Coverinfo
Bruce has covered the song 5 times:
Garry Tallent occasionally also played a snippet of the song for his solo during 10th avenue freeze out on The Reunion Tour.
1965-10-00 - MARLBORO STATE HOSPITAL, MARLBORO, NJ (Castiles)
with the Castiles performing for patients at a local psychiatric hospital
during the lawsuit tour
1984-06-10 - THE STONE PONY, ASBURY PARK, NJ (Cats on a Smooth Surface)
off-tour on 10 Jun 1984 at The Stone Pony in Asbury Park where Bruce and Nils Lofgren joined Cats On A Smooth Surface onstage
2012-03-15 - MOODY THEATER, AUSTIN, TX
Off-tour on 15 Mar 2012 at Moody Theater in Austin, TX, during an intimate concert following Bruce’s keynote speech at the South By Southwest music festival. The song was played with the E Street Band and featured a guest appearance by The Animals' Eric Burdon.
with Animal’s Eric Burdon during the second leg of the Wrecking ball tour
Songinfo
"We Gotta Get out of This Place", is a song written by Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil and recorded as a 1965 hit single by The Animals. It became an iconic anti Vietnam war song. Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil were husband and wife (and future Hall of Fame) songwriters associated with the 1960s Brill Building scene in New York City. Mann and Weil wrote and recorded "We Gotta Get out of This Place" as a demo,
with Mann singing and playing piano. It was intended for
The Righteous Brothers, for whom they had written the number one hit "
You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'" but then Mann gained a recording contract for himself, and his label Red Bird Records wanted him to release it instead. Meanwhile, record executive Allen Klein had heard it and gave the demo to Mickie Most, The Animals' producer. Most already had a call out to Brill Building songwriters for material for the group's next recording session (The Animals hits "It's My Life" and "Don't Bring Me Down" came from the same call, and The Animals recorded it before Mann could.
Bruce on the artist
In the 2012 keynote speech Bruce performed an abbreviated version of The Animals' version on acoustic guitar and then said, "That's every song I've ever written. That's all of them. I'm not kidding, either. That's 'Born to Run', 'Born in the U.S.A.'
2012 SXSW Keynote ( at 23:00 )
"For some, the Animals were just another one the really good beat groups that came of the Sixties," Bruce Springsteen said at his 2012 keynote speech at South By Southwest. "But to me, the Animals were a revelation. The first records with full blown class consciousness that I had ever heard." The passionate vocals and organ-heavy sound of the Animals was a huge influence on Springsteen as a young songwriter and he fully admits he stole the chords of "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" for "Badlands."
Bruce met The Animals frontman Eric Burdon when he joined the E Street Band in 2013.
Lyrics
In this dirty old part of the city
Where the sun refused to shine
People tell me it ain't no use in trying
My little girl, you're so young and pretty
And one thing I know is true
You're gonna die before your time is due
See my daddy in bed a-dying
See his hair a-turning grey
He's been working and slaving his life away
I know
'Cause he's been working, yeah, every day slaving his life away (work)
He's been working, baby (work)
He's been a-working, work, work, work
We gotta get out of this place
If it's the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there's a better life for me and you
Mm, yeah
My little girl, you're so young and pretty
And one thing I know is true
You'll be dead before your time is due
Yes, you will
See my daddy in bed a-dying
See his hair been turning grey
He's been working and slaving his life away
Yes, I know
Believe me, he's been working, yeah
He's been working, yeah, whoa! (work)
He's been working, work, work, work
We gotta get out of this place
If it's the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there's a better life for me and you
Whoa, baby
We gotta get out of this place
If it's the last thing we ever do
We gotta get out of this place
Girl, there's a better life for me and you
Oh, you know it, baby
And I know it, too, babe
Oh, yeah