Touring, Still Creating
The announcement comes as Springsteen has started a new tour, his first in several years due to health issues. Even though he hit the brakes on live concerts to care for his wife -- whose health has been a cause of concern since being diagnosed with a rare form of blood cancer -- the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame member has promised to perform "until the wheels come off."
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