Coverinfo
The album was anounced with the single
Do I love you ( indeed I do ). Do I love you ( indeed I do ) is the leading single from
Only The Strong Survive album. It was released on digital platforms on 29 Sep 2022, the same time the album was officially announced. A
music video for the song was simultaneously released on Bruce Springsteen's YouTube channel. The video was directed and edited by Thom Zimny. Only The Strong Survive is Bruce Springsteen's twenty-first studio album. It is officially released on 11 Nov 2022 on Columbia Records. It consists of 15 tracks, all of which are covers. This marks the second time that Springsteen releases a cover album following We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions in 2006. The album is "a collection of fifteen soul music greats," as described in the press release. It "celebrates soul music gems from the legendary catalogues of Motown, Gamble and Huff, Stax and many more." Springsteen commented: "I wanted to make an album where I just sang. And what better music to work with than the great American songbook of the Sixties and Seventies? I've taken my inspiration from Levi Stubbs, David Ruffin, Jimmy Ruffin, the Iceman Jerry Butler, Diana Ross, Dobie Gray, and Scott Walker, among many others. I've tried to do justice to them all and to the fabulous writers of this glorious music. My goal is for the modern audience to experience its beauty and joy, just as I have since I first heard it. I hope you love listening to it as much as I loved making it."
The announcement was made by Springsteen himself who addressed fans in a pre-recorded video posted online.
In anticipation to the announcement, Springsteen dropped hints on his social media accounts over the course of the previous three days. On 26 and 27 September, he shared each morning a photo of a road and of a steering wheel respectively, without any caption or comment.
On 28 September, he posted a 26-second
promo clip of a vintage car FM radio dial turning to different stations and listening in for a few seconds, each station playing a different song from the upcoming album.
Media:
Songinfo
"
7 Rooms of Gloom" is a song recorded by the Motown Records vocal quartet the Four Tops. It was released as a single in 1967 on the Motown label. Described as "throbbing with dread over a racing minor key dominated arrangement" it was written by Holland–Dozier–Holland. The single's B-side was "
I'll Turn to Stone" also written by Holland-Dozier-Holland with R Dean Taylor.
Bruce on the artist
2022-11-00 Stone Hill Farm, Colts Neck, NJ
Bruce records a series of promotional interviews from his home in support of Only The Strong Survive, The precise recording dates of these interviews are uncertain. One of them was with The Italian virginradio . Massimo Cotto asked Bruce during the
Italian virginradio interview about 7 rooms of gloom.
"7 rooms of gloom, that was one of the so many more well known 4 Four Top songs and I tried a few of them. It was kind of a B hit, people didn't know that well. That was wildly psychological, insanely intens is 7 rooms of gloom. The song starts out: " I see a house, a house of stone", Levi (Stubbs ) didn't start with a tone, he starts with a shout " : ' I see a house, a house of stone, a lonely house ' cause now you're gone, to 7 rooms, 7 rooms of gloom."
And the song takes out ...... It's pounding, pounding, relentless and desperate. One of the darkest Motown songs ever released. "
In the BBC serie "desert Island discs " Bruce mentions "The Four Tops" as one of the songs he would bring to a desert Island :
Baby I Need Your Loving (1964):
Bruce on the four tops :
"I had to have some Motown because Motown was an incredible part of my youth. Also, if you wanted to know how to write, how to structure successful pop records, you could learn it all from Motown. The sound of the band, the importance of a great singer. Motown was the school where you wanted to go to learn your craft."
Lyrics
I see a house, a house of stone
A lonely house, 'cos now you're gone
Seven rooms, that's all it is, seven rooms of gloom
I live with emptiness, without your tenderness
You took the dream I had for us, and turned that dream into dust
I watch a phone that never rings, I watch a door that never rings
I need you back into my life and turn this darkness into light
I'm all alone in this house, turn this house into a home
I need your touch to comfort me, your tender tender arms that once held me
Without your love, your love inside
This house is just a place to run and hide
Seven rooms, that's all it is, seven rooms of gloom
Rooms of emptiness, without your tenderness
Don't make me live from day to day, watching a clock that ticks away
Another day, another way, another reason for me to say
I need you here, here with me, I need you, darlin', desperately
I'm all alone, all alone in this house that's not a home
I miss your love I once have known, I miss your kiss that was my very very own
Empty silence surrounds me, lonely walls, they stare
Seven rooms, that's all it is, seven rooms of gloom
I live with emptiness, without your tenderness
All the windows are painted black, I'll wait right here 'til you get back
I keep waitin' and waitin', 'til your face again I see