This 1976 One-Hit Wonder Was Actually Written by Bruce Springsteen

In 1973, Bruce Springsteen released “Blinded By The Light” as his debut single. The song, written solely by Springsteen, is part of Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., Springsteen’s debut album. Neither “Blinded By The Light” nor “Spirit In The Night”, Springsteen’s next single, did well at radio for him. It wasn’t until “Born To Run” came out in 1975, the title track of Springsteen’s third studio album, that he had a radio hit.

Still, Springsteen did eventually have success with “Blinded By The Light”, just not as an artist. In 1976, Manfred Mann’s Earth Band released “Blinded By The Light”.  Although Manfred Mann’s Earth Band released numerous moderate hits over the span of more than two decades, “Blinded By The Light” remains their only No. 1 single.

Manfred Mann’s Earth Band’s version of “Blinded By The Light” is on their The Roaring Silence album. The group never reached the top of the charts after “Blinded By The Light”. However, they did fare slightly better in the United Kingdom. Manfred Mann’s Earth Band only had one more Top 40 single after “Blinded By The Light”, ironically also with Springsteen’s “Spirit In The Night”.

The Story Behind “Blinded By The Light”, Written by Bruce Springsteen

“Blinded By The Light” starts with, “Blinded by the light / Revved up like a deuce / Another runner in the night / Blinded by the light.” Springsteen later said the song was born from his own youthful ideologies.

“I was 23 years old; I wanted to create my own ridiculous language,” Springsteen says. “So it was really a young musician’s tale, a litany of adventures and rather on the autobiographical side.”

“I wanted to get blinded by the light,” he adds. “I wanted to do things I hadn’t done and see things I hadn’t seen.”

It’s interesting that “Blinded By The Light” became the biggest hit for Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, since Mann later admits he never fully understood the lyrics in the song.

“With ‘Blinded by the Light’ I didn’t really know what it all meant, just that each line sounded right to me,” Mann concedes. “I really should have checked more carefully, as Springsteen had written ‘cut loose like a deuce.’ And in the process of rehearsal, I somehow landed up with ‘rapped up like a deuce.’ And the record was so difficult to make that I just overlooked the error. I also landed up with a slightly different chord structure, just through my endless fiddling about, not by design.”

Photo by Suzan Carson/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images

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