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Later this year, Jeremy Allen White will play The Boss in Deliver Me from Nowhere, which is about the recording of the legendary Bruce Springsteen‘s Nebraska album.
So, now feels like the best time to look back at all of Springsteen's work. We ranked his best 10 albums, which range from his entire illustrious career.
Honorable mention: Letter to You
It was hard not to mention Letter to You or Devils & Dust on this list. The former is the album that reintroduced me to The Boss, thanks to his appearance on SNL to promote it.
“Ghosts” and the album's title track are two of Springsteen's better recent works. “I'll See You in My Dreams” is a signature hopeful ballad for anyone who has lost someone. It is nice to see him play other standout tracks, like “Rainmaker” and “House of a Thousand Guitars,” during his 2025 Land of Hopes and Dreams Tour.
Letter to You is a return to form for Bruce Springsteen. It is a strong enough album that I'd argue Springsteen should've focused his ongoing tour around it.
10. Tunnel of Love (1987)
Springsteen's second deviation from the E Street Band after Nebraska was Tunnel of Love. The album does feature some E Street members, but it started the lengthy break between The Boss and his band.
There are some really good songs, such as “Tougher Than the Rest,” which remains one of his best live songs, and “Brilliant Disguise.” The title track is another standout.
Tunnel of Love is stuck between Born in the U.S.A. (which came out three years prior) and what would come on albums like Human Touch and Lucky Town with its reliance on synthesizers and drum machines.
It's no secret that Springsteen is often better with the E Street Band. Tunnel of Love felt like a divorce between The Boss and his iconic backing group, giving it a tainted taste in retrospect.
9. The Rising (2002)
After a 15-year break, Springsteen and the E Street band marked their in-studio reunion with The Rising. They embarked on a reunion tour from 1999-2000, and their coming together proved anything is possible. It marked a hopeful return to form for the band.
That speaks to The Rising's overall motif. It was released in 2002, right on the heels of 9/11. Songs like “Lonesome Day,” which is one of the best songs Springsteen has written in the last three decades, drive that message home.
Hope continues to be a constant theme throughout the rest of the album. “Into the Fire,” “The Rising,” and “My City of Ruins” are some of the most important tracks he has written.
8. The Ghost of Tom Joad (1995)
A little over a decade after the acoustic Nebraska album came out, Bruce Springsteen tried to recapture that magic with The Ghost of Tom Joad, filled with more haunting characters and imagery.
It opens with the title track, which sounds like it could have been a holdover from Nebraska. Springsteen's finger-picking guitar riff sends chills down your spine. The song would be perfect for a narration of The Grapes of Wrath.
Early in his career, Springsteen was compared to Bob Dylan. They share some similarities, but The Ghost of Tom Joad is where Springsteen channels the ghosts, no pun intended, of Woody Guthrie and other folk legends as Dylan did early in his career.
7. Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. (1973)
If you want to make a splash upon your debut, Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J., is the way to do it. While it's not as refined as Springsteen's later albums, its rawness gives it a certain blue-collar feel.
Of course, Greetings from Asbury Park opens with “Blinded by the Light.” While it was later made famous by Manfred Mann's Earth Band, Springsteen's rendition remains the definitive one.
Its fast-paced nature earned Springsteen comparisons to Dylan. His infusion of jazz into rock and roll was brilliant from day one. He has continued to evolve with every album since.
Some of the other standouts include “Growing Up,” “Spirit in the Night,” and “Does This Bus Stop at 82nd Street?” These are songs that made Springsteen a must-see live act.
As far as debuts go, Greetings from Asbury Park is one of the best. It's a shame Springsteen didn't blow up in popularity after it. Granted, it all worked out.
6. The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle (1973)
While Greetings from Asbury Park, N.J. was a good start for The Boss, he continued to find his footing with his second album, The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle.
It opens with “The E Street Shuffle,” which shows off the title band's abilities. He follows that up with “4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy),” one of his signature ballads. Lyrically, it observes New Jersey's boardwalk culture, and musically, it transports you to the beaches of Asbury Park. It's a remarkable song, largely thanks to its instantly recognizable accordion part.
The second side of the album only features three tracks: “Incident on 57th Street,” “Rosalita (Come Out Tonight),” and “New York City Serenade.” All of them are over seven minutes long, which resembled the epic early performances by Springsteen and the E Street Band.
