The Josh Innes Show - Springsteen Hits The Road Part 1

Episode Date: February 18, 2026

Bruce Springsteen is going on tour this summer. I find it amusing that he wants you to know the world is in deep doo doo. But, if the world is going to be in deep doo doo, you may as well see him on tour. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Welcome in, all up, Ennis. Hello. Glad you guys choose to listen to the podcast. Tell your friends about it, share it. Do whatever you have to do to get people to listen to this thing and discover what we're doing here. It would be greatly appreciated. You are lovely people. I adore you.

So, what's going on in the world today? Bruce Springsteen is touring. And look, I am, is well documented that I have a disdain for Bruce Springsteen. And it's not a political thing, right? Just to be clear. Like when you tell people who are Bruce Springsteen people that you don't like Bruce Springsteen, what you get is, oh, you must be some sort of right-wing lunatic. Actually, anybody who would be a defender of Bruce Springsteen probably does not sound like that. It's probably more like, oh, I guess you like Kid Rock.

Is that what this is? You must be listening to Kid Rock and that fake Christian music of his. And we'll get into that a little bit. But I've never been a Springsteen guy. And my disdain for Springsteen originates really from Houston doing the show with Rich, who was obsessed with Springsteen. Like that was his whole thing. Like that was his guy. He loved Springsteen.

Everybody knew it about Rich. When we did the roast of Rich Lord, like one of the main things was his obsession with Springsteen is one of the things that people would criticize and make Fisick criticize. He would bust his balls for in the roast. He was. Dude, when Clarence Clemens died, the big guy, the big man. the big fellow, whatever the hell they call him, in the East Street band, when Clarence Clemens died, we were on the air that afternoon. And I forgot if Clarence Clemens had died while we were on the air live,

and it was announced live on the air, or if it had already happened and we knew he was dead, and that happened the night before, then Rich comes in the next day. I forgot exactly how it went. But I remember vividly because I want to say, what year did Clarence Clemens die? It had to been after 2013 because he played on the Gaga album. It had to been in 2013, I would imagine is when he died, because he played the saxophone on Edge of Glory on the Born This Way album for Gaga.

So he would have probably died at some point during the summer of 2013, some point. And I remember sitting there with Jim. It was me, Jim. Wait a say, did Born This Way come out in 2013? Actually, I might be wrong on that. Because Born This Way, I know we're looking at details here, but I think, did Born This Way come out in 2013 or did it come out in 2013? or did it come out in 2011? It may have come out in 2011.

Anyway, let me play a couple commercials, and then we will continue. So yeah, Clarence Clemens died in 2011. So that actually makes more sense. So Clarence Clemens died in 2011, which means born this way, came out in 2011. So it wasn't 2013. I knew I was on the air with Rich at the time, but that was that. So Clarence Clemens dies. He dies on June 18, 2011.

All right? I remember sitting there on the air, and I guess then the producer that would have been, would have been Rich. Rich would have been the host, obviously, and the producer would have been Ben, would have been Wolf Boy, I guess, because I think he was still there in 2011, I think. Yeah, he had to be, because I think he left. He was there for the 2011 year, I think. So he'd be the one that would remember this. But we're sitting there, and Rich is talking about Clarence Clemens dying, and he goes, the big man died. died and the world has changed forever.

I'm like, what fucking world has changed forever? Like, I'm sorry that the guy died. I know that you like the guy, but like, what are we doing here? Like, we're talking about it like, you know, like Mother Teresa just croaked or something. It's the guy from the East Street man. And his straight-faced reaction to the death of Clarence Clemens was, the world has changed forever. But, yeah, so Clarence Clemens died.

that would have been in June of 2011. Clemens had a stroke in June, June 12th, 2011. Initial signs have been hopeful, but he died at 69 on June 18th. All that. Okay. So again, all I remember is sitting there with Rich, and he's like, the world has changed forever. And I looked at, I guess it would have been Ben. I look over and we just kind of give each other this look like,

the fuck is he talking about? Like, the world has changed forever due to the death of the big man. But my disdain with Bruce Springsteen originates from that time, right? Like, musically, I've never been a fan, but I was never someone that really disliked the guy. Like, you know, I like some of the Bruce Springsteen poppier hits, you know, like Hungry Heart, for instance.

Hungry Heart would be like my favorite Bruce Springsteen song because Hungry Heart does not sound like Bruce Springsteen. Like, if you listen to the vocals on it, it sounds like a totally different human being. Like if you told me that was Bruce Springsteen, I'd be like, that's not Bruce Springsteen, that's somebody else. So that would be my favorite. I don't care about 70s Bruce Springsteen.

