Bruce Springsteen lyrics -- Bruce Springsteen shows -- Bruce Springsteen records

Song title: For You


For You

Princess cards she sends me with her regards
Barroom eyes shine vacancy, to see her you gotta look hard
Wounded deep in battle, I stand stuffed like some soldier undaunted
To her Cheshire smile, I’ll stand on file, she’s all I ever wanted
But you let your blue walls get in the way of these facts
Honey, get your carpetbaggers off my back
You wouldn’t even give me time to cover my tracks
You said “Here’s your mirror and your ball and jacks”
But they’re not what I came for, and I’m sure you see that too
I came for you, for you, I came for you, but you did not need my urgency
I came for you, for you, I came for you, but your life was one long emergency
And your cloud line urges me, and my electric surges free

Crawl into my ambulance, your pulse is getting weak
Reveal yourself all now to me girl while you’ve got the strength to speak
`Cause they’re waiting for you at Bellevue with their oxygen masks
But I could give it all to you now if only you could ask
And don’t call for your surgeon even he says it’s too late
It’s not your lungs this time, it’s your heart that holds your fate
Don’t give me money, honey, I don’t want it back
You and your pony face and your union jack
Well take your local joker and teach him how to act
I swear I was never that way even when I really cracked
Didn’t you think I knew that you were born with the power of a locomotive
Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound?
And your Chelsea suicide with no apparent motive
You could laugh and cry in a single sound

And your strength is devastating in the face of all these odds
Remember how I kept you waiting when it was my turn to be the god?

You were not quite half so proud when I found you broken on the beach
Remember how I poured salt on your tongue and hung just out of reach
And the band they played the homecoming theme as I caressed your cheek
They ragged, jagged melody she still clings to me like a leach
But that medal you wore on your chest always got in the way
Like a little girl with a trophy so soft to buy her way
We were both hitchhikers but you had your ear tuned to the roar
Of some metal-tempered engine on an alien, distant shore
So you, left to find a better reason than the one we were living for
And it’s not that nursery mouth I came back for
It’s not the way you’re stretched out on the floor
`Cause I’ve broken all your windows and I’ve rammed through all your doors
And who am I to ask you to lick my sores? And you should know that’s true
I came for you, for you, I came for you, but you did not need my urgency
I came for you, for you, I came for you, but your life was one long emergency
And your cloud line urges me, and my electric surges free

Notes: Reharsed for the TOL tour (but not played).Live version didn't never show appreciable differences from the album lyrics.

Statistics from the KILLING FLOOR (www.brucespringsteen.it) database

Published on the following official releases:

First known live performance: 01/12/1972 Kenny's Castaways, New York,NY ,USA
Last known live performance: 05/09/2016 Veterans United Home Loans Amphitheater, Virginia Beach,VA ,USA

Song 'history':

Played live 4 time(s) during the so-called 'Greetings Tour' and 26 time(s) during the gigs preceeding the official Born To Run Tour.
Keep in mind that only a small amount of the setlists of these years has surfaced, so it may have been played a lot more.
Apart from the above live performances, the song was recorded for the Laurel Canyon / London Publishing demos, then recorded again during the Greetings / Wild sessions in 1972-73 (and released on GREETINGS....)
The Born to Run tour counted 23 apparitions of this song
Often played during the Darkness tour (41 times)
Played during the River tour (41 times)
One only performance during the Human Touch tour (07/08/1992 Meadowlands Arena, E.Rutherford,NJ ,USA)
Scarcely used during the Ghost of Tom Joad tour, with 4 inclusions
Scarcely used during the Reunion tour, with 5 inclusions
Played during the Conventional Hall shows in 2000
Played during the Rising tour (12 times)
Played during the 'Double Take' shows in 2002
The song was then included in the ESSENTIAL compilation, released in 2003.
Played during the rehearsals for the Devils and dust Tour, in Mar/Apr 2005.
Bruce inserted it 16 times in the setlists of the Devils and Dust tour
Two only renderings for this song in the The Seeger Session tour (19/11/2006 The Point, Dublin ,Ireland and 21/11/2006 The Odyssey, Belfast ,Ireland)
It only saw the light less than a dozen times in the whole Magic tour
During the Working on a Dream tour, the song was played less than a dozen times
Scarcely used during the Wrecking Ball tour, with 5 inclusions
Two only performances during the High Hopes tour (05/02/2014 Perth Arena, Perth ,Australia and 14/05/2014 Hersheypark Stadium, Hershey,PA ,USA)
Scarcely used during the 2016 The River tour, with 4 inclusions

The song was also played in informal happenings or off-tour appearances
Data from the www.brucespringsteen.it database