While The River would later try to recapture the band's live sound, The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle captured that in real-time, no trying required.
5. Nebraska (1982)
Deliver Me from Nowhere will depict Springsteen's recording of Nebraska, based on Warren Zanes' book of the same name. The story of the album's creation is fascinating, and we'll have to see if Scott Cooper effectively translates it to the big screen.
Nebraska is not Springsteen's most exciting album. It's remarkable how he went from rage-filled Darkness on the Edge of Town and the epic River to Nebraska.
Springsteen delivers Nebraska at a deliberate pace, opening with the title track. Its minimalistic arrangements allow Springsteen's lyrics to take center stage as he paints haunting imagery with his words. “State Trooper” is the best example of this, which Springsteen builds on the back of a basic blues riff.
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“Atlantic City” picks up the pace as the second track on the album. It flows seamlessly with “Mansion on the Hill.” The next track, “Johnny 99,” is an old-school rocker in an acoustic arrangement.
Overall, Nebraska is Springsteen's most raw work. He tried to recapture this magic with later albums like The Ghost of Tom Joad and Devils & Dust. However, nothing can beat the original. He was in a different place at the time, and it helped bring the best out of him.
4. Darkness on the Edge of Town (1978)
One thing is for sure: Bruce Springsteen does his best work with his back against the wall, as he showed with his 1978 album Darkness on the Edge of Town.
You can feel the animosity and rage in the album's opening track, “Badlands.” The song remains one of Bruce Springsteen's most exciting live songs, and it has retained the energy of the album version for decades.
That feeling continues in the second track, “Adam Raised a Cane.” While not one of my favorite tracks, it does send a strong message and may be the most angsty Springsteen has ever been.
Springsteen's storytelling abilities continued to evolve on the album as well. “Badlands” and “The Promised Land” paint haunting portraits of certain versions of the American Dream.
3. Born in the U.S.A. (1984)
Many misinterpret Born in the U.S.A.'s message. Some take it as a dig at America, while others see it as a full-fledged endorsement of it.
Politics aside, it's one of Springsteen's strongest works because it evolved some of the Nebraska demos into full-band songs. You could make the case that “Dancing in the Dark” is Springsteen's best song ever, and there are other standouts like “Glory Days,” which pokes fun at those who fixate on high school glory.
I also love how both sides of the album close out with a whisper. Side one concludes with “I'm on Fire,” a Johnny Cash-like ballad about lust. Side two ends with “My Hometown,” which transports listeners back to Springsteen's hometown somewhere in Jersey.
2. The River (1980)
Listening to The River, it becomes clear that Springsteen was recording it with the intention of bringing the energy of his live shows to the studio.
Sure, The River has some misses in its 20-song tracklist, but even something like “Crush on You” has its place in the canon of Springsteen's career.
The opening side of the double album is what cements its place in this Bruce Springsteen album ranking. “The Ties That Bind” is an infectiously addicting song, and it goes hand-in-hand with “Sherry Darling.”
I also believe “Two Hearts” is one of Springsteen's most underrated love songs. You may disregard the lyrics due to the song's fast-paced nature, but I love the thesis of “Two hearts are better than one.”
Then, you have side two, which opens with “Hungry Heart,” another one of his best songs. The second side of the album closes out with “The River,” a haunting portrait of two young working-class lovers in above their heads.
1. Born to Run (1975)
The number one spot on the list was a toss-up. Springsteen's Born to Run and The River are two of his best albums. What gave me a greater appreciation for Born to Run was reading Peter Ames Calin's Tonight in Jungleland: The Making of Born to Run.
There was so much pressure on The Boss, who was anything but that, after his first two albums. Columbia needed a hit record, and with his back against the wall, he created the epic “Born to Run” anthem that would define his career.
That isn't the only song of such scope. “Jungleland” is The Boss' “Scenes from an Italian Restaurant,” and “Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out” remains one of his best live tracks.
Born to Run is the album where the focus of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band's iconic sound takes shape. The Wild, the Innocent & the E Street Shuffle laid the foundation, but Born to Run takes it to a new level.
It narrowly edges out The River, a double album, because of its conciseness. The River masterfully brings the E Street Band's live sound to the studio, but Born to Run is nine songs and 39 minutes and 23 seconds of perfection. There are “no skips,” as the kids say.