I don't care about Born to Run. I don't care about 10th Avenue, freeze out. I don't care about any of the shit. Like I'm just, I'm not a Bruce Springsteen connoisseur. I'm not someone that gives a shit about the music of Bruce Springsteen. And I guess that's sort of sacrilege. I also don't give a shit about the music. of the Beatles, really. I'm fine with it. I probably like that music better than I like the

music of the East Street band. But it's another one of those things that I don't really give a shit about, right? Like, these are just not people I care about. These are not bands that I care about. They weren't music that I grew up with, right? Like, it's just not my thing. And of course, in this era, if you say you don't like Bruce Springsteen, well, you don't like Bruce Springsteen because Bruce Springsteen is different than you politically, which is he? I don't know. I would imagine somewhat, but like I'm not a super political person, so it's not like I'm loaded with, you know, this political animus towards Bruce Springsteen. I find him to be annoying. Like I find most celebrities to be annoying with their political stances, and that's kind of where we're going

with this Bruce Springsteen thing. But like, Born to Run does nothing for me. Darkness on the edge of town does nothing for me. Like none of these songs matter. And then what happens is, you explain to people that love Springsteen. I talked about this on the air today. You explain that you don't really care for Springsteen and you don't give a shit that he plays 10-hour shows and you don't give a shit about the promise land and bad lands and the river and you don't give a shit about all this. And you let people know that you're just not interested in that shit. And what it becomes is, well, you've got to see him in concert. I don't want to see him in concert. You know what I'm saying?

Like I'm looking at the river album right now, the Bruce Springsteen River album, okay? the top song, the first single on there was Hungry Heart. I could not tell you what these other songs are that are singles. For a million dollars, if you said, Josh, sing Fade Away by Bruce Springsteen, I don't know what Fade Away by Bruce Springsteen is. What about Sherry Darling? Not a fucking clue what Sherry Darling by Bruce Springsteen is. Well, Josh, why don't you do the river? I have no clue.

I could not tell you if you said Josh sing the river. I don't know. Josh sing Cadillac Ranch, no fucking clue. Point blank, no clue. And this album, this probably sold one billion copies if I had to guess. I have no clue about any song other than Hungry Heart. That was a five-time platinum album. I couldn't name or play or sing any of the other songs on there other than Hungry Heart.

Now, if you go to the next Springsteen album, which is born in the USA, I think that's when you start getting into this more commercial air, which are some people, even like the diehards, like Rich Lord and those kind of guys even kind of renounce a little bit when you start talking about Springsteen when you get to born in the USA and into whatever that album was that came after that. But then you get dancing in the dark and cover me and I'm on fire and glory days and my hometown. I know all those songs. So basically, the extent of my Bruce Springsteen knowledge musically and music that I might enjoy to a degree would be Hungry Heart and the Born in the USA album.

Once you get past that, I'm kind of like, I got nothing for you. Like Tunnel of Love, which I think, like a lot of shit. What was the damn song that was on there? Well, Tunnel of Love and Brilliant Disguise. Like, I thought that album sucked too. But anyway, that's all to let you know that my disdain for Bruce Springsteen

has nothing to do with his politics. than the fact that he is a celebrity, and I think celebrities have annoying, unrelatable politics. Other than that, I have no interest in like, there are people that will hate someone just because of who they are politically. I mean, that's just how it works. There are people that hate Kid Rock because of Kid Rock's politics. There are people that hate Stephen Colbert because of Stephen Colbert's politics. That's the world we live in. That is the country we live in.

That is us. That is who we are. We generally speaking are just hating people. At least people with the biggest megaphone. We hate people because they disagree with us politically. I don't operate that way. I never have. It's never been who I am, right?

Now, I'll disagree with you, and I might find you insufferable. And by and large, I find most celebrities to be insufferable, and most celebrities are people that I wouldn't associate with anyway or want to associate with anyway, because I find most of them to be annoying people, and I find them to be phony and disingenuous, and grifters a lot of the time, right? They're just putting on a grift.

But Springsteen's just musically I've never liked. I don't like to listen to a dude waddle around and grunt all the time. I don't care that he puts on a four-hour show. Who wants to go to a concert for four fucking hours anyway? Like, nothing about Springsteen interests me, right? And I was talking to my boss today, Casey. And he's like, well, it's because you've never seen him in concert. I've taken people to their first Springsteen show, and then they love it and they get it.

I'm like, I don't want to see it. I've looked at the set list, and I'm like, I don't even know half the shit. I don't care that he goes out and plays 45-minute versions of glory days. The fuck do I care? Again, whatever. Anywho. So, Bruce Springsteen is one of these celebrities that wants you to know that the world is melting down. The world is ending.

We live in Nazi Germany. Okay? This is Nazi Germany. He, along with the bin Stillers of the world, and really just insert any political figure that's left wing or any celebrity. Basically, they all read from the same pamphlet. They all read from the same guidebook, right? They all read the same shit. So you hear the same shit from Ben Stiller.

