Springsteen’s ‘High Hopes’ Came From Stray Ideas

Although Bruce Springsteen's albums, for the most part, have been methodically planned out track by track -- 2014's High Hopes seems to have broken all the rules. The new collection, which hits the street on January 14th, features some re-recorded, previously issued songs -- including the title track to 1995's The Ghost Of Tom Joad, Tim Scott McConnell "High Hopes" -- which the E Street Band first released in 1996, and Springsteen's take on Suicide's "Dream Baby Dream" -- a live 2005 version of which was released in 2008 for Record Store Day. Also included is a revamped version of "American Skin (41 Shots)," which was first released on 2001's Live In New York City.

Springsteen shed light on the new album, telling Rolling Stone, "The best way to describe this record is that it's a bit of an anomaly. But not much. I don't really work linearly like a lot of people do. I have a lot of this music on a computer. I bring it out on the road to amuse myself. Very often, if I have nothing to do late at night I'll bring it up and look at different bodies of music."