Bruce Springsteen - THE SEEGER... Vinyl

Bruce Springsteen is certainly no stranger to acoustic-based, folk-inspired music. He began his career as a post-Dylan troubadour, and he's been making "unplugged" albums as far back as 1982's NEBRASKA. He's already recorded Woody Guthrie material, so it's not a shock that he would release a tribute album to folk icon Pete Seeger. WE SHALL OVERCOME: THE SEEGER SESSIONS celebrates not just Seeger's musical influence, of course, but also the political stands the singer took, which obviously resonate with the famously progressive Springsteen.
Unlike NEBRASKA, though, this is no bare-bones affair. The E Street Band may be absent, but Bruce tackles Seeger's tunes in classic larger-than-life Boss style, with a huge band that includes several string players, a horn section, accordion, and more. Incorporating everything from Dixieland to zydeco into the folk/blues template, Bruce stirs up a rowdy cauldron of Americana teeming with as much pure human passion as social import. WE SHALL OVERCOME is likely to be one of the biggest albums ever made under the "traditional folk" banner, but it's full of small surprises as Springsteen gets to the spiritual and musical heart of the matter.

• Genre: Rock
• Format: Vinyl