You hear the same shit from any celebrity, from Barbara Streisand, from just insert whoever it is, Jane Fonda to Bruce Springsteen, all these self-hating white guilt-ridden, rich people who aren't giving any of their fucking money back. But they want to let you know that, hey, maybe people that have less should have more. Well, give them more. You're going to charge five grand a ticket for your concert. Why don't you give some of that money back to those people? But anyway, once again, I digress.

So, and I'm trying to think, like I heard Tony say this the other day. Like, I've been listening to some of you because Bruno's been doing the political stuff in Philadelphia. So, like, I'll go. I listen to a lot of different radio shit. Mostly people I know or people I've worked with. Like, I'll listen to my buddy Matt in Baton Rouge or I'll listen to, you know, radio stations I've worked for in the past, you know. I like to talk or just listen to people and see what they're talking about, see how they sound and all that shit. I'm listening to Bruno and he's talking about how Springsteen and Mellencamp are the two biggest frauds out there.

And I tend to agree. I think Mellencamp, from everything I've heard, is just a giant asshole. But they both found a niche and that niche is like selling this blue-collarie kind of, you know, rugged every man schick. When deep down they're just rich, extremely liberal, extremely, extremely wealthy, living in mansions, judging you if you disagree with them politically, telling you the world is fucking ending and we live in Nazi Germany, left wing, extremely left wing people, which again, whatever you are politically is whatever you are politically. But I would agree with Tony that they just come across as total phonies.

Although, like, the phony part of these celebrity types is that the biggest fraud and the biggest phony thing about them is that they are people who want you to believe that they care about people who have less money and they tell you about how they want to help everybody and they want to change the world and everything else. But they're also the same people that I'm going to guess are not going to give any of that money back. Like when you hear people talk about socialism or whatever, right, and talk about how the world would be a better place, like I saw somebody make a comparison to how the NFL and why

the NFL works so well is because. because all of the teams are basically on an even playing field, whereas in baseball, it's kind of like capitalism. You just kind of have the money you have and you run with it from there. Oh, the NFL is different because the NFL basically is socialism and blah, blah, blah. Okay, cool. What I would tell all of these famous people is while you're sitting here pounding the drum about how we need more equality and people need to have, you know, need to make X amount of dollars and nobody should be impoverished. Okay.

but you do realize that means that then you shouldn't live in a mansion. Like, I'm going to guess. Let's take a guess. How big do you think Bruce Springsteen's house is? Let's see. Bruce Springsteen house. Let's see. Where does Bruce Springsteen live?

His primary residence is a sprawling 368-acre horse farm in Colts Neck, New Jersey, which has served as his main home since the mid-1990s, Known as a quiet rural estate, it includes top-tier equestrian facilities for his daughter, Jessica Springsteen. He also owns other properties, including a home in Rumson, New Jersey, and previously held a 10,000 square foot estate in Beverly Hills. All right, so my man here lives on 368 acres. He has a horse farm. Let's see. He purchased a 4.5 acre estate in Beverly Hills area for $14 million, which includes a 10,000 square foot Mediterranean.

Italian-style house and a 7,500 square foot English-style house. Do you need all that space? Like, you have a hotel. Do you really need that, right? So all we talk about is billionaires and billionaires and billionaires. So why are people who are super-duper millionaires not a problem? Like, if we all should have the same shit and we all should be on equal footing here, at least somewhat on equal footing, you know, socialism, socialism, right?

If that's what we should be doing, which, okay, fine. then like I wonder if Bruce Springsteen if they said all right Bruce Springsteen you can get rid of Trump and get rid of all these people and capitalism is dead and all this shit if if we were to do that you would have to get rid of all your mansions we would like put like a certain square footage on houses or whatever it would be right like so you could only live in you know like a 1500 square foot house

I mean it's just you and your wife right Bruce you don't have any kids anymore you don't need those fucking horses you don't need a fucking ranch So would you be content with living in a 1,500 square foot three bedroom house, two bedroom house? My guess is no. But it's very easy when you're rich and you have no one to answer to to just say shit and be the hero of the people and tell everybody that they need to have more money and the government's terrible and blah, blah, blah, blah, while you're sitting there living the fucking lifestyle. Like it's very easy to do. But anyway, so, Springsteen's got a tour. And I don't even know if Springsteen's viewpoint is the same as some of these other people who are like super socialist and capitalism is terrible.

You hear a lot of those people say that politically, but I don't know if Bruce Springsteen. Like he'd be a fucking dipshit to be a guy who's made millions of dollars off of the fact that he's written songs that people love and perform songs that people love. He'd be a real fucking dip shit, a real pud to go out and be like, hey, by the way, guys, capitalism sucks. Well, you're a great beneficiary of capitalism. So I'm going to guess that Springsteen is not one of those people. All that said.