I was just reading a review of the new Bruce Springsteen album, and I can’t even be bothered to recall the name of it. At one point it noted that he has released something like five albums in the last six years. Age certainly hasn’t slowed him. Springsteen took some long sabbaticals earlier in his career, but it’s never been in doubt that he’s one of the hardest working genii in rock. Still, he’s on a remarkably productive streak and I haven’t paid the slightest attention to it beyond dutifully listening to a promo single here and there and not giving it a second thought. I felt almost a civic duty to investigate The Rising. If any pop artist could help us deal with the trauma of 9/11, Springsteen seemed the most likely to be up to that impossible task. Still, I never really got around to it.

This would all be understandable and unremarkable if I wasn’t a fan of Springsteen. That’s not the case, however. I’m a relatively big fan of the Boss. Relative, because I don’t hold a candle to the entire state of New Jersey and an international following that exalts him with godlike devotion. Still, among my set of friends who are all at least latent music geeks, Springsteen doesn’t get the kind of play another legend like, say, David Bowie does.

I find myself in the position of having to urge friends of mine to spend some time with one of the most popular musicians of the twentieth century, which is kind of weird, but that’s one of the ways I spend my time. In these drunken moments, I can get quite passionate, which makes me know that there is a spot in my soul that loves it some Springsteen. Darkness on the Edge of Town, Born To Run, and Tunnel of Love all have their own spot in my psyche.

Born in the USA isn’t my favorite, but for a mid-80s blockbuster, damn does it have some nice songs. “I’m on Fire”? “Dancing in the Dark”? Are you kidding me? No wonder this went diamond, and it’s pretty amazing that I consider that one of his lesser albums of the time. I also don’t have a special spot in my heart for Nebraska, even though I’m supposed to if I want to keep some indie rock credibility. But I do think that album is great, not to mention bold and impressive that such a god would expose himself with an album full of depressive, minimal demos heavily influenced by fellow American mythmaker Terrence Malick. It’s also the least sensationalist concept album about a murder spree ever. Damn, wait…I do have a special place in my heart for Nebraska. Take that, imaginary indie rock tribunal!

One of my favorite movies is High Fidelity. It’s up there with Annie Hall and All the Real Girls in the field of romantic comedies I can actually stomach, be amused by, and relate to (yeah, I do think All the Real Girls is pretty funny). I have noticed that High Fidelity, adapted by music geek John Cusack from the novel by music geek Nick Hornby, seems to touch music geeks more than it does, you know, normal functional humans. Part of this appeal is the detail and truth that penetrates the movie, where pop culture shorthand evokes very real emotion. Reeling from a breakup, Cusack’s protagonist puts Springsteen’s The River on his turntable. I completely get that, and it breaks my heart.

That movie also has a comic incident where Jack Black (who became a star with his perfect performance embodying the asshole record store clerk archetype) sadistically rips into a nice middle-aged guy who just wants to buy a schmaltzy ’80s Stevie Wonder hit for his daughter. Cusack criticizes him for being an asshole, but Black takes it as an opportunity to spark another pop debate…how to deal with artists who keep making music after making some of the best music ever? “Is it better to burn out or fade away?”

Springsteen’s post-classic period is far less egregiously wack than Wonder’s (although Wonder has done a few things after the ’70s that remain under-rated). From what people tell me and what I’ve heard, Springsteen’s post-’80s output is pretty solid, with a legitimate masterpiece hidden here and there. Just because he made some of the most beloved albums to me, what keeps me from listening to him do stuff that’s merely good? I certainly subject my earlobes to much worse music on the regular. I probably would be listening to everything he did if he didn’t share a name with a legend called “Bruce Springsteen.” If he was a new quantity with a name like, I don’t know, “The Hold Steady,” I might even be lining up to praise his recent albums as “Springsteenesque.”

So why do I pathologically resist paying attention to new Springsteen? It reveals something not so great about my own tastes and habits that might apply to a few others. As much as I’d like to pretend my music habit is something completely pure and sacred, balding bearded music geeks aren’t entirely unlike pre-pubescent girls in our temporal tastes. We have a whorish thirst for the new, even if the old favorites are working their ass off to enrich our lives. Just like Zac Efron’s fans are going to actually be attending high school and into something completely different in five years, I will have abandoned some of my current idols like I have Springsteen.

Springsteen’s just an example. The paragraphs spewed above are but a distillation of my slurred drunken love for the Boss in a certain mood. This also applies to U2, Public Enemy, REM, Elvis Costello and countless others. What makes me stop caring, and stop listening? There’s a kind of inertia and exhaustion where artists have a finite number of albums that change my life. After that the question becomes “Is this as good as Darkness on the Edge of Town, Achtung Baby, Fear of a Black Planet, Automatic for the People, or Armed Forces?” Regardless of how good something might be, if it isn’t a timeless masterpiece, I don’t have the time and I’m going for something newer and younger (and probably not as good).

Where does it happen? That’s a good topic for debate. Personally, with Springsteen, it happens when he takes a break and comes back with Human Touch and Lucky Town. Pretty good albums, but its a new decade and hip hop is undeniably better and more vital than even the best rock has to offer. All the mournful movie synth ballads in Philadelphia can’t bring me back. With my favorite band ever, Pink Floyd, I will not listen to a note of their post-Waters period. Sure, David Gilmour, Nick Mason, and the late Richard Wright are still amazing musicians, but they’re not going to build another The Wall. There is a wonderful quality control in my nostalgic brain if I consider the masterful The Final Cut to be, you know, their final cut.

There are loopholes, but pop stardom seems to have a shelf-life. Re-invention helps. U2 reached a pinnacle of spiritual arena rock in the ’80s, then went experimental and ironic and did their best work in the ’90s, but how interested has anybody really been in their calculated commercial return to messianic conservative songcraft in the aughts? I blogged about my first impressions of the new one and recall being fairly entertained, but haven’t cared enough to revisit it. Has anybody sincerely listened to any of Bowie’s work from the last twenty years?

You could go the Scott Walker route, and follow up pop stardom with strange, adventurous work and then turn into a one album per decade hermit when folks get used to that. I still listen to everything he does, but that requires so much restraint and patience. Al Green presents another tactic to avoid this disinterest. He abandoned pop at his peak and spent a few decades in the deep forest of gospel and the priesthood. His return to secular music yielded some very worthwhile Willie Mitchell collaborations and last year’s ?uestlove helmed classic Lay It Down.

Even that is a lot of work, and probably not worth it just to catch the attention of lonely bloggers. Ultimately, I believe this is more my problem than that of iconic millionaire musicians. Springsteen gets the Super Bowl, so he can probably deal with my lack of interest in his latest release.