Clarence Clemons is second only to Bruce Springsteen in the adoration of Springsteen’s fans. His ability to be the clown onstage with Springsteen was unmatched and it made going to a Springsteen concert a lot of fun. I think for many of us it also represented a color-blind world that we wished ours was more like.

I’ve been sitting here listening to everyone talk about Clarence and staring at that photo of the two of us right there.  It’s a picture of Scooter and The Big Man, people who we were sometimes.  As you can see in this particular photo, Clarence is admiring his muscles and I’m pretending to be nonchalant while leaning upon him.  I leaned on Clarence a lot; I made a career out of it in some ways.

– Springsteenin his eulogy of Clarence Clemons, 2011

In his quirky autobiography, Big Man, Clemons and his close friend Don Reo go over Clemons’ life and come away with some stories that filled in some of the gaps in his life, but also left me scratching my head at times. I confess to searching the internet trying to come up with any proof that Springsteen and Clemons once did give Hideki Matsui a ride from Boston to the Bronx and came up empty. Parts of the story were confirmed, but Matsui’s presence was not. Is it real? Is it imagination?

Really, it’s anyone’s guess. Matsui isn’t talking.

And that’s the promise for the entire book. Clarence’s stories have enough truth in them that I couldn’t tell where reality ended and a story began. His early years before meeting Springsteen ring true enough, as a big black man in a world that was generally afraid of him. He had a soft heart, though, and a talent he discovered when he picked up the saxophone. He tells about the life-changing moment when he met Bruce Springsteen, and the pain it caused him when Springsteen cast The E Street Band aside to try something different for a while.

As a young child my son Sam became enchanted with the Big Man… no surprise.  To a child Clarence was a towering fairy tale figure, out of some very exotic storybook.  He was a dreadlocked giant, with great hands and a deep mellifluous voice sugared with kindness and regard.  And… to Sammy, who was just a little white boy, he was deeply and mysteriously black.  In Sammy’s eyes, “C” must have appeared as all of the African continent, shot through with American cool, rolled into one welcoming and loving figure.  So… Sammy decided to pass on my work shirts and became fascinated by Clarence’s suits and his royal robes.  He declined a seat in dad’s van and opted for “C’s” stretch limousine, sitting by his side on the slow cruise to the show.  He decided dinner in front of the hometown locker just wouldn’t do, and he’d saunter up the hall and disappear into the Temple of Soul.

– Springsteenin his eulogy of Clarence Clemons, 2011

However, his body was beginning to betray him when Bruce got the band back together. Much of the book deals with what it took to get Clemons on stage for those epic performances. It took a miracle to get him onstage for that Superbowl half-time performance. Clarence and those around him made that miracle happen, but it cost him.

As much as he can be, Clemons is honest about his foibles in life. He wasn’t always a good spouse or father. His affection for his nephew, Jake, is palpable as he talks about seeing him perform in Central Park at a time when he didn’t know that Jake would replace him in The E Street Band. 

Don Reo’s contribution is substantial, and sometimes too much so. I really had no clue who he was when reading Big Man, even with all of his name-dropping. He confirms some of the stories Clemons tells, and adds his own. When he’s writing about his experiences with Clemons and Springsteen, it’s interesting. When he’s off on his own tangent, I found myself taking a break from reading. It wasn’t what I wanted to read at the time. I wanted to learn more about the man who seemed to be the partner in crime to an artist I greatly revere. I did get that, to some extent, but the mysticism is still there. Clemons tells some, but he doesn’t tell all.

I did come away from Big Man with a better picture of the man, the myth, and the legend that is Clarence Clemons, but it was far from a complete picture. I recommend it with a caveat much like the beginning of the book mentions that not all you’ll read is true. What you take away from the story is what you’ll believe with your heart and not your head, especially if you’re a Springsteen fan.

SO LADIES AND GENTLEMAN… ALWAYS LAST, BUT NEVER LEAST.  LET’S HEAR IT FOR THE MASTER OF DISASTER, the BIG KAHUNA, the MAN WITH A PHD IN SAXUAL HEALING, the DUKE OF PADUCAH, the KING OF THE WORLD, LOOK OUT OBAMA! THE NEXT BLACK PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES EVEN THOUGH HE’S DEAD… YOU WISH YOU COULD BE LIKE HIM BUT YOU CAN’T!   LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, THE BIGGEST MAN YOU’VE EVER SEEN!… GIVE ME A C-L-A-R-E-N-C-E.  WHAT’S THAT SPELL? CLARENCE! WHAT’S THAT SPELL? CLARENCE! WHAT’S THAT SPELL? CLARENCE! … amen.

– Springsteenin his eulogy of Clarence Clemons, 2011