"Incident on 57th Street" is a song written by the American singer-songwriter Bruce Springsteen that was first released on his 1973 album The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle. It has been described by critics as a key development in Springsteen's songwriting career and regarded by fans as one of his greatest songs.
Writing and recording
"Incident on 57th Street" was the last song Springsteen recorded for The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle. Springsteen had been working on it under the working title "Puerto Rican Jane."
Lyrics and music
According to Springsteen, the theme of "Incident on 57th Street" is "redemption," a theme he would return to again many times. It has parallels to Leonard Bernstein's West Side Story in telling a Romeo and Juliet-like story with Latin American characters set in New York. They sleep together, but when his old companions call to him asking him to join them in making "some easy money," he leaves Jane to join them.
As with many of Springsteen's early songs, "Incident on 57th Street" has a complex, extended structure. The refrain appears after the first verse, but is skipped at the end of the second verse. Music critic Clinton Heylin called it "an early masterpiece, it is the kinda epic song [Springsteen] has spent his youth imagining and the [previous] 18 months working towards.
Humphries sees an influence from "Incident on 57th Street" on the structure of Dire Straits' 1980 song "Romeo and Juliet." Springsteen himself has suggested that the lyrics of "Jungleland" may tell what happened after "Incident on 57th Street," with Johnny becoming "Jungleland"'s Magic Rat. The live performance was also released as the B-side of Springsteen's release of the 12" single "War" in Europe in 1986; despite its exceptional length, it also appeared as the B-side of the US release of the "Fire" 7" single.