I can’t quite tell whether something about Bruce Springsteen’s look has fundamentally shifted, or if I’m just paying closer attention since he fried all my synapses by wearing a black dress shirt that I didn’t hate.
Either way, the Boss seems especially adept at getting a fit off recently, as exhibited most recently at the BFI London Film Festival, where he attended the premiere of Western Stars.
While greeting throngs of fans – more than a few of whom had vinyl copies of Born to Run in hand – Springsteen wore a black suit, a white shirt, and black boots. That’s all. No tie. No pocket square. No extraneous accessories of any kind. It’s a completely stripped-back look, and that’s what’s so great about it. Where so many elder statesmen of rock opt for sometimes-uncomfortable excess (see: Steven Tyler), Springsteen keeps it as simple as can be.
Now, let’s be real here: there are a couple places where this suited look could have gone from an object lesson in sartorial minimalism to one in transcendent tailoring in general. Basically, if Bruce had taken a quick trip to the tailor and brought up both the pants and the sleeves so they didn’t hang quite so long, that would have been great.
But sometimes life intervenes. Sometimes you just don’t have a spare moment to get those alterations done. And when that happens, you can do a whole lot worse than a clean black suit and a crisp white shirt. Bruce knows this. And so do you. Consider it, next time you suit up.
