With Bruce Springsteen’s iconic guitarist Little Steven Van Zandt having just wound up his first Australian tour upfront of his Disciples of Soul – and just weeks ahead of the release of their new album Summer Of Sorcery, we're goona take a look at the classic hit Little Steven wrote for our own Barnsey.
“Ride The Night Away” is one of the most memorable Jimmy Barnes solo hits – a thumping, freewheeling rocker with a big chorus. It featured on Jimmy’s massive 1985 For The Working Class Man album, and was the album’s third hit single, following “I’d Die To Be With You Tonight” and of course “Working Class Man”. But, oddly, no one at the time seemed to make much of the fact that the song was indeed co-written and given to Barnes by Steven Van Zandt, former guitarist for Bruce Springsteen & The E-Street Band.
Of course, the song itself remained somewhat in the shadow of the single that preceded it, and Van Zandt had just stepped away from his place beside the biggest rock artist in the world. But it would've made a great story then, just as it does now. And of course, the connection made sense. The song was a gift from one working-class soul fan to another, and Van Zandt was a man already known for his attempts to use his status to give like-minded artists a leg up.
Little Steven, or Miami Steve as he had earlier been called (because, legend has it, of all the poor New Jersey neighbourhood kids he hung out with, he was the only one who’d travelled as far as Miami!) had been Bruce Springsteen’s main rival on the Asbury Park scene in the late 60s. He conceded defeat and his hitched his wagon to the Boss Express in 1975, on the eve of Born To Run going ballistic. As well as being a guitarist and bandleader Steve was a great singer and songwriter, but he had no outlet to really do either as a member of the E-Street Band. So he gave his songs (and production skills) and used his status to elevate his old New Jersey compatriots, Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes.
The Jukes would release three albums with him at the helm in the 70s, from 1976’s I Don't Want to Go Home to 1978‘s Heart of Stone; and would be Van Zandt’s main songwriting outlet until he quit the E-Street Band in 1984. Eventually, he would form Little Steven & the Disciples of Soul, the band whose awe-inspiring soul power we’ve just been blessed with here in Australia. The Disciples of Soul originally lasted from 1982 to until 1990; they only achieved moderate success, but Australia, in particular, took a strong liking to Steve’s anti-apartheid anthem “Sun City”. Steve – Little Steven – would eventually rejoin the E-Street band when the Boss got the old gang together in 1995, and he’s been there ever since. He released the hard-rocking Born Again Savage in 1999 and started the acclaimed and influential radio show Little Steven’s Underground Garage, nurturing raw garage rock from around the world, in 2002. Since 2016 he’s found time to reconvene the Disciples of Soul to wonderful effect when not on-call for Bruce.
“Ride The Night Away” was passed to Barnes’ via his American A&R man in the form of a Dictaphone tape of Stevie bashing it out at home. The song was co-written by Steve Jordan, who would later play with Keith Richards & The X-Pensive Winos, who also featured guitarist Waddy Wachtel; before Jordan and Wachtel had joined Keith, Wachtel played guitar on For A Working Class Man.
For A Working Class Man and “Ride The Night Away”, of course, were massive hits here, but sadly failed to make an impact for Barnsey in the States. Van Zandt would remember the tune when he reconvened with Southside Johnny and gang, who included a great version of the song on their Van Zandt-produced album Better Days in 1991.
The Southside Johnny version featured driving Keith Richards style open-chorded riffing rhythm. Whether that was how it was originally envisioned, or if the inspiration came after Jordan’s involvement with Keith we’ll probably never know, but when Steve and Jimmy finally met in 2014, when Barnes opened for Bruce & The E-Streeters in Australia, they re-recorded it in that style. The new version was included on Jimmy’s 30:30 Hindsight album. Three years later Stevie would again revisit the song with the Disciples of Soul and include a similar version on their excellent 2017 comeback album Soul Fire.
"Ride The Night Away" is a great tune and there’s plenty of versions worth hearing so here they all for your bingeing pleasure!
Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes 1991
Jimmy Barnes & Little Steven Live in 2014
