Solo acoustic version. Sometimes I play this at parties. It's not a song you think of as being suited for acoustic styling, but Springsteen must have played it something like this when he first wrote it. Very important song!
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Story behind the song
Chords Used:
Intro/Theme/Outro - E, E7sus, A bar with open high b & e, A, B (X2)
Verses - E, A bar with open b&e, B bar with open b&e (X2)
A, AMaj7**, F#m, AMaj7, E, Bm,
A, AMaj7**, F#m, AMaj7, E, C#m, A, B (back to theme)
Middle - (Dsus, D, Dsus, D) Dsus, D, Dsus, D, Gsus, G, Gsus, G, Asus, A, Asus, A, Gsus, G, Gsus, G (X2)
Fsus, F, Fsus, F, C, Csus, C, Fsus, F, Fsus, F, Gsus, G, Gsus, G
Downward Progression* - Csus, Bsus, A#sus, Asus, G#sus, Gsus, F#sus, 1234 rest, back to verse... (All sus chords are suspended 4ths, played in bar formation with the 3rd and 4th strings depressed 2 frets up from the bar)
* As I recall, I decided to shorten this downward progression from the original recorded version, which I believe stepped all the way down in semi-tones to an Esus.
Easy to see that the song was written using electric guitar, employing a lot of up the neck bar chords, as evident in clips of Nils Lofgren performing live.
** Although most people use an AMaj7 here, I actually use an E6, which is very similar but with a B replacing A. I play it with 3 open strings and the 5th string depressed at the 4th fret and the 4th and 3rd strings depressed at the 6th fret.