Hold Steady being held up to Springsteen

The Hold Steady's third record, "Boys and Girls in America," takes its title from a remark by narrator Sal Paradise in "On the Road," the Beat classic by Jack Kerouac, which singer Craig Finn re-read last year while on tour.

"Boys and girls in America have such a sad time together," Paradise observes.

"That was one of the funniest lines, and I remember seeing it and saying, 'That's my next record,' " Finn says from New York, where the Brooklyn band hails.

"In the context, it's funny because he's trying to make out with this girl that he met, like, 20 seconds earlier. And she says no, and he's all, 'Boys and girls in America have such a sad time together.' "

The rest of the quote, though, is the spiritual backbone of the album, out recently on Vagrant: "Sophistication demands that they submit to sex immediately without proper preliminary talk," Paradise says. "Not courting talk — real straight talk about souls, for life is holy and every moment is precious."

"That's exactly what the record is about," Finn says. "And you know, it's also about the concept of love. There are a million songs in popular music about love — it's not exactly the most original topic. But love is this kind of weird thing where the older you get, it seems like it's the one thing you don't get any wiser about. It's still as much a mystery when you're 35 as it is when you're 15."

Finn balances such philosophical underpinnings with vivid characters and gritty scenes he drew from his own experiences, and his witty, literate lyrical wordplay is matched by the tightest, most collaborative musical arrangements the band has created so far. There's more interplay between guitar and piano, and it's held together by rock-solid drumming.

Music preview


The Hold Steady, Sean Na Na, Neutral Boy, 9 p.m. Saturday, Crocodile Cafe, 2200 Second Ave., Seattle; $12 in advance, $14 day of show

(21-and-up; tickets at Sonic Boom locations or www.ticketweb.com; information, 206-441-5611 or www.thecrocodile.com).

"Everybody was a lot more involved in that process, which I think helped," guitarist Tad Kubler says. "And Craig had been writing a lot on all the tours we had been on, so he had a real cohesive idea of the narrative thread he wanted to have for the record and ... because there were lyrics already available, I think it really influenced the music a lot."

Finn also sings on the record, which is a change from the band's first two albums: He mostly talked his way through 2004's "The Hold Steady Almost Killed Me" and last year's "Separation Sunday."

Not only does singing better complement the music, he says, it helps give listeners a point of reference.

"I want people to remember this stuff, and the thing is not only singing, but having repetitive choruses," Finn said. "Things like that allow people to maybe latch on in a way."

The depth of songwriting and romanticized vision of young adulthood on "Boys and Girls in America" have already earned the record comparisons to another coming-of-age record: Bruce Springsteen's "Born To Run," an association the Hold Steady finds flattering.

"Can you be in better company than Springsteen? I don't think so," Kubler